316 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Sepr., 1901. 
Poultry. 
DO POULTRY PAY? 
By JAMES TROW, Rocklea. 
This is a question often asked. After fourteen years’ practical experience 
I can assert that it pays anyone to keep poultry on a small scale for eggs alone, 
but a good many who keep fowls for profit give them up after a little time, 
for the simple reason that they jump to conclusions and purchase a few fowls 
of any age and of any kind, dump them down in their backyard or poultry 
run, and then expect them to do all the rest. It is not absolutely necessary 
to get pure stock to start with: a few crossbreds (first crosses) of Minoreas, 
Hamburegs, Leghorns, Wyandottes, or Andalusians are about the best crosses 
for egg production. One hears a good deal about one breed being better than 
another as winter layers. eed your fowls properly and they all will lay 
nearly as well in winter as in summer. But some say: How is it that eggs 
are dearer in winter? The reason is, that the fowls are fed principally on 
maize all the year round. In the spring and summer they pick up a good 
deal of animal food, such as worms and grubs, and also green food, all of which 
go to make a variety. In winter there is little for them to pick up, therefore 
the want must be supplied with something as nearly allied as possible to the 
summer food, and that something is a little cooked meat. I have found a 
little raw meat, about two or three times per week, to be avery good thing 
for the birds, but some feed raw meat at all times with no bad results. It may 
be objected that meat is too dear to feed fowls upon; true, if you buy prime 
joints, but you can always purchase liver cheap enough. My plan of feeding 
my fowls has been for years to give crushed wheat in which I put a little salt. 
I scald the wheat on previous night and make it into a stiff dough with pollard 
and bonemeal for the morning meal, with whole wheat at night. In the 
winter months I add a few chillies when scalding the crushed wheat, and 
feed in the morning in the same way as in summer, giving a little meat and 
green feed during the day, whole maize occasionally, and sometimes whole wheat. 
Jf the weather is mild I always manage to keep up a good supply of eggs all 
the year round, and also have plenty of broody hens to sit during the winter. 
Some think eggs at 1s. 6d. per dozen are too dear to set. This is a mistake, 
for the resulting young cockerels will be in their prime at Christmas and some 
of the pullets will be laying when eggs are bringing a good price. The chicks 
hatched in June especially are more vigorous, and you miss the thousand-and- 
one ills which summer and late-hatched chicks are subject to, as they are 
nearly full grown before these diseases appear. Consequently, what you think 
you lose in one way you gain by 5 per cent. in the other. I have set hens 
all the year round, and find that chicks hatched between the months of April 
and August, but not later than September, turn out well; but the best results 
are from those hatched between May and July. At present I have several 
broods looking the picture of health, also several hens sitting. I find it just as 
easy to rear chicks during the winter months, adopting the most primitive 
methods (beer cases with wire-netting), as I do at any other time. I condemn 
summer hatching as productive of all diseases incidental to poultry. After 
three years’ experiments with forty hens, I can give what I think will be 
conclusive proof to our farmers that a few hens well looked after will pay well, 
but large numbers will not pay so well pro ratd, and it is here where beginners 
make a mistake, as I will try to show. My returns for three years from 1898 
were three eggs per week per hen, total for the year 6,240, for which I got 8d. 
per dozen all round from 1st May, 1898, to lst May, 1899. 
