PROFITABLE EGG FARMING. 
all the run possible, cooping out on grass 
fields after haying. If this is not possible, do 
the best you can, supplying green food and not 
raising too many birds. When the cockerels are 
half grown, remove them to some other yard, 
giving their room to the pullets. 
The most important prerequisite to success is 
birds with the winter laying habit. By giving 
the right care, you can do much with any birds 
to increase the winter egg yield, but good solid 
success only comes when you have good working 
birds to use. Bv selecting the best layers to 
breed from each year, you can build up a pro¬ 
lific strain. Buying a male bird of known pedi¬ 
gree for winter laying, and mating him with the 
best hens you will hasten the time when you 
will be getting good results. 
In the long run, it pays to start as soon as 
you can, with birds that have fixed in them the 
laying habit. If you have no such birds, be on 
the lookout for eggs or stock from prolific layers. 
No matter what birds you prefer or need for 
your special purpose, you will find that there is a 
wide difference in the laying on various poultry 
plants. It is not always the ordinary bird that 
does the extraordinary laying. On the con¬ 
trary, we find today many prolific layers that 
are high scorers. Fancy breeders are giving 
more attention than ever before to attaining 
utility as well as show points. Blood does tell 
in a hen, as well as in a horse or cow. Build up 
an egg strain, and in time you will get j*our re¬ 
ward. 
Whatever the condition of the birds you may 
have to depend upon for your winter layers, 
much can be done to get the best results. Get 
the pullets into their winter quarters early. 
This enables them to settle down and become at 
home. Have the house well whitewashed, and 
free from red mites. Clean up all floors and 
windows. Dust every bird with some good in¬ 
sect powder, and repeat in two weeks. In car¬ 
ing for the birds, be quiet as possible, making no 
motion that they consider to mean danger to 
them. By all means keep the dog out of the 
house and yard. 
The house should be water tight, with no 
cracks to let a current of cold air onto the birds. 
The open front scratching shed house has helped 
solve to a large extent the keeping of healthy 
stock, and the getting of eggs in the off season 
of the year. The hens are so warmly clad that 
they will stand a low temperture, provided they 
receive proper food and are obliged to scratch 
for their grain. The trouble from the old time 
house was danger from extremes of temperature. 
The tight house would warm at midday to SO or 
90 degrees and cool down to 10 or 20 degrees at 
night. Hens well fed and kept busy will pay 
little attention to freezing weather. 
Scratching material must be furnished with 
free hand. This may be cheap hay, straw, 
leaves, or corn fodder. It will need little cutting 
as the birds will soon work it up fine enough if 
fed their grain in it. Clean water and sharp 
grit must always be within reach. To depend, 
even partially, on snow and gravel, is to take 
serious chances of failure. 
Feeding the mash in the morning give only 
what the birds will eat at once, keeping them in 
a condition to be willing to hunt in the litter for 
stray grain. At noon a light feed of grain or 
barley is scattered in the straw, and the hens 
scratch, sing and lay. The busy hen is the busi¬ 
ness hen. 
The supper should be a full feed of wheat or 
corn. Too many farmers depend upon corn and 
corn meal for poultry food. Corn is the most 
unbalanced grain we have in use. If not sure 
how to feed it, err by using little of it. 
When using the mash suggested above don’t 
give green bone. If you wish to use cut bone, 
feed it twice a week, at noon, giving what the 
birds will eat quickly, having omitted from that 
morning’s mash all animal food. Cut clover 
may be fed in the mash or by itself. 
Be quick to notice anything wrong about the 
birds. Know your best layers and hatch from 
them each spring. Of their chicks mark those 
that mature early and prove prolific layers. In 
buying fresh blood see that you get birds or eggs 
from good layers. It is not necessary to use 
crosses to get good layers. In fact, the thorough¬ 
breds have got ahead of the old barnyard fowl or 
cross. In the cold North, I should prefer to 
take my chances of success with the medium¬ 
sized birds, such as Wyandottes or Plymouth 
Rocks. Whatever breed you keep, do not be 
satisfied until you have as good a winter egg 
record as has been recorded for the variety. 
There is a pleasure in getting eggs when they 
are high in price, not only for the cash they 
bring, but also for the satisfaction that comes 
from succeeding in what we try to accomplish. 
The foundation upon which to build the success¬ 
ful poultry plant is winter eggs. 
Dr. N. W. Sanborn*, 
In “ Farm Poultry. ” 
58 
