Poultry Raising. 
5 
ence to those that may follow, will mean many unnecessary steps, 
discomfort and dissatisfaction. Lay out your plant as though you 
expected at some future time to have your entire farm, whether large 
or small, devoted to poultry. Whether you expand to such propor¬ 
tions or not, if you have planned wisely, you will be saved much an¬ 
noyance and labor and your work will be better done. 
Cost of Land .—How much to pay for land must depend largely 
upon the object in mind in engaging in poultry raising. 
If the intention is to supply both poultry and eggs to the consumer, 
thus necessitating weekly or semi-weekly trips, it would be advisable 
to pay more for land in order to get nearer to market, and use less 
acreage. Time is money, and long drives take time. On the other 
hand if the intention is to wholesale the products, and make eggs the 
orimary object, or perhaps to employ the colony system of housing, 
it would be advisable to buy cheaper land farther from market and 
ship the products by train. With daily mails, telephones and fast 
trains, one can easily keep in touch with the markets ; and while the 
prices received would be less than in retailing, the cost of production 
and delivery would also tie less, and the net profit would perhaps be 
about the same. 
BREEDS. 
We have no space to take up the history of our various breeds. 
We wish to aid the beginner to choose the right breed of fowls for his 
or her special purpose, and from a commercial standpoint the choice 
necessarily falls upon the so-called “general-purpose" fowls, com¬ 
monly classified as the American breeds, or upon the so-called “egg 
breeds’’—the Mediterraneans and other smaller fowls. 
General Purpose Breeds .—Under this head will come the different 
varieties of Plymouth Rocks, the Wyandottes, the Rhode Island Reds, 
and the Orpingtons. These breeds are spoken of as “general pur¬ 
pose’’ because they answer the call for a fowl which will give the 
owner an early broiler, a plump, good-sized roaster, and also a goodly 
number of eggs in the course of a year. Where the intention is to furnish 
both eggs and fowls for the market, and especially where one can 
sell directly to the consumer, no mistake can be made in selecting 
any variety of any of these breeds. Perhaps the variety chosen 
should be the one most nearly pleasing the fancy of the individual. 
Egg Breeds .—Almost invariably where “eggs for the market" 
is the principal object of the poultryman, one of the smaller breeds is 
chosen, and usually the Single Comb White Leghorn is the variety. 
Often where the object is “eggs and broilers" the same variety is 
chosen, as the chicks come to broiler size, one to one and a half 
pounds, nearly as quickly as the larger breeds. 
