IC-NRLF

SB 33

CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

WRITTEN TO TEACH BETTER POULTRY METHODS
OS THE FARM. BY SUSAN SWAYSGOOD

P R K E I E Y^\

j LIBRARY

! UNIVERSITY OF j
\CALIFORNIA/

\

MRS. SUSAN SWAYSGOOD

LI

California
Poultry Practice

BEING

Plain Hints for Beginners in* the Rearing,
Housing, Feeding, Protecting from Pests and
Diseases and Marketing of Poultry Products

BY

SUSAN SWAYSGOOD

Special Contributor on Poultry Topics of the
Pacific Rural Press

PACIFIC RURAL PRESS

SAN FRANCISCO
1915

RESERVATION

OPY ADDED
)R1GINALTOBE

DETAINED
30

COPYRIGHT, 1914

BY
PACIFIC RURAL PRESS

GIFT

PREFACE

t

This book is not an accident; it is born of a desire to help others
to avoid the stumbling blocks in the poultry business and at the request
of many readers of The Pacific Rural Press, and other papers.

With forty-five years of experience with poultry it is to be expected
that I have .learned a few things about it; it's a poor business that does
not teach lessons in that length of time. Don't you think so?

There are books, yes, books without number, on poultry matters,
but many of them are mostly theory. This book tells you just what
I have done and how I would do it.

It is a book of action, and it is action that counts these days. We
have to act in the living present if we want to live. I want to live
and I want others to live, too, and as I have learned these things by
experience it is fitting that I should tell others how to obtain results
without paying such a big price for the experience.

The things told ytou in this book are original, unorthodox, but
strictly practical; and if you will read and then heed, you will be well
satisfied that the author has given you your money's worth. California
is an Empire in itself, and I am sure there are enough men and women
engaged in the poultry business, or wanting to get into it to call for a
million copies of this book, though its only claim is that it is needed.

Yours for better and more poultry,

SUSAN SWAYSGOOD.

521

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Mrs. Susan Swaysgood.

Partial Open Front Poultry House.

Open Front House with Wire Netting.

Double Poultry House.

Poultry in Orchard and Colony Houses.

Glimpse of Petaluma Poultry Section.

A Stockton Poultry Yard.

Typical California Leghorn Ranch.

Poultry Ranch and Colony Houses.

A Breeding Pen of Pekin Ducks.

Merced County Band of Turkeys.

CONTENTS

Chapter.

I Some of the Advantages of California Poultry Raising.

II When and How to Start in the Poultry Business.

III Location.

IV The Colony Plan.

V Open Front Houses.

VI Large and Small Plants for Eggs.

VII The Care and Management of Eggs.

VIII How to Build an Incubator Cellar.

IX How to Run the Incubator.

X Raising the Chicks.

XI Why Chicks Die in the Shell.

XII A Few Don'ts in Raising Chicks.

XIII Brooders and Brooding Systems.

XIV The Building of Brooder Houses.
XV Poultry Appliances.

XVI Raising Broilers.

XVII Feeding for Eggs.

XVIII Balanced Rations, What Are They?

XIX Feeding the Breeders.

XX Fattening and Preparing Fowls for Market.

XXI Balanced Ration for Heavy Breeds.

XXII The Mold that Injures Poultry.

XXIII Egg Foods, or Condition Powders.

XXIV The Value of Milk in the Poultry Yard.

XXV The Management of Poultry During the Summer.

XXVI The Molt in California.

XXVII The General Purpose Fowl.

XXVIII Capons.

XXIX Prepotency and Prolificacy.

XXX The Mediterranean Class.

XXXI The American Class.

XXXII The French Breeds.

XXXIII The Asiatic Class.

6 CONTENTS

XXXIV The English Class.

XXXV Games and Orientals.

XXXVI Duck Culture in California.

XXXVII Turkeys in California.

XXXVIII Raising Geese Profitable.

XXXIX Pigeons for Profit and Pleasure.

XL Poultry Diseases and Their Remedies.

XLI Parasites Affecting Poultry and Methods of Extermination.

XLII Secrets of the Show Birds' Toilet.

XLIII Killing Poultry.

XLIV What Los Angeles Poultrymen Have Accomplished by

Co-operation.

XLV Preserving Eggs.

California Poultry Practice

CHAPTER I

SOME OF THE ADVANTAGES OF CALIFORNIA IN POULTRY

RAISING

Climate. — First of all, the advantage is our unsurpassed climate,
where chickens can forage outdoors every day in the year without any
inconvenience whatever. Here we can raise the best specimens of all
breeds outdoors. Breeds that require a long season to make their
growth have no trouble to make it withotit being put in houses at all,
except as chicks.

The very cheapest of poultry houses can be used with comfort to
both hens and attendant. A good roof constitutes the making of a
good poultry house, as the rest is a small item.

Goad Markets. — Very few places, except the vicinities of New York
City or Boston, have such good markets for all poultry products as we
have in all parts of the State. Good railroad facilities carry the
product to the cities. A growing country can always be depended on
for good markets; the Pacific Coast, at least the California part of it,
has just commenced to have growing pains, and these will continue
for many years yet. All the cities are growing faster than all the
rest of the United States and there is a reason for it. Men are getting
tired of buffeting blizzards in winter and falling down with heat
prostration in summer. They are looking towards California for a
haven they can call home.

Continuous Green Feed. — In the eastern poultry papers we read of
experiments with silos for storing poultry feed for winter, and cellars
for oat sprouters. All these things cost money and labor and without
doubt they are all necessary adjuncts of an eastern poultry plant, but
not in this State. All the year around we can go out in the garden and
get our green succulent feed for the hens; all the year around the
'hens can be turned out on the alfalfa to pick their own green feed.
Only those who have lived in a cold climate can appreciate what this
means to a poultryman, both as regards the cost of feed for the winter
months and the amount of labor necessary to provide something of a
succulent nature for the winter months.

8 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

In California Grains Sprout Without Artificial Heat.— The oat
sprouter thiat must be bought, or made, to sprout. oats in the cellar is
advertised in all poultry journals, and varies in prices from a few dollars
to fifty. Then the cellar room must be provided and room to store the
oats. Then, too, there is a lamp to fill and trim, oil to buy, and last
but not least, is the danger from the lamp. Besides this there is the
labor, from all of which we are relieved by our mild climate.

Health. — But aside from all these things the greatest advantage we
have over other States is the healthfulness of the occupation. Even
delicate women who have never been able to do outdoor work of any
kind, will, after being in California a s'hort time, undertake to do the
work of a poultry ranch here. This is certainly one advantage we are
proud of and justly so, because poultry raising is essentially a woman's
business. Some of the largest poultry ranches in the State are owned
and run by women who do practically all their own work.

No Danger of Overdoing. — There are no indications at present that
the poultry business wifil ever be overdone in this State. The people
are nocking in and as neighborhoods get more thickly settled more
stringent sanitary laws will be imposed on those who keep poultry
inside city limits, and this will force out large numbers who are too
indifferent and careless to obey the law, and the poultry and egg supply
will have to be produced in the small country places.

CHAPTER II

WHEN AND HOW TO START IN THE POULTRY BUSINESS

This is, perhaps, the one question that is asked more frequently
than any other; and it is perhaps the hardest to answer. It is hard to
answer because the person asked does not 'have an inside knowledge of
the inquirer's financial status, nor his natural assets of grit, sticktoit-
iveness and adaptability.

If a man is well fixed financially he can afford to experiment, other-
wise he wants to know what he is doing before he experiments. And
to start in any business without a fair understanding of the principles
is to court failure. The time has passed when any old failure can take
up the poultry business and make any kind of success without under-
standing something about it. But in a general way it is possible to
advise as to when and how to start to be^st advantage.

In the fall of the year, if a house and yard is ready, is really the
best time to start with hens. If finances are low so that hens cannot
be purchased, then wait until spring and buy either baby chicks or eggs
for setting. Very often a second-hand incubator can be bought for the
price of a few hens, in which case the start can be made with a very
smiall sum of ready cash.

If the start is made with hens it is well to know just what variety
or breed you want to raise, then get some good poultry or agricultural
paper and study its columns for advertisers that have the breeds you
want. Buy good stock if possible, as half a dozen good hens will give
more satisfaction than double the number of poor ones.

During the winter months there is time to study the habits and good
qualities of the little flock and to prepare to venture farther, if things
are satisfactory. If they are not, and the beginner finds that poultry
does not have the attraction for him he had been led to believe it
would, he can drop out with no great loss of either time or money. On
the other hand if the beginner finds he is suited, he can during the
winter months prepare to enlarge his flock and take care of it.

The one great mistake that most people make is to try to raise more
chicks than they have room for. Some even try to raise more than
they can feed, and both of these are serious mistakes, for they usually
end in disaster. Growing chicks need lots of room and an abundance
of good wholesome food if they are to give good results for the care.
So whatever else you do — do not go deeper than you can see the way
clear, for to go beyond your depth is to get discouraged and lose
your grip.

10 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

A man that starts small and works his way slowly will know how
he got there, in other words, he will know w'hat to avoid and what to
do for the best results at little expense.

The poultry business is like all otiher kinds of business in that it
must be conducted economically if there is to be any profit. The
profit escapes in little leaks that are not noticed unless a person is
watching for them. There are just lots of people that have started in
with a few hens and by diligence and perseverance worked up quite
a 1'arge poultry plant, at the same time making a comfortable living for
themselves and family and even having a bank account, something they
never had before.

And what one man has done another can do if he possesses the
qualities that will 'help him to hold on, and while waiting for his
chickens to grow, makes every effort to help them. Such a man or
woman need not hesitate to venture into the poultry business, for suc-
cess awaits every one who has grit and hustle.

CHAPTER III

LOCATION

Every business is a bigger success when it is in the right location.
In the poultry business location means several things in one. For
instance, it must include nearness to market for the product, nearness
to food supplies, to water; then the quality of land must be considered.
As to the land, la rather light friable soil is the best for poultry, because
it 'has plenty of drainage for water. All fowls do better on well drained
land than on wet, swampy land, where they must wade through water
during the rainy seasons.

If the beginner must buy a place it is much better to take these
things into consideration before than after. As for sunshine, there are
very few places in California where there is not an abundance of it and
to spare.

But right here let me say that the most ideal poultry ranch is one
that is combined with a prune or plum orchard. There is no other
fruit that responds so well to poultry droppings; besides the hens keep
the trees free from many insect pests and furnish ideal conditions for
the full maturing of the fruit, while the hens in turn are benefited by
the shade and insect life found in the ground or on the trees.

A five acre prune orchard and two thousand c'hicken's will support
in comfort and give many of the luxuries of life for the average family
of today. True, the green feed would 'have to be grown outside of
the five acres, but a good sized oat sprouter would supply that and it
could be placed in an old hen house.

This would be rather intensive poultry raising and would require
good sanitation, but all the care given in that respect would pay both
in prunes and poultry, so that it would work both ways.

Location very properly includes nearness to market, and constant
knowledge of what the market demands. And these things are among
the most vital if you are going to depend on poultry for a living.
Getting your product to market at as low a cost as possible, and your
feed the same, makes all the difference between profits and loss. The
wise man looks up the market situation first, then chooses his location.

CHAPTER IV

THE COLONY PLAN

This is really the most economical way of running a poultry plant
and orchard combined. To save yourself worry and loss it will be
cheaper to fence the land at the start. Redwood posts cost a trifle
more at first but save later on because they last a long time. Put a five-
foot wire fence of two-inch mesh and a couple of strands of barb wire
on top and you have a fence that will keep out all animal marauders,
and chicken thieves will fight shy of it. All 'houses for the colony
system should be built on runners, so that they may be hauled around
by horse power. In summer they can be taken to the farthermost
points of the land, and when fall comes haul them closer in for the
winter. This need not be such a big haul, either, because if the houses
are placed in line in the first place, and moved every few days just
their own length, they are on new, clean ground all the time, saving
the labor of cleaning out and gradually coming into winter quarters.
As the houses are moved, the cultivator can be run over the ground,
mixing the droppings with mother earth so that the land is getting its
full share of the elements for nourishment in the best possible form,
for by being mixed with the dry earth at once there is very little loss
in the droppings.

The Houses. — All houses intended for colony plant should be built
on runners, as before stated, and if both ends are shaped like sled
runners the houses can be moved either way without twisting and
turning, as is the case when only one end of the runners are shaped
sled fashion. This appears a simple thing, but it saves most of the
wear on houses. The houses should not be of very heavy material, and
yet heavy enough to stand a storm without danger of blowing over.
The ideal colony house should hold fifty or sixty Leghorns or Min-
orcas, and from thirty-five to forty of any of the large breeds.

It should be open front and built of material suitable to its location.
In the northern part of this State we used to build the walls of sawed
shakes, lapped over like shingles; the roof was also of shakes, but laid
on a little differently. These made light, portable houses, that were
rain proof, wind proof and when painted or whitewashed, very re-
spectable looking. But shakes are now as high as lumber, and paper
appears to be in more demand for light houses. A Riverside poultry-
man, who keeps several thousand hens, has nothing but these light
houses covered with roofing paper. The cost of his houses he says,

POULTRY HOUSES 13

"is about $6 each, and some of them have been in use over two years
with very little signs of being worse for wear." Some of my pullets
are being raised in small houses having a paper roof, but burlap tacked
on ends and back. This material allows air to pass through freely and
acts as roosting house for nights and s'hade in the day time. And I am
going to winter some in the same kind of houses, and some in canvas
houses. In the southern part of California we do not have rain enough
to call for expensive poultry houses, yet we do need a good roof at
all times.

In localities where the rainfall is heavier, lumber gives better satis-
faction. Matched lumber costs a little more in the first place, but as it
requires no battens and is wind as well as water proof, it is really
cheaper in the long run.

But whatever the material used it is the roof that is the most im-
portant part of the building, for with a leaky roof, no matter how
good the walls may be, the chickens are not very comfortable.

Shingle roofs should have a one-third pitch, while paper roofs can
be made more flat; however, the mor£ pitch a roof has the longer it
will last, for the rain does not stay on to rot the material.

CHAPTER V

OPEN FRONT HOUSES

The open front house has passed the experimental stage from the
Atlantic to the Pacific Coast. In the Eastern and Middle States there
must necessarily be many modifications owing to climatic conditions,
but here in California there is no occasion to modify at all; just three
covered sides and ends and the straight open front in all cases is the
healthiest and best. The houses can be so arranged as to evade the
most direct winds; thus if northern winds are prevalent in a locality,
let the houses face some other direction, and so on. Everybody can
plan for local advantages or disadvantages in that respect, but stick to
the open front straight without compromise. The material for the ends
and back may be just what answers the best all round purposes accord-
ing to financial or other conditions. A good roof, that is a roof that
will keep the poultry dry, and that the owner can keep in ia condition
free from vermin pests, is a necessity in any climate. Such a roof need
not be costly in our climate, and the one that will be described answers
every purpose for California, and can be made to answer even for the
coldest place by putting1 a ceiling independent of the roof, where it
freezes hard.

Mite Proof Roof. — The rafters may be of any strength desired.
We use one by three set on edge, but two by two would be just as good,
perhaps better, but this item can be just what suits each one. Having

FIG. 5. — Types of roofs for poultry houses. A, shed ; B, combination ;
C, gable; D, monitor; E, semi-monitor; F, A-shaped.

OPEN FRONT HOUSES 15

the rafters on, unroll wire netting of one or two-inch mesh. Of course
the smaller mesh is the stronger and will hold up better if the building
is large. Space the rafters to the width of the wire netting if possible,
so as to keep the wire straight and smooth. Fasten down a portion at
a time, while a helper keeps the wire stretched. If rafters are too far
apart it will be well to use a batten or some light stay between. Now
fasten down with double pointed carpet tacks well driven home. If
the roof has a ridge pole it is better to commence tacking the wire on
the lower edge and unroll across ridge pole, making fast at ridge, then
down to outer edge of the other side. When the roof is wired and
well fastened down (use plenty of tacks) the roofing paper should be
laid the same way as the wire and fastened down with the usual cement
and nails. If mites or ticks should ever venture in this roof they can be
reached with a spray pump and killed with two sprayings at most;
where in case of a shingle, board or shake roof you must burn the
roof to rid it entirely of the vermin.

In a cold climate, an air space can be made by duplicating this
roof on the inside, or by putting in a ceiling. The latter would be the
easier if not cheaper and would answer all purposes. In case of a flat
or shanty roof, the wire may be spread as on the ridge roof and the
paper makes a better appearance if run crosswise instead of lengthwise.

An Open Front House for Fifty Hens. — This house is 6x10; the
sills are of 2x4, the front studs are five feet, 2x3, and are three in
number; the back is four feet high and studs are 2x3, also end studs
are same material. The front is made in two separate panels, meeting
at the center studding and are held in place by buttons. This makes it
very convenient for cleaning, spraying or any other use you may have
for going in and out handy, as one or both panels can be taken out in
a minute. The floor can be either of earth or board, as desired. Drop-
ping boards are eighteen inches from the floor and a row of nests fits
riglht up to the dropping boards. The nests are open at the back, being
reached from the outsde by a hole cut in one end; the front of the
nests is a board hinged at the bottom and held in place by two hooks
or buttons. The eggs are gathered from the front by the operator,
who is under cover if raining. As there is ample space for fifty Leg-
horn or any of the small breeds, the floor may have litter on it and the
hens be fed a grain breakfast right in the building, though it is not
large enough to be called a scratching house as well as a laying and
roosting house for all the time. Still it will answer for that if
hens are given liberty after breakfast. The reason it is just six
feet is that that width is easier to move without straining. A twelve or
fourteen-inch board the whole length of the front serves as an awning
for rainy or very sunshiny weather. This can be movable so as to lay
back on top of building when not wanted, or during cleaning-out
operations.

16

CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

f^ %^.Qjyyni-K$ j(o> we£ '•

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AN 0?£A/ FRONT POULTRY MOUSE

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NO H.ACE FOK MITES TO HIDE

Diagram of an open-front California poultry house.
May be of any desired length.

The roof is of wire and roofing paper, as described before, and this
house can :be made very presentable by boarding up the ends and back
with matched lumber such as is used in bungalows, etc. By putting
the dropping boards and perches at one end, all the way across with
nests underneath, the other end can be used as a scratching pen in
bad weather, and with a moderate sized yard would be ample room for
fifty chickens.

A Larger Open Front House. — This house is made of heavier ma-
terial and is intended to stay in one place. The house is 10 feet wide,
7 feet deep and may be any length to suit. Front is made in panels as
in the other with dropping boards on hinges or stationary. It is 7
feet high in front and has a drop of two feet, owing to extra width.
Roosts in all cases should be 2x2 Oregon pine. These are mite
resisters and last a long time. The roof is of paper and wire, but has
heavier rafters, 2x4 being plenty ligfht enough. The back and ends

DOUBLE HOUSE AND SCRATCHING SHED 17

may be of sheet iron, common lumber or matched lumber to suit the
pocket and wish of the builder.

The Double Open Front House and Scratching Shed Combined. —

For those who are building permanently this is by far the best arranged
house I have seen. This one has a shingle roof, but that is optional.
Mr. Suits, the owner and builder of this house, thinks one expense is
the best, so he shingles and paints his roofs so that they will last in-
definitely. It costs, though, and if mites got in, they would not be as
easily reached as in a wire roof.

CHAPTER VI

LARGE AND SMALL PLANTS FOR EGGS

This branch of the poultry business is generally conducted along
special lines. That is eggs are the main object in view. Very often the
proprietor does not keep any breeders, but buys his chicks from a
hatdher, who, in turn, makes a specialty of hatching; and the hatcher
buys his eggs from a man who makes a specialty of keeping hens as
breeders. These eggs are contracted for at certain prices above the
market quotations. The hatcher, before contracting, goes to see the
stock and bargains for the method of feeding, so as to insure himself
and patrons good stock. If the hens do not appeal to the hatcher he
will not contract, but will seek other breeders, as he does the very best
he possibly can to safeguard himself and those who trust their orders
to him. But we all know that "the best laid plans of mice and men
gang aft aglee," and so sometimes a hatcher does not get what he
bargains for.

The egg farm that is to make good and run at a profit all the year
round, must know not only w'hat kind of eggs are put in the incubator
to hatch, but must know how the hatching is done. The best success
comes from keeping your own breeders, feeding them as outlined in
another chapter, and knowing the history of the parents.

The commercial hens for an egg farm are first the Leghorns, and
it matters little what color, so that you get a strain of healthy birds
that will liay a good sized white egg. In localities where hawks are
troublesome the dark chick will be left and the white one taken every
time, and this counts in the end.

Second to the Leghorns come the Minorcas, and here I make the
statement without fear of contradiction, that the Black Minorca is the
best egg laying machine in the whole list.

Breeders say, "they eat more than Leghorns." I agree with that.
If they did not eat more than Leghorns they could not !lay the number
of eggs they do, and Minorca eggs are of the largest size. I don't say
they are the largest, but they belong among layers of the largest white
eggs. If I were just running an egg farm, Black Minorcas would be
first choice.

The large white egg brings top prices and if a special trade is
worked up for private families, or among soda fountain men, the
Minorca eggs bring more than any other.

BEST EGG PRODUCERS 19

The Parcel Post, is one method of selling eggs to private families
that the modern poultryman has at his comm'an'd. Just a few lines
in a city paper will bring the enquiries, and the charges are so light
in the first zone that it will be profitable to both contracting parties.

If you hatch your own chicks it is necessary to hatch them so that
when the pullets molt their last feathers and commence to laj% they
will stay on the job and not lay off about two or three months in the
best paying part of the season.

The first chicks should be hatched to come out in the middle of
February; the second lot should be on hand with the new moon in
March; the third lot with the April new moon. Always catch the
moon from the new to within five days of being full. Where there is
plenty of shade chicks can be hatched up to June; then the male
should be removed from the breeding pens and the hens given their
liberty. After the molt, start up the breeding yards again and get
one good hatch of chicks out in October. These chicks will help out
the following summer when the other hens commence to lag, as they
will molt a little earlier than the others but will not take so long.
As they are young, they can even be put through a forced molt and
have them back in sixty days.

The eggs must be kept coming in and this can only be done by
having chicks follow each other in rotation. March chicks are always
considered best but that is not an absolute fact, though they are good,
but we can't have all in one month, nor is it advisable to do so.

Leghorns can be matured in from five to six months and they will
them lay a. fair sized egg and keep laying; but if matured before that
age they are not reliable layers, but more in the nature of freaks. I
have seen them lay at four months of age but no satisfaction is
obtained by such early maturity.

Minorcas are ia little longer coming through, and 1 think that is
one reason that they are not more popular on egg ranches. Minorcas
must be fed a good, substantial ration right from the start and if they
lay at seven months they are all right. From then on you will collect
the big white egg that will bring in the best prices and the Minorca
hen in her second year is a better layer than during the first year.
This is a good offset to the late maturity. To get the best out of
Minorcas they should be hatched in February, March and April, not
later, and kept growing from the start. By keeping them through
the molt and feeding well, they can be gotten back to work in sixty
days and the second season's eggs will be larger and the hens will
lay more of them than the first year.

With Leghorns it is advisable to cull out all the weakest, smallest
hens every year and replace with chicks; to do this one must hatch
double the quantity needed as one half will be cockerels. With
Minorcas, if the flock is not to be increased, it is not necessary to

20 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

hatch every year unless from a desire to have some ready to take the
place of others at molting time.

The Anconas are claiming great attention just now as layers of
large White eggs. Some authorities go so far as to prophesy they
will run the Leghorns off this Coast as layers.

The hatching season must be governed by the quantity of eggs
needed, and strict tab kept on all expenditures and income so that
you may know where you stand financially at any time.

A California General Purpose Poultry Ranch — There are more
general purpose ranches in California than just special egg farms,
and the small fruit ranch where natural shade abounds is of all places
the best for a general purpose poultry ranch. Fruit, poultry and bees
are just right for those who can handle bees. The poultry breeds
best adapted to the general purpose farm are the American and
English classes. The birds of both these classes are good layers of
colored eggs. These eggs do not count as firsts in some markets,
but as there is but about one cent difference they more than make up
in price by numbers during the winter months when eggs are highest.

The chicks should be hatched in rotation as on the egg farm,
because by so doing you have broilers to sell nearly all the time,
and that brings in an income that should help out the feed bill.
The broilers command the highest price and if you keep them for
fryers and roasters they bring more. But it requires room and shade.
When the hens are to be disposed of, namely, when they have out-
lived their usefulness as layers, they will still bring what it cost to
raise them and a profit or wages for the labor. For instance, ia
crate of Orpington hens, twenty-five in number, was shipped to a
commission man at Los Angeles. The quotations were, small hens 13
cents ; large hens 18 cents. The twenty-five hens brought $27.57, and
this was a poor price, though all expense was paid and this was net.

Now let us see what twenty-five small hens would bring and
average them at four pounds each, something they don't do unless
fed on corn. The twenty-five would bring, if they weighed four
pounds each, just $13.00, a few cents over half what the heavier or the
general purpose fowl brought. Did it take that much more to raise
the large hen?

That is a question that should be asked more frequently. I
claim it does not take any more to raise an Orpington than a Leghorn
and not near so much as it does to raise a Minorca. To the casual
observer this will not be seen, at least they want "to be shown." The
fact is it only requires common sense, and any one can see. The
Leghorn chick is a restless, wiry piece of living activity; the chicks
of the larger breeds are contented; they can eat and rest, using up the
food consumed to build up bone and muscle. The small breed chick

INTENSIVE POULTRY FARMING 21

is always on the move, ever looking up some new place to get into
mischief and the very food it eats is run through it like a sausage
machine, always grinding but never holding what it grinds.

Intensive Poultry Farming

It is a notable feature in this method of poultry keeping that the
intensive farms are all along one line, namely, eggs. The farmer or
poultryman who keeps the general purpose fowls keeps them in
ordinary runs or ranges, not cooped up in little 'dinky houses, nor
even in large roomy houses. However, there is little doubt but that
intensive poultry farming can be conducted in our dry climate to much
better advantage than in a cold or very wet climate.

In 1913 we gave an account of a poultry plant on a city lot that
occupied a space of 25x100 feet. The plant consists of one house
20x100, is two stories high and has pens 20x20 feet, holding 100 hens.
There is a cellar, which serves as a manure pit. There is an office
and feed room on the first floor, and a room the size of one pen for
storing litter, etc. The building has a -gable roof and on the south
side is nearly all open. The product is all sold at the office at retail,
customers calling for the eggs, which command a premium of five
cents a dozen over those sold at the grocery store. No chicks are
raised, but instead 400 pullets are bought each year to keep up the
stock. The flock is kept two years, so that half of them are always
hens and the other half pullets.

When the hens stop laying in the fall they are sold to the egg
customers at 20 cents per pound, and the proprietor claims that
nearly all of them are disposed of at this rate. By this method the
old hens can come very near paying for the pullets.

The proprietor says, having conceived the idea that hens could
be made to pay in houses on the "no yard plan" it did not seem very
far away to put them in a two story buiMing and do away with all
land and yards. Hence, as there was no use in buying land and locat-
ing in the country in order to have an egg farm, he decided to have
his egg factory right in the city. .Strict cleanliness is the watchword,
the dropping boards are cleaned every day. A little car runs on a
trolley just beneath the dropping boards and the manure is scraped
directly into it. It runs to the end of the building and empties into
a chute, where it falls into the manure pit in the cellar. The same car
is used when the pens are cleaned out to carry both clean and dirty
litter. No foul smells or odors are allowed to remain in any part of
the plant. A systematic method of spraying is used that keeps every-
thing sweet and clean.

The Method of Feeding. — The hens are fed a dry mash from a
hopper that stands on a platform above the floor. Scratch grain is

22 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

thrown in the litter twice a day to give the hens exercise. There
is city water and all the founts on one floor are filled by turning on a
faucet. These founts are also on a platform so that no litter can be
scratched into them. Sprouted oats are fed for greens, and here the
basement or cellar is utilized, as the oats are sprouted there.

The advantages of a plant of this kind are, first; the fowls are all
under one roof, tas are also the necessary belongings to take care of
them. The operator has the hens under full control; if one is sick
he can easily catch it. His cleaning can all be done in an orderly
fashion and need not take up very much of his time. Beting no
yards, there is no danger of soil contamination. Plenty of litter in
the pens keeps the birds in exercise and at the same time it keeps
the floors clean and dry. But the biggest advantage lies in the fact
that the business can be conducted without middlemen or extra
expense, such as horses and wagons for delivery, which wcwld also
mean drivers.

As no chicks are raised there would be no need for crowing cocks,
thus all eggs would be free from germ life and such eggs keep better
in warm weather, and are really better for table use at all seasons,
so that such a plant need not be a nuisance in any city. It would have
to be tried, however, before any one could tell whether California
housewives would be willing to do their part toward saving middle
men's profits.

CHAPTER VII

THE CARE AND MANAGEMENT OF EGGS

Market eggs should be gathered and cared for as faithfully as if
for hatching. Cases with good clean fillers should be ready to receive
the eggs as soon as gathered, and the cases should be stored in a room
where the temperature can be kept at about 50 or 60 degrees. There
should be no strong smell from vegetables, oils or other matter
because eggs, like cream, absorb odors through the shell. The egg
fillers particularly, should be above reproach, for if there is any
broken egg on them although to all appearances dry and inoffensive,
there is danger. All such should be thrown out and clean fillers
substituted. No matter how fresh the egg is that comes in contact
with a dirty filler, it will soon be tainted. If the eggs are to be,
shipped to a distant market, no matter if but a few miles, they should
be sorted to conform with the demands of the market. If there are
both brown eggs and white, the brown eggs should be put in one side
of the case and the white eggs in the other, a note on top of each
side explaining how many of each. Grocers like this method because
it saves them the extra trouble of sorting. If they have agreed to
give you one price, it makes no difference. Make a statement of how
many dozens of each — they will appreciate it Also be sure you send
nothing1 but clean eggs to market. If you have pullet eggs keep them
separate and ship as pullet eggs, if you don't you may possibly lose
a good buyer. These are busy men and have no time to spend
explaining. Never, by any chance, leave eggs out in the sunshine.
Incubation starts very easily in the sun and from then on decay is
very rapid. If obliged to carry eggs during the hours of sunshine,
a good layer of green grass laid over the case will keep the direct
rays of the sun from striking them.

Eggs for Hatching. — A revolving cabinet placed in a room where
the temperature can be depended upon not to get below 50 nor over
60, is the easiest and best way to care for hatching eggs. If they
have to be kept longer than five days, they should be turned from
small end to large end down, or the yolk may settle, and if this must
be done by hand it takes up considerable time. Eggs that are
strictly fresh hatch the best, but it is not always possible to have
strictly fresh eggs on hand, yet it is possible to keep the freshness as
well as can be done.

24 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Packing Eggs for Shipment. — When eggs are going some distance
they have to pass through a good many hands and some of these hands
are very careless. Others are just itching to play ball with every
package that comes their way and the only way to do is to pack
eggs so that these hands can all be accommodated and the eggs still
come through in good shape.

For one, two or three settings, or even fifty eggs I have never
found anything as good as a good chip basket. The very small size
is not practicable, but the second size is large enough for one setting
of eggs. The next larger size will hold two settings. The cost of the
small one is ten cents, of the larger fifteen, and the one large enough
to hold fifty eggs will cost twenty cents.

Line the basket with several thicknesses of paper or cardboard,
then lay excelsior along the bottom and sides. Wrap each egg in a
square piece of paper and in placing them in the basket put a little
pad of excelsior between each egg. Keep laying the eggs in this
manner until all are in, then tuck in well with more excelsior. The
aim must be to have the eggs so solid in the basket that no amount
of shaking will disturb them. If they can be shaken out of place they
will not carry safely to their destination and you may as well go over
the task again. There is just a knack in it and if you keep trying you
will catch on. After you succeed in getting the eggs to stay, proceed
to cover the package. I use clean burlap, but that is a matter of
choice. Burlap is strong and will stand a good thick string to sew it
on with. Use a packing needle, cut the cover a little larger than the
basket, tuck the raw edges inside and sew burlap and basket all
around right down to your excelsior filling. Paste a label with
address of person eggs are for and your own address as* shipper, and
in extra large type the words: "Eggs for hatching, handle with care."
Give correct value of eggs to express agent and advise your patron
to collect if eggs are damaged in transit.

CHAPTER VIII

HOW TO BUILD AN INCUBATOR CELLAR

While we do not have the extremes of cold and heat they do in the
east, it is necessary to have a place for incubation where an even
temperature can be maintained the year round. To get this we must
be partly underground. The very best material to build an incubator
cellar with is hollow cement blocks. And these can be bought almost
as cheaply as buying cement and having a man to build a wall. The
wall should be from twelve to eighteen inches above the ground and
four to five feet under ground. The size must be determined by the
number of machines you wish to run, but always allow for expansion,
for expansion is inevitable sooner or later; you never stand still in
the chicken business. Put your windows in the space above ground
allowing one for every ten feet of surface, but so arranged that you
have windows on all four sides. Hinge the windows on the inside and
at the bottom, then put fly screens outside. By this arrangement you
have good ventilation and if the wind is blowing from one direction
the window on that side can be closed, leaving the ventilators on the
other three sides still on the job. There will never be any smell of
oil or smoke in a cellar of this kind and the operator can attend to
everything from the inside. If you fail to get good hatches in a cellar
built like this, there is something wrong somewhere else.

The upper part of the building can be used as a store room or a
packing room. But to economize, the space should be used for some-
thing connected with the business. Land is too valuable to lie idle,
and having the foundation of a building already to hand, it is cheaper
and better to run up a lumber building over the cellar. A feed room
is a necessity and it would not cost very much in connection with the
incubator cellar.

CHAPTER IX

HOW TO RUN THE INCUBATOR

After setting up your machine sit down and read the directions.
Not once, but just as many times as it takes for you to get a good
understanding of the maker's meaning. Some incubator manu-
facturers are more direct and plain in giving instructions than others,
so it pays to have a good understanding before even lighting the lamp.
After you have the lamp in running order turn your attention to the
regulator. Keep unscrewing it until the heat comes up to 100 or 101,
then place your themometer in a good spot where you can watch it
and close up the doors. If the temperature Varies, put in another
thermometer as the first one may be incorrect. When your temper-
ature reaches 102^ and stays there for any considerable time, your
machine is ready for the eggs. But it is better to run it a day or two
without eggs if you are a beginner, just to get acquainted. When the
eggs are put in, give the machine plenty of time to regain the
temperature. Some say twenty-four hours but most hot air machines
will come up to the 102^ in twelve hours, but if it takes longer don't
get uneasy, it will be all right.

Run the ventilation according to directions sent with the machine,
because every manufacturer knows what his machine does best with,
much or little vent, so it is better to go according to his directions.
If the eggs are put in the machine in the morning keep the doors
closed until middle of next day, then turn the trays from one end to
the other. If it is a two tray machine change places. If a three tray,
change the middle tray to one end and end tray to middle. Do not
turn the eggs but only the trays until the evening of the third day.
At this turning take only one tray out to turn at one time, and turn the
eggs quickly. Then take out another tray and replace the tray that has
been turned in place of the one just taken out. The eggs must not
be chilled in the least, at this stage, so the work must be done as
quickly as possible without jarring.

After the fourth day turn your eggs twice a day, and make a point
of doing this work when you will not be interrupted. If there is
any trouble that way, fasten the door, for incubating is a matter of
precision and regularity.

Begin airing the eggs after the fifth day, and in this you must be
guided by the temperature in the room. If it is up to 70 degrees the
eggs can air a little longer than if the temperature is 50 degrees.

SOME INCUBATOR DONT'S 27

Animal heat begins to influence the incubator after the seventh day
and your temperature will begin to work up, so you must give the
regulator nut part of a turn every time the heat crawls up to 103 or
more. But here it will be necessary to use judgment, because if you
are operating in1 a cold room it will be better to run the machine at
103 and not air the eggs until later on; just turn them and put back
in the incubator. In warm weather and in a warm room give plenty
of air — the -chicks need it. On the seventeenth day one or two
hours airing will go a long way towards helping them break the shell.
Put water in according to instructions with machine. Some in-
cubators require more moisture than others so follow directions given
with the machine you are operating.

Some Don'ts About Incubating. — Don't ever try to hatch brown
and white eggs in one hatch; one or the other will not do so well.

Don't fail to fill your lamp and trim the wick, and be sure to wait
around long enough to see that all is well; also don't fill the lamp too
full. Many an explosion and fire has been caused from an over filled
lamp.

Don't fail to test out all eggs that are not fertile or likely to
hatch, because one bad egg contaminates others and poisons the
chicks that hatch.

Don't open the door under any consideration after the eggs
begin to pip until the hatch is practically through; thdn if any
belated chicks need help give it quickly and close the doors. These
late chicks don't often amount to much, but sometimes they are worth
saving.

When all are hatched that are going to hatch, clean out the
trays," open up the ventilators and give the chicks fresh air, but
beware of chilling. Yes, it can be done even in the incubator, but
when the chicks are quiet and restful you may know all is well with
them.

Don't be in a hurry to set the incubator again, you will gain by
keeping the chicks in the incubator for at least twenty-four hours,
but forty-eight would be better. This rest in an even temperature
helps the chicks to digest the yelk of egg that is to give the first
nourishment and start in life, and if you once try this way you will
never want to hustle chicks out of the incubator in order to start it
up again.

When you do take the chicks out of the incubator throw it wide
open, keep the heat going and get a fine spray (a small hand spray)
and put in it a solution of creolin and water; one teaspoonful creolin
to a pint of warm or rather hot water. Spray the inside of the
machine with this solution; wash out the nursery drawers and egg
trays with the same then shut doors and let it steam and dry. Wash

28 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

the lamp out, boil the burner in water in which you have put a table-
spoonful of baking soda, then polish it up and it will be as good as
new. Put in a new wick every time you set a new hatch and do as
I tell you and you will never be bothered much with chicks having
diarrhoea. Most of the bowel trouble comes either from chills or
filth, either in the incubator or brooder.

Always use the best oil you can get. Some incubators will burn
poor oil but all of them do much better with good oil. Whenever
an incubator smokes you are using poor oil with a machine that
calls for good, refined oil, or you have the lamp too full or the wick
too high. Don't blame the machine but go to work and remedy what
is wrong. If for any reason the egg chamber gets smoke in it, open
the doors and take the eggs out until the smoke has passed away when
it will be safe to return them, if you have cut off the cause of the
smoke.

Don't forget that the egg is the chief source of moisture needed
under ordinary conditions. If too much moisture is added the
chicks drown, or they grow so fast that the shell is filled before the
chick is due; then it has no room to work and it is .a case of
"dead in the shell." Don't forget, that when there is too much
moisture in the incubating cellar the air does not circulate as freely
as when the moisture is not so abundant. If you can adjust the
moisture question the rest is easy. And except during the months of
July, August and September we are fairly safe about the moisture
on this Coast unless in some of the inland valleys.

Don't forget that irregular and inefficient attention to filling lamps
and turning eggs are to blame for a large percent of poor hatches,
and that these things are entirely under your control. Have a certain
time to do these things and let nothing interfere with that duty.

Don't get excited if it should happen that your lamp gets
in a blaze. Just go with a gunny sack or something that it not in-
flammable and get the lamp out of its place and carry it to a place of
safety. Wrap a gunny sack around it and the fire will go out. Then
open up the egg chamber so that if there is any smoke there it can
escape. If the eggs <are hot take them out and cool, being careful not
to leave out long enough to chill, then return to the incubator. Don't
start the lamp up again until you have cleaned up all soot that may
have gathered in the pipes or heating chamber, because most likely
you will have the same thing happen again.

In case of accident keep cool and your good sense will come to
the rescue.

How Young Chicks Look The First Two Weeks

So many people do not know how chicks of the several breeds look
when young and they sometimes think they have been buncoed when
the chicks do not look just like the old ones.

How YOUNG CHICKS LOOK 29

All Black or dark chickens whether Minorca, Langshan, Leghorn,
Wyandottes or Barred Rock, have splashes of white on them. These
may be on the breast under the body, on the back and on top of the
head. When the chicks feather out they will in all probability be
perfectly colored.

In White Rocks, and sometimes in White Orpingtons and White
Leghorns, there will be a greyish or yellowish cast to the white, but
all that goes away and the birds in full feather are white.

Buff chicks of all breeds are sometimes quite light colored, and
sometimes have little streaks of black in the down. In Brown Leg-
horns, they are striped a buff stripe and a black stripe all over the
back or some would call it a brown stripe and a black.

Houdans are black on back with white under the breast. Rhode
Island Reds are a richer buff and have more little spots on them as a
rule. Sometimes eggs from white birds will throw a black chicken.
This is considered a sport because it occurs so seldom.

According to Mendel's Laws, white is dominant and that, perhaps
will account for the rare occasion of a black chick being hatched from
eggs where there is positively no danger of mixing breeds.

How To Get More Pullets Than Cockerels

Mate your male bird with more females than ordinary and if they
are older it won't matter. The eggs will not be so fertile as if you
had less females with him but the bulk of the chicks will be pullets.
And you can afford to lose a few eggs if you want pullets. Also the
last eggs at the end of the season are nearly always pullets.

CHAPTER X

RAISING THE CHICKS

To raise good chicks, it is really necessary to go back to the stock
and know what they come from, but we c;an't all do that so must start
with what we have. If they have been bought from the Hatchery and
come any distance, give the shipper credit for sending you good
chicks and don't start in to spoil them.

Have your brooder ready, and that means strictly clean; and if
it has been used before, to be clean it must have ibeen washed or
sprayed and every little odor of "chicken" removed from it. This
being done have it running at about ninety degrees. Sprinkle fine
ground oyster shells around and give the chicks fresh sweet butter-
milk. If there is sour milk on hand churn it until it turns to butter-
milk. Just give the shell and buttermilk for the first half day, then
sprinkle a little rolled oats on a board for them to pick at. For the
first three days care must be taken not to feed much at any one time,
but just what they will clean up in a few minutes. After the first day
mix equal parts of dry bran, chick feed and rolled oats with a little
ground oyster shell. This is for the general feeds to be changed off
with appetizing bits, mash, green feed, etc. Always remember that
too much rolled oats is laxative. This can be offset by cutting up a
stale loaf of bread, toasting same brown all through in the oven, and
then grinding it in a food chopper or coarse coffee mill. Wet, or
rather, moisten this ground toasted bread with a little hot water or
milk and feed when cool. And here you have one of the finest and
most nourishing chick feeds possible. Another nice way to serve
stale bread, iand it can usually be bought for 25 cents a sack, is to
toast as above, grind and put in food hopper dry. They love to pick
out the dark colored crumbs and this is a, good feed for chicks.

About the fifth day give them a dry mash. The mash should be
two parts good wheat bran, one part middlings, one part cornmeal or
fine ground barley meal, one part rolled or pinhead oats and one part
good beef scrap. Mix all together adding only a very little salt, a
little charcoal and some ground oyster shell. This mash can be
kept before them all the time and they will never eat enough at one
time to hurt them.

As the chicks grow, increase the quantity of chick feed adding a
little extra cracked wheat to the bill of fare. No matter whether you

FEEDING YOUNG CHICKS 31

buy chicks, hatch them yourself in the incubator, or have hens hatch
them, this method of feeding will be good enough for all.

(Editor's Note: We realize that many readers will consider
the above methods of boiling and varying the feed for young chicks
too bothersome and time consuming. This applies particularly to
those who wish to conduct the poultry business on a large or com-
mercial scale.

It has been proven beyond doubt that reliable manufacturers of
commercial chick feeds furnish Dry Mixed Infant Chick Feeds, com-
posed of small grain, seeds, charcoal, grit, etc., that supply all the
chicks' wants, and if properly fed, seldom fail to raise a very large per-
centage of properly hatched chicks. At times every healthy chick,
even in lots of four or five hundred, has been safely carried through
baby chickhood by the feeding of these commercial chick feeds.

To be perfect, the chick feed must contain a small amount of grit
and shell, which should be thoroughly mixed through it. The ques-
tion of grit and shell is very important and if the chick feed you buy
does not contain these ingredients, be sure to secure them and mix
them in yourself to the amount of 5 per cent.

In Bulletin 164 of the University of California, Prof. M. E. Jaffa
says, "The Grit and Charcoal are added to the chick feed, as the babes
can not at first be depended upon to visit the grit trough regularly;
but the trough is placed in the run to teach them to acquire the habit
for the future."

This matter of grit in commercial chick feeds has recently been
given attention by the Federal Government. The Bureau of Chemistry
of the Department of Agriculture recently ruled that "A certain
amount of grit is considered a food and when the amount is not ex-
cessive, no statement in regard to the quantity of grit is demanded by
the Federal law.")

Extras. — The above is the straight everyday diet but unless it is
varied chicks soon get tired of it. Now the first and most valuable
way to vary the chick's diet is to give it some succulent green feed.
These things should be prepared ahead of the chicks so as to have
them ready. Now I class nice fresh tender lettuce by itself. There
is nothing chicks like better, nothing that they can eat so much of
without being harmed. I never knew a chick that ate so much lettuce
that it was hurt by it, and I have known them to be harmed by eating
too much of other good things. If possible, I always aim to have a bed
of lettuce ready when I have a hatch coming off. That is how much
I think of it.

Next in favor is chicory. This plant is the nearest elements to
lettuce of anything I know; besides it is tender, succulent and bears
cropping well, as it is almost perennial. You can cut the tender leaves
and come again without injuring the plant in the least and chicks
like it.

32 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Rape is another nice tender green for little chicks but unlike
chicory it lasts but one season. Sow the seed as you would lettuce
in rows, and it can be cut from four to six times in a season. Every
new growth of leaves is tender and fresh for the chicks.

Kale is a most excellent green and more will be said about it later;
for small chicks I do not think its use advisable.

Sprouted oats are a green and grain food combined, and it is
better than anyone has ever given it credit for, and that is saying a
good deal. But it is not as economical as many other forms of green
food under the regular conditions. That is, if a person has plenty of
vacant land he can grow other foods cheaper than he can buy the
oats and sprout them, and with less labor. Therefore, my reason for
calling attention to sprouted oats is because it fits in with the
fancier and the city or surburban poultryman who is short on land
but long on patience and the desire to make the best out of his
surroundings. With oats at $1.80 to $2 a hundred pounds, the average
poultryman fights shy of them, and yet when processed right, one
bushel makes about four so that the price is cut considerably. Oats
are just as valuable to poultry as they are to horses. They simply
stand for bone and muscle, health and energy and a good coat of
feathers. In another part of this book I will tell you how to sprout
oats to the best advantage for both chicks and grown fowls.

Watering the chicks looks such a simple thing to make an item of
in the making of a book that most writers leave it out. But it is really
an important factor in the raising of the chicks. As before said
good, fresh buttermilk should be given the chicks the first half day,
then pure water. I prefer to give boiled water for the first ten days,
and always give it warm in the early morning. Now suppose you have
one thousand chicks, you will want five gallons of water boiled, to
supply the chicks a day. I don't think they will be stinted at all on
that and it is not such a very big chore to set a five gallon oil can on
the stove and boil that much water the evening before it will be used.
Then the next morning, set the tea kettle on to boil while you eat your
own breakfast and then you have the warm water by mixing that just
boiled with what was boiled the evening before. Remember it is only
for a few days to give the chicks a chance to get a good strangle hold
on life instead of being fastened upon by millions of bacteria.

About once or twice a week they can have buttermilk or sour curd
if you have it. The acid contained in milk is appetizing and healthful.
In fact there is no objection to feeding milk every day, but the
chicks should also be served water; then let them take their choice.
To the bill of fare for chicks may be added Johnny cake, once in
awhile a kettle of boiled rice and pin head oats, a beef heart boiled
and cut up in strips then thrown in for them to enjoy and race for
and a mess of small potatoes boiled and mixed with a little mash

PARTIALLY OPEN FRONT POULTRY HOUSE

OPEN FRONT POULTRY HOUSE WITH WIRE FRONT

TROUBLES OF CHICKS 33

material. This is about as wide a ration as is safe for chicks that are
intended for breeders and layers.

Bowel Trouble In Small Chicks

Bowel trouble in small chicks is nearly aways some form of diar-
rhoea, and in nine cases out of ten it might have been prevented by
careful feeding and brooding. Chicks are either fed too much or the
food is of such a nature that it takes a long time to digest and the
feeder adds more fuel to the already overloaded furnace. Undigested
food may sometimes be found in the droppings but as a rule it is
not noticed.

Chilling Is A Common Cause. — But more ofter the diarrhoea of
small chicks is due to a chill at some stage of the game. The brooder
is too hot and chicks get out, then fail to get back. Just a few may
start with a looseness in the bowels, and in a few days it has spread
to the whole flock. Don't forget that in diarrhoea there are alwaye
germs to be reckoned with, and germs multiply.

Sanitation Needed. — It is always best to find the source of the
trouble if possible, but no time should be lost after a case shows itself.
Simple measures are the best. Spray the brooder and brooder house
with the creolin solution, boil all the water that the chicks have to
drink and feed more dry grain.

The chicks must be kept comfortable and if they have been over-
crowded, separate into smaller flocks. Both overheating and chilling
are fore-runners of diarrhoea and should be equally avoided. It is
really better to supply a variety of food and keep it before them all
the time, than it is to be continually giving them more of one thing
than they can eat. Let them balance their own ration if you have
failed to do it right. Keep a good supply of ground oyster shell and
charcoal before them as both these are needed to absorb gases. Give
them raw vegetables on clean boards — lettuce and any form of green
feed.

Remedies. — If the water is boiled and given cold, that alone is
helpful, but the next best remedy is to pour a gallon of boiling
water over ia piece of quick lime as large as an egg, stir well, then let
all settle and when cold give the chicks the clear lime water to drink.
This is also a very effective, yet a simple remedy in all cases of
bowel trouble for young and old. It may be given for one or two
weeks at a time without any harmful results. The Homeopathic
remedy for diarrhoea in small chicks is Mercurius Viv, a dozen pellets
in the drinking water, say one dozen to the quart.

CHAPTER XI

WHY CHICKS DIE IN THE SHELL

This is a very vital question to every poultryman, every hatcher
and anyone who hatches several hundred chicks in a season. More-
over, it is a question that is so many sided that one must have had
many different experiences before he can answer it at all. And I
believe that in more than forty years work with poultry I have had
experience along most of these lines and found out some few reasons
"why chicks die in the shell."

One reason, and I may say the most frequent cause of chicks
dying in the shell is poor management of the incubator. Poor man-
agement includes irregular heat, incubator run at high temperature
for a few hours, then run low, and in the efforts to maintain a
regular temperature the eggs get a good many variations. While
they will stand a certain amount of abuse of this kind at some stages
of incubation, at others the eggs are very easily affected and it is at
these critical stages of incubation that the embryo is weakened and
robbed of that vigor that should be in reserve for the final break into
the outside world.

Another cause is lack of exercise of the eggs, here we should take
a lesson from a good setting hen, not a lazy hen but one with the
natural motherly instinct strong. After the first three or four days
she rolls and rolls her eggs every day and perhaps several times a
day, and if you notice nearly every -egg will hatch from a hen of
that type. A lazy hen, and there are lots of them, may be given a nest
exactly like the other hen, with exactly the same kind of eggs and
she will have chicks dead in the shell, chicks that are crippled and all
kinds of trouble, just as some people do with incubator eggs. The
reason is she did not exercise them, did not roll them and the muscles
did not develop. "Muscle!" you say. Yes, muscle and energy to use
the muscle; it takes both for a chick to dig it's road out of it's prison
into daylight. After the seventh day roll the eggs around every time
you air them and turn them, never mind marking eggs so as to tell
which side they were up or which side down, but roll them around like
the old hen and let them take pot luck as to which side they happen to
go to bed on.

And yet another cause in the incubating is lack of knowledge in
adjusting the moisture. A great many chicks are actually drowned
in the shell. You may know when this happens because there will be

BEST TIME TO SET EGGS 35

a glutinous substance inside the shell. Lack of moisture dries up the
inside skin and the shell peels off, leaving the chick stranded inside
because it cannot work on that dry skin, hence it smothers.

The last and most fatal cause of chicks dying in the shell is be-
cause the chick has outgrown its quarters and has not room to work.

The word cause, in the above sentence- is wrong. The size of the
chick is simply the effect. Every cause has its effect, as every effect
must have a cause which precedes it. The question that interests us
at present, is what causes the chick in its state of embryo to outgrow
its habitation. First, the temperature of the incubator if it is run too
high during the last two weeks. Second, too much moisture, perhaps
too much of both heat and moisture. If to these we add too much
light we have a natural condition for quick growth, whether in the
shell or out. Life is there; fulfill the natural conditions required and
the life will grow to that stage nature has allotted to it.

And in this connection I am going to give you one more reason
for this growth that leaps its bounds so that the chick at the
time it should break the shell cannot do it and it dies in the shell.
We look at it and say: "My! but it is a shame to see that big fine
chick die in the shell. What it the reason?"

The reason is this: We set the eggs at the time that suits our
convenience, regardless of what nature has to say about it. A few
old fashioned folks still consult the almanac as to whether the moon
is right for planting potatoes and other garden truck, but how many
ever dream that the phases of the moon could influence the growth
of a chick in the egg. And yet I tell you, friends, it does.*

It is certainly strange that people will accept half of a truth and
refuse to let their mind expand to receive the whole truth. No one
ever doubts the fact that the moon influences the tides, because that
has been an .accepted fact so long that it is not even questioned. But
tell them that it also influences the earth and animal life too, and
they laugh.

It won't cost anything to set the incubator so that the chicks
will hatch some time during the first quarter of the new moon. I have
found that when eggs are set in the new moon the embryo grows too
fast during the first days of incubation. Having used up its energy
in making this rapid growth in those first days, the chick is much
weakened for the final break into the world, and being overgrown it is
a little inclined to laziness too, so dies rather than make an effort to
live. You have probably heard of the lazy man, every State in the
Union claims him. This particular lazy man came from Indiana and
he was so poor and so good for nothing that the town decided to bury

* We dissent from all the moonshine which follows — but to succeed with poultry
one must learn to be watchful and systematic and learn to do things at the right times.
If he begins by faithfully watching the moon he is likely to learn to watch other
things which matter much more. — EDITOR.

36 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

him. As they were hauling him to his final resting place a man
inquired what he was to be buried for, when he was apparently alive.
On being told, he said: "I will give the man some corn. Take him
back." The lazy man was told of this offer and he softly inquired:
"Is it shelled?" "No," the charitable man said, "but you can shell
it." To this the other merely said: "Drive on." He preferred to die
rather than shell the corn and I believe that is the case with over-
grown chicks, they prefer death to the effort of pipping the shell.

Now as I have already said the elements for growth are light,
heat and moisture. The eggs contain enough moisture under natural
conditions to incubate and bring to a successful hatch the germ
within them. Now if the eggs are put in the incubator, the glass
doors covered or darkened so that no light penetrates to the egg
chamber except when the eggs are being turned and aired, the heat
kept at a rather lower temperature than usual, say 102^4 for a few
days, then if it is desired run them at 103, providing moisture ac-
cording to directions sent with the incubator. I believe you will
not have so many "chicks die in the* shell."

If, in addition to these precautions you will set the incubator
when practicable, so that the chicks will come out during the growing
moon, you will not only reduce the dead in the shell chicks but the
chicks you hatch will grow so fast that you will wonder why some
crank did not put you wise before this.

I told you in the first place this would be a different kind of a
poultry book, and I am going to make good. If you have a baker's
dozen of poultry books you still need this, because it will tell you
things you will not find in any other. I am strictly unorthodox, I
never travel in ruts; when it so happens that I fall into a rut, some-
thing comes to jerk me out.

CHAPTER XII

A FEW DONT'S IN RAISING CHICKS

Don't ever put a second lot of chicks on the same ground that
others have been on, or in the same brooder or house until every
trace of the first lot of chicks has been obliterated as far as possible.
The first lot of chicks clean up everything in the soil that is worth
having, leaving nothing but their own dirt and odor. And these are
poisonous to the newly hatched chick.

If compelled to run the chicks on the same ground, clean the
top dirt off 'and cart it away. Soak a bucketful of oats, a little millet
and rape seed and after spading up the ground good and deep rake in
the soaked seeds.

Spray the walls and floors of the brooder house with a mild dis-
infectant, scrub, if necessary, the brooders, hovers, etc., until they
are as sweet and clean as when new. When every trace of the smell
has disappeared, the place is fit for the new hatch, and not till then.
No poultryman with self respect will put newly hatched chicks in
dirty, ill-smelling brooders.

Don't leave food out in wet weather and expect your chicks to
be all right, because they won't be if you do. Feed of all kinds
sours very quickly in moist weather, and sour feed causes bowel
trouble. If by accident this happens, the surest remedy is to move
the chicks to new ground if possible, feed nothing but dry grain
for a few days or boiled rice and cinnamon, charcoal and grit. If,
however, the runs are fixtures and cannot be moved, spade up the
ground and put as much sand on it as you can, with a little air-
slacked lime buried under the spading.

Don't feed newly hatched chicks incubator eggs. They have been
living on that diet for some time and need a change. After ten days
you may feed them in moderate quantities. But the best way to feed
them is to use them in making a Johnny cake.

Don't — Mix sweet and sour milk. That is if you feed sour milk
or buttermilk one or more days, don't change off and feed sweet
milk, just because you happen to have it. This is a sure way to
cause bowel trouble. Bowel trouble in young chicks that have
started right is nearly always caused by wrong feeding, generally
through giving tid-bits that they would be far better without.

Don't — Fail to keep your brooders clean, well aired and free from
bad smell. For the first few days they will do very well let alone.

38 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

After that clean them out every day and they will pay you back in
quick healthy growth of the chicks.

Don't — Fill the brooder box or hover with fine dust or dirt. It
gets in the chicks' lungs, gives them canker in mouth, and is altogether
wrong. The best way I ever found to keep a brooder clean was to
spread burlap on the floor, fit it in corners as you would a board,
then put nice fine cut litter over the burlap. When you want to
clean out just draw out the burlap take it out doors and shake the
contents off. By having two pieces of burlap one can be washed and
hung on the fence to dry while the other is in use. Or, if you have no
litter, just sprinkle clean sand over the burlap. This saves dust,
saves time, and better still it saves the floor from getting such a
strong chicken odor.

Don't — And this is the biggest don't and should be printed in red
letters: "Don't overcrowd." All brooders, hovers, etc., are sold with
a capacity that is very much overstated, in the first place, and no
allowance is made for the growth of the chicks. The capacity is for
day old chicks, and as the manufacturers have to sell in competition
with others that are so rated, we cannot blame them. Then the
poultry man happens to have a matter of fifty chicks or so extra, and
he puts them in and his brooder is now carrying nearly double what
it was rated at. By the time the c'hicks are two weeks old they
commence dying, not from lack of room perhaps, but for lack of
something more vital — air. Even if the chicks live, some of them
will be stunted and will be more or less of a loss.

Overcrowding is not a question of room only; in fact the room
is secondary. The vital point is in the "quantity of air." If there is
air for fifty chicks and one hundred are put in, don't you see that
every chick is being robbed of just half the air it should have to
keep it in health and strength?

I have seen chicks come out of brooders so weak they could not
stand. At that time I did not realize what caused the weakness; the
knowledge came later.

Under natural conditions all varieties of land and water fowl are
hatched and brooded in small groups or families, and sometimes in
lean years, air is the biggest asset they have; but with plenty of fresh
air and a little picking here and there and the warmth of the mother
hen the little broods manage to grow into lusty youngsters, and there
is no such thing as their "going light." That condition is left for the
brooder chick that has been robbed of its pure air. With properly
ventilated brooders, we can improve on the natural method of brood-
ing so far as numbers, but when one thousand chicks are confined in
a space where there is only air for five hundred, there is something
wrong.

PURE AIR FOR CHICKS 39

Just recently a man told me he bought two brooding devices that
were sold to accommodate one thousand chicks each, but he said: "I
saw chicks that had been brooded in one thousand lots under them
and I did not want those chicks, so I will brood three hundred where
my neighbor puts 1000." This man's philosophy was sound and his
chicks show it. Chicks that are raised in plenty of good pure air
will pay their own board bill and their owner's too. So "don't forget"
that overcrowding means robbing the chick of the elements of growth,
health and even life itself.

Most people think of overcrowding as stinting space only. If that
were all, some way could be found to make up for the lack of space,
but as we have shown, it means more than space. A brood of chicks
that is robbed of air will dwindle down so as to regulate the question
of space themselves.

CHAPTER XIII

BROODERS AND BROODING SYSTEMS

First we will consider the small brooder, as the average farmer or
small poultry man does not need a system, but just something that
can be relied upon to brood a hundred or two hundred chicks without
building special brooder houses.

For this I do not know of any better than one that has been got-
ten out by the International Correspondence Schools.

The "hover" is round and made of galvanized iron; the lamp sets
in the center, making it absolutely safe, because even though the lamp
got on fire it is confined in the metal frame and the blaze cannot get
away. My belief is that if the lamp should run very high through bad
management, that it would smoke and clog up until it went out. But
after using two all one season I see no reason for any accident happen-
ing at all. They have been thoroughly reliable. The good feature
outside of the safety lamp is that there are no corners, no closed
boxes; the chicks are all around the hover, a curtain of canvas
hanging down and they can run under or out at leisure. Yes, there is
another good feature and one that will appeal strongly to the farmer.
These hovers can be set in any small house, shed or barn and the
chicks raised just as well as if they had a high priced brooder
house. When the chicks are through with them they can be carried to
another house in one hand, they are so light and handy. These can be
purchased from poultry supply dealers.

Brooders for Outdoors. — There are other small brooders for out-
door use, or they can be bought for indoors without the little house
part. One hundred chicks is usually the capacity, though there are
people who crowd more into them.

The Stove Systems. — There are several of these stove systems on
the market, and they must all have some merit or they would not be
bought. With most of them the chicks are all out where they can
have what air the brooder house contains, and so that is in their favor.
But the idea of twelve or fifteen hundred chicks being confined in one
house is entirely wrong. If, as has been the case, the stove becomes
faulty and either goes low or goes entirely out, just think what will
happen to those chicks. I know they have just about perfected some
of these stoves and put automatic alarms on them so that the danger
is not nearly so great as one might think, but even if they were per-
fect, there should never be such a number of chicks together in one
place.

HOVERS AND BROODERS 41

The George Hover. — A great many of the big poultrymen are using
the George brooder or hover. This is a stove too, but the chicks in-
stead of being around the stove in a circle are under a hover, where
warm air passes through and around them. In case of accident to the
stove, the chicks would in a measure be comparatively safe, because
the heat from their own bodies would keep them warm, being con-
fined by the top of the hover. This is all the advantage I can see in
the hover over the stove. The same number of chicks are crowded
together with the same difficulty, namely, a shortage of fresh air.
Twelve or fifteen hundred chicks must consume barrels of air and the
bodies of so many chicks must be exuding barrels of foul air. Now if
the intake of fresh air does not enter a hover or building in excess of
the foul air being sent out from these bodies, you can imagine what the
results will be.

The results will be poisoning from carbonic acid gas. The chicks
may not die in numbers but the poison is there and unless they can
throw it off by open air exercise during the day, they will stand a
poor chance for a long and happy life.

The only remedy for this is to reduce fhe number of chicks to half,
and I believe poultrymen would get much better results.

The Hot Water Pipe System. — Like the preceding systems, this also
is expected to brood large numbers of chicks together, and exactly like
them, the weak place lies in the number congregated together, no
matter what the system may be called. However, this tubular hot
water system has one advantage. It can be set in the center of a
house running as long as you wish, and if it were desired, it seems to
me that the chicks could be divided into small runs, running each way
across the house. This would be much better than having the chicks
all scrambling together. The hot water pipes are covered over by a
platform, that forms a hover for the chicks, and as they can run out
either side there is not so much danger of crowding. The air supply
is the one thing that needs watching in all these systems where crowd-
ing large numbers of chicks together is practiced.

The One Perfect Brooding System. — This is a brooding system
that has no strings to it so that any one who is mechanically bent can
make one after it without fear of infringing on patents. Mr. Norton,
the man who invented it for his own use, is a mechanic by trade and
given to studying out the whys and ^wherefores of anything that
bothers and perplexes him, and as he had been much perplexed over
the brooding of his chicks he set himself the task of inventing some-
thing that he could rely upon. As it is difficult to get pictures of such
interior places the only thing to do is to try to describe this brooder
system so that you can see it for yourselves.

This is something of a task, but if we try, that is all that can be ex-
pected of us whether the result is success or failure. The brooder

42 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

house is 16x150 feet and is separated into runs entirely apart from each
other. Each hover is 3x4 feet. The runs lead outdoors to other runs
so that each lot of chicks is separate whether indoors or out. Thus a
person can stand at the door of this brooder house, in the end of the
building, and look down where chicks of all ages up to three months
can be seen; or on olther occasions one may see three thousand chicks
of one age, yet separated in small lots with their own hover and run.

The system of heating is with pipes, the pipes being below the floor
about eight inches and confined in a box made of inch lumber. At the
'top where both heat and air ascend it is partially confined so as to
make the heat diffuse better. At the top of the hover is a burlap that
acts as a diaphragm to carry the heat over the backs of the chicks. At
the front of the hover a curtain keeps in the heat and all over their
backs this mild, warm air is on the move all the time. If it is desirable
to close up, or rather shut off the heat from one, two or several hovers,
a piece of board with holes the exact size of the ones that let in the
heat and air, is right there and can be placed over the heating aper-
tures and thus shut off for as long as necessary the heat from any
number of brooders. From 50 to 75 chicks are as many .as Mr. Norton
cares to put together. He is in the hatching business, and sometimes
has just a few chicks lefit over. Another tinre he may have a hatch
come off that he has not sold, and he always has a place to put them
where they will be kept warm and comfortable. The death rate is very
low, as one would expect where such small lots of chicks are kept in
almost perfectly natural conditions. The hot water pipes are heated
by an oil burner. Being confined in the box under the floor it does
not take very much heat to keep them hot. Now if this is not plain it
ought to be, for it looks so easy to me that I could make one myself
(if I were a carpenter).

The heat from, this brooder is indirect heat and the warm -air is
always coming up, because that is the natural outlet, as warm air can
never go downwards.

The George system is something after this plan of warm air com-
ing upwards, but where twelve hundred chicks are in one body it
would require volumes of air to furnish all they require. By distribut-
ing the chicks in smaller lots they have a better chance. Overcrowd-
ing is the greatest mistake of modern poultry raising. We want to
bunch chickens up like plants, and like the hothouse plants that are
given too much heat and too little air, chickens grow spindly and weak
with no constitution or vigor. Chicks that are overcrowded fall easy
prey to disease, and instead of being ta source of income they are a
continual source of expense.

With a brooding system where the 'heat is direct, the chicks may
be kept just as warm and comfortable as with indirect heat, but they
are not getting the movement of fresh air. By the direct heat method

BROODERS AND PURE AIR 43

the air around the chicks is stagnant. Consequently the chicks breathe
and rebreathe the same air over and over again.

To chicken raisers this will mean a great deal when they once real-
ize it. We have been brooding chicks artificially a good many years
by the direct heat methods of various kinds, and the secret of get-
ting fresh air by indirect heat has not been properly appreciated yet.
When it is, all other methods will go to make room for the best.

The large 'hovers and systems lessen labor; that is the only excuse
for having them, and if the air currents can be enlarged so that the
chicks can get a moderate" amount of fresh air, nothing will displace
them. Labor is an important factor in the successful management of
a poultry plant. The profits are so small that it is absolutely necessary
to minimize expenditure in all possible ways. Crude oil can be
burned in all these large systems, and that is as cheap fuel as we
ever expect to get.

The fuel question is very easily answered, as so far, nothing
cheaper has been found to substitute for crude oil.

The Sandbox Brooder and Its Construction. — The sandbox brooder
was used by T. B. Purvine lasit year to care for 12,000 chicks hatched
by himself. About 9,000 came to maturity. A box is made about 20
feet long and one foot square, laid lengthwise of the house. Through
the center of it a terra cotta stovepipe runs from a wood stove to the
chimney. Around the terra cotta pipe, the box is filled with sand. A
low hover is placed over the box while the chicks are small, and re-
moved to make room for roosts later. Half a cord of wood is used
to brood each brood of chicks, from 800 to 1000 at a time. With this
sand brooder there is no gas in the air and extremes of temperature
are avoided, because the sand is not easily overheated and does not
lose its heat quickly if the fire dies out. Mr. Purvine has fourteen
houses all equipped with this system.

CHAPTER XIV

THE BUILDING OF BROODER HOUSES

There are several things to keep in mind when building brooder
houses for small chicks. There must be just so much warmth. Whether
it is to be all artificial warmth or whether we can conserve some of the
natural heat of the chicks by eliminating the cold air, is the question.

This much I have proven, that thin walls are not good for a
brooder house. Too much cold gets in at night and too much heat
during the day. This makes a very irregular heat that does not add
to the comfort of the chicks, nor to their health. One-inch lumber
of the shiplap or other matched varieties is the best material for a
brooder house. The thicker the wall the more cold it keeps out and
the more we conserve the natural, the less artificial heat need be used
to consume the oxygen in the room.

Where direct heat is used, the burner is usually placed in the cen-
ter of the room, and very few methods of ventilation have so far been
sufficient to cope with the amount of oxygen consumed by this burner.

More chicks die from a lack of oxygen than from shortage of heat;
one thousand chicks require, and must have, if they are to be well
brooded, an immense volume of fresh air. Now with ordinary methods
of heating, the heater consumes half the oxygen the method of venti-
lation allows for, so here is the problem. If fresh, warm air can be
conducted into the brooder house in sufficient quantity, very few
chicks that are at all fit to live will die. Hence the idea of conserving
what heat is possible by building with this view in mind. Good walls,
a good roof and a warm floor are great aids along this line.

For most of the brooder stove systems in use now, the size of house
called for is 14x16. Some I have seen were 12x14, but the large size
prevails. These houses have windows in all four directions, but they
are small and set well up away from the floors. Too much light
causes toe picking and other cannibalism in chicks.

One of our prominent poultrymen is quite well satisfied with this
system of brooding. He finds the pullets are more gentle, therefore
easier to handle than when brooded in small lots. This is quite nat-
ural because the tender is continually going in and out amongst them.
In another case, one of my neighbors lost a number of chicks just a
few days old because a man shouted to him near the brooder house;
the chicks stampeded like so many cattle and before he could separate
them, quite a number were suffocated. This, too, is natural. When

How TO MAKE A FIRELESS BROODER 45

chicks are only a few days old, they certainly do not understand what
noise means, and get frightened. So quietness should prevail until the
chicks get a line on what to expect from the tender, then they will be
gentle and docile. It is not so much the system after all, as the man
who operates it. All these systems have good features, and every poul-
tryman who is in need of one, should investigate the merits and de-
merits of each before investing his money. One lot of chickens prop-
erly brooded will often pay for a good system; while if it should not
prove to be good, it is enough to experiment with.

How to Make a Fireless Brooder

The theory, or working principle, of a fireless brooder is that the
heat of the chicks furnish enough heat to keep them warm. And this
is true, but every particle of that heat must be conserved. If it is al-
lowed to escape, the result will be chilled chicks, or what is worse,
chicks that have been huddled up in a bunch and got sweated.

Fireless brooders are rarely successful except in small hatches.
Twenty-five to fifty is enough to put in a ^fireless brooder and in all
cases the fireless brooder must be in a building. A box 2x3 feet long
and eight to ten inches high will accommodate 50 jchicks until they are
six weeks old.

The cover should be hinged from the rear, so that when the chicks
are out, the box cover may be lifted up and aired. The hover part, the
cloth that hangs down on the chicks' back, is laid on cleats for han-
diness. By being loose it can be taken out and set in the sun during
the day and the whole brooder be kept sweet and clean.

Nail cleats on both sides and ends about two inches from the top.
Make a frame to fit loosely on these cleats. Tack a piece of soft ma-
terial, such as flannel or Canton flannel on to the frame, allowing it
to sag in the middle just so that it will rest on the chicks' backs. On
this should be laid a strip of cotton batting double, or more if the
weather is cold. Bore small holes at each end of the box, just above
this hover frame, for ventilation.

Now we are all ready for making the nest for the chicks. Remem-
ber, we have to conserve the heat and protect the chicks from getting
away from each other into corners were they might get chilled. If we
keep this in mind, it will aid us in making a snug nest that will keep
the chicks warm and safe.

Get some soft short litter, chopped straw or hay is best, and with
the hand go around all the corners, sides and ends until there is a good
warm lining of litter. Now make the nest after the fashion of a sau-
cer with about four inches of hay or litter in the bottom. Put on your
hover frame, cotton batting and cover with the lid over all. This

46 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

should be fastened with a hook and eye. The entrance should be about
eight or ten inches wide and three or four deep, ,as chicks do not like to
go through a very small opening. When the chicks are in, put your
hand in to see if all are snug and if so cover up the entrance with
some of the litter. These are the best kind of home-made brooders
and can be made of flooring boards, or ceiling boards, but some kind
of matched lumber is the best if only one box is used.

CHAPTER XV

POULTRY APPLIANCES

If you are going to hatch with hens, you must have a system. Do
not have hens sitting around the house in all kinds of places where it is
next to an impossibility to attend to them. A room or shed 12 feet
long can be made to accommodate twenty hens, or more if it is
worked right.

A Natural Hen Incubator

Build a box, without top or bottom, 18 inches high, 10 feet long
and 8 feet wide. Run partitions, one foot iapart the 8-foot way, mak-
ing compartments 12 inches by 8 feet. Divide these compartments in
the center into two, making them 12 inches by four feet. This will
give you 20 compartments. At the ends, away from the middle of each
compartment, take a board 6 inches wide, 1 inch thick and ten feet long
and nail across at the top, tacking it to each partition. This board
should be nailed so as to leave an opening 18 inches at the ends away
from the center partition. Hinge doors to these boards, having the
doors 18 inches by 3 feet, except one, which will have to be 18 inches
b3r four feet. Thus each door covers three nests at each end, except
one, which covers four. The space in the center, between the two
6-inch boards, should be covered with wire netting, 2-inch mesh. This
makes the top, and the ground is the bottom. Raise up the covers and
put your nests in next to the ends. Use two bricks to keep your nest
material from working away. Put a shovelful of dust and coal ashes
in each compartment, next to the dividing partition, away from the
nest end. Put water and feed at the other end as far away from the
nests as possible and toward the dust pile. Change the water every
day and see that the hens come off to feed. This gives a quiet, cool
place to set hens, and you can go along each day and raise up the
cover and see if your hens and eggs are all right. The hens are never
allowed out of the run, as you have room for water, grain and green
feed, right there to their hand all the time, also one of the best of dust
baths, as nothing beats earth and ashes.

This incubator will hatch more chicks than many of the 500-egg ma-
chines. If the hens are all of good size and it is set full and fifteen
eggs to the nest, you ought to hatch 250 good, strong chicks in the nat-
ural way with no more expense than the few cents for wire and a few
boards, that can most likely be found lying around the ranch. One
year I hatched over 700 chicks in such a natural incubator, and they
were good chicks.

48 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Very little can be done to improve the hen's method of handling
eggs, but if the eggs should get dirty, they should be taken out and
washed, while the hen is feeding. Filth should always be washed off
eggs if they accumulate any. If the weather is dry and hot at hatch-
ing time the nest can be sprinkled with warm water and the hen will
do the rest.

A Home Made Oat Sprouter

Make a set of boxes, any size you wish, without bottom or top;
make a frame of two upright boards say six feet high and fourteen
inches wide, now nail cleats on these upright boards about 8 inches
apart; put a board on top as a stay and another on the bottom. This
is the frame for your bottomless boxes, so the boxes must fit the
frame. Now get double pointed tacks and good burlap and tack bur-
lap bottoms in your boxes, fill the boxes about four inches deep with
oats or barley that has been soaked several hours and sprinkle from
the top. It should be set out of the wind as much as possible against
some building, and in winter if you have a shed to put it in the sprouts
would grow quicker.

Another Sprouter. — Make a frame of Ix6-inch lumber 3 feet wide by
8 feet long. Place this frame on hard ground and spread inside a bushel
of oats that have been soaked over night. Cover the oats with 1 inch
of loose earth and water every day. When the sprouts show through
it is ready to feed. Then with a garden hoe, work under the roots,
pull them up straight and you will have the best egg maker on this con-
tinent. Every hoe full has a big lump of dirt on it and lots of small
animal life which the chickens will use to good advantage.

How to Build a Cheap Trap Nest

A trap nest to be successful, must not only catch every hen that
enters, but must prevent the entrance of other hens. The one here
shown does that to perfection and is very simple to understand, as well
as to construct. In constructing one of these trap nests the gate is
made of thin boards, cleated top and bottom, and should be about
12x18 inches. A hole is sawed in the lower half 8 inches square. A
small gate is made by connecting two pieces of wood together with
three wires 8 inches long. Holes are bored in each end of these pieces
of wood, so the gate may slide up and down on two upright wires that
are fastened to the gate cleats. This gate is held up by a wire trigger,
having a shoulder bent on one end, on which the gate rests when
open. The closed door shows that the same kind of a wire shoulder is
used to fasten the door, which is done by simply pushing it shut. To
open the door this latch is raised with the thumb until the door is re-
leased.

These doors may be fitted to any kind of a box or barrel, but it is
best to nail a 1x4 up edgewise across the box, about 4 inches from the

TRAP NESTS

49

View of trap nests — The left-hand one is closed and the one on the
right open to show triggers.

front, to keep the nesting material from interfering with the gate. This
also makes the hen more certain to trip the trigger in entering the nest.
The partitions of the nests ,are made mostly of cheap muslin, and
extend from the platform to the roof, so that the hens cannot roost on
them. The fronts are made in one section and held in place by three
nails, partly driven, so that they may be readily removed should the
interior of the nest need spraying or whitewashing. The cost of mak-
ing one of these doors with the gate and trigger attached is about
25 cents each, so that there is no excuse for a handy man being with-
out trap nests on his poultry plant

Handy Poultry- Catching Hook

There is nothing belonging to
a poultry ranch more useful than
a good catcher. Some folks call
the dog, the children and even
the neighbors when they want
to catch a few hens. Now the
right way is to have a good piece
of poultry wire made into a small
panel, drive the flock, or part
of them into a corner, set up

T j u i £ ii. the panel and catch the fowls

Improved hook — part of poultry . , .^, A, . ,

catcher quietly one by one with this han-

dy catcher. In fact, it is just as

50 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

well to have several of them and keep one in each yard, then if a
bird shows any signs of sickness, it can be caught without having
to stop to think where you left the hook, and then run after it.
The hook is made of a six-foot piece of No. 10 steel wire and a
broom handle. The hook is so bent that it is larger where the
shank of the fowl is 'held than at the opening. Thus the fowl is not
injured when caught and it cannot get away. The wire is less con-
spicuous than the wooden end which attracts attention when you
slip the hook over the shank. The wire may be braced and made
stronger by wrapping it with No. 8 steel wire for the last two feet
next the handle, or it may be made of wire alone, braced the last
four or five feet and a hook made to hang it up by.

How to Make An Egg Tester

Take an empty box that has been used for breakfast foods, an
oat box is generally the strongest. Cut off one end, and then cut
away the/ pasteboard (on one side) on a curve so as to come
against your forehead. On the opposite side, make a V-shaped
opening to fit the nose; in fact, you want to fix this pasteboard
box so it will come up tight and close around the eyes, nostrils
and forehead. When put up against your face you have a dark
box. In the opposite end of the box make, with a small-bladed
knife, an oval opening. It should be just about the size and
shape of a good-sized spectacle glass. The egg is to be held
up against this opening, on the outside; but in order to have it fit
tight against the pasteboard you must paste around the opening
a circle of dark-colored cloth. A piece of black muslin is good.
The idea is to shut out every particle of light that might get in
around the egg. Then if the light is cut off in the same way when
the box comes up against your face, you will have a little "dark
room." With this instrument you can tell whether a white egg
shell has the germ, started in 48 hours. In 72 hours, three days,
you can tell very plainly. Point your egg tester right towards the
sun; or, if after night, hold the egg near a strong lamp or electric
light.

Use For Tomato Cans

Tomato, or other quart cans can be made to do service in the
poultry yards. After one end is cut out to get the contents, take
a pair of tin shears and cut a half moon down the side. Make the
edge dull with hammering it over a little, then make a nail hole
and hang up on side of house, or feed boxes. They do very well to
put grit or other things in, such as bone, etc., for small yards. Or
if you ship fowls either to market or to customers, they are better
than whole cans for watering in. Usually a male bird is a little

FOOD HOPPERS 51

afraid of putting his head in a deep can, but he will always drink
from one that is wider than it is deep. Besides, express men do
not, as a rule, fill such cans when they water stock, so that the',
cut cans are better in many ways. If you have a sick chicken
these cans come in handy, because they can be thrown away after
using if the disease was contagious.

A Simple Food Hopper for Chicks

This is a very simple hopper that hens can eat from on both
sides. One half the top is hinged, so that it can be raised to put
feed in or to clean out the hopper, the other side of top is fas-
teneid down. The hopper is 8 feet long and 8 inches wide. The
ends are solid. The side board is 4 inches wide. A strip project-
ing 1/2 inch is nailed on top of the side boards to prevent the
chicks pulling the feed out and wasting. The upright slats are 3
inches apart and common laths will do, though 2-inch battens are
better. The hopper may be set on a 2x4, 2 feet long, one at each
end, nailed across the hopper to prevent it^turning over, as it might do,
being so narrow. The height between the bottom part and top of
the hopper, or the feeding space, should be from 6 to 8 inches, and
the covers should have a good pitch, like a house roof, to keep
chicks from climibing up on it. If it extends out a little way so
much the better, as then it shelters chicks from the sun.

A Home Built Hopper For Hens

Cut out two boards for the sloping sides. These may be either
redwood or pine, four inches wide at the bottom, ten inches wide
at the top, and 20 inches high. These are triangular in front. The
front board is 15x18 inches and the back board is 15x20. Two
boards 5x8 inches tacked on at the bottom keep the grain in at
the side. A board 15x5 inches closes the front feed box and one
15x2 inches should be tacked on to prevent the feed from being
wasted. Care must be taken that the angle of the two sides is
not too sharp, or the hopper may get top-heavy when filled with
grain. The bottom of the hopper should be 15x12. This will tend
to make it stable on its feet. The front upright board should lack
2 or 3 inches of going to the bottom to give a force for the feed. Make
the cover several inches wider and longer than the hopper to keep the
feed dry.

A Hopper That Holds A Hundred Pound Sack of Feed.

This is a serviceable hopper. It holds one hundred pounds of
mash or grain and this should last sixty hens a week.

To make. Take a common redwood board 2 inches wide for bot-
tom and ends, saw a piece two feet long for the bottom, and two

52 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

pieces three feet long for the ends. Nail these together, ends in
bottom. For back and front use tongue and groove lumber,
as it stands weather better. To put in your back, fit the
first board inside of the ends, letting it come on bottom in center
of hopper, putting the rest of back boards even with the outside. Put
the rest of boards on outside. This lets your feed come out in front.
Now put a four-inch strip across front at bottom. This prevents hens
throwing out the grain. The cover should reach out at least one foot
so as to protect the feed and the hens while eating, and should be
made of water-proof material.

A Good Beef Scrap Hopper

This 'hopper can be made on the same plan as the other, only
smaller and make the throat \l/2 inches instead of one inch, because
beef scrap does not feed as easily as grain or dry mash. You can
also make a three department hopper of this by giving it a two-inch
throat. This will feed oyster shell, beef scrap and grit.

Another Home-Made Hopper

This is suitable for indoors or in dry weather outdoors and it
costs nothing. Get a box at the grocery store, say fifteen inches long,
five inches wide and 10 to 12 inches high. Now board this box up
tight, only leaving a 3-inch opening across the entire front of the box
near the top. Fill the box with beef scrap and hang it up by a nail
and the hens can eat it empty and no bother about clogging or other
fuss.

The two hoppers mentioned above will need a cover that reaches
at least 8 to 10 inches over the front where the chickens feed. As
the hopper only feeds from one side the cover should hinge at the
back and the hopper set against the wall. The cover being made of
tongue and groove boards, similar to the back and front, will protect
the feed in rain storms and also the hens while eating, if brought out
wide enough. Beef scrap, too, must be covered, hence the hopper
will need one unless put indoors.

CHAPTER XVI

RAISING BROILERS

The raising of broilers at a profit, unless you feed your own laying
stock, is almost impossible. The three great drawbacks being infertile
eggs, diarrhoea, and chicks with not enough vitality to stand forcing.
All three of these faults will be dealt with in the chapter on "How
to Feed the Breeders." We often hear the stock condemned for all
these troubles, but it is not the stock that needs the blame, but the
feeder. Nearly all a poultryman's troubles can be traced to the feed-
ing. And that ought to make us more careiful, but the fact is, that,
people will persist in doing things even when they know they are
losing by it. But all this belongs to another place and right here is
the place to talk about raising broilers.

The chicks that are intended for broilers will be all the better for
a good long fast before feeding at all. Instead of 48 hours keep them
72 hours in the incubator without food or water. This cleans up every
particle of the yolk that the chicks have to live on during these first
hours of life. The digestive tract is empty and now ready to absorb
whatever food is carried to them.

There are two plans of feeding broilers and choice of plan depends
somewhat on the time the chicks are hatched, and on the demands of
the market they are intended for. What I call the rapid plan will put
the chicks on the market as early broilers but at the price of quality,
for the meat is never quite as good. The slow plan takes a little
longer but the meat has a better flavor.

The Slow Plan

We will take the slow plan first. The chicks can be treated as if
intended for layers and breeders for one month. That is they can
be allowed ample exercise, indoor and out and given moderate feeding.
At the end of a month, if they commenced with a 72-hour fast, they
have built up strong gizzards and good strong digestion, so that they
can assimilate a lot of feed without being laid out with diarrhoea.
This is most important, for unless you have a strong bony structure
that will hold meat, and unless the digestive tract can assimilate the
food, you can't raise profitable broilers.

At the end of a month you can select the pullets from the cockerels,
if you wish, and they have had the very best treament towards making

54 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

good breeders and layers. Then you can commence to put the flesh
on the cockerels.

Now chicks with such a start can stand a lot of spoiling in the
way of food, and in putting broilers in shape for market, most of the
food must be mashes. Vary the kind every day and feed only what
they will eat up in fifteen minutes. All kinds of waste vegetables can
be used in making these mashes, but care must be taken that they are
not too sticky. Never leave them before the chickens to sour, as
that would rob the chicks of appetite and cause diarrhoea. Ground
oats, barley meal, wheat bran, middlings and ground corn can be used
to fill up any or all of the mashes, but it is better to use just one or
two at one time and change off. Always add a little salt, some char-
coal and beef scrap in the mashes. By mixing these ingredients in the
dry mash stuff before adding water, you get them more evenly dis-
tributed.

A dish or sour milk once in a while will help keep up the appetite,
so if at all handy, serve it.

Green feed galore can be served and that will keep up both appetite
and health. The animal food should be increased with the age and
size of the chicks.

When yellow legs and skin are desired, put ten per cent of cotton
seed meal in the mash, more than that will make the mash sticky.

For milk-fed chickens, which bring the best price in the market
where they appreciate good things, the feed should all be mixed with
sour milk or buttermilk. This is usually made the consistency of
porridge and then the fowls are not given any water to drink. Sweet
skim milk does just as well if it can be procured and if a little care is
taken, the appetite can be held for three weeks, but that would be the
limit. Fowls fed after this manner are usually in good condition to
start with and this is the best way to finish them. They are fed in
troughs and are given no exercise, so that the meat is soft and tender
with a delicious flavor that nothing else but milk can impart.

During the last week of fattening milk-fed poultry add a table-
spoonful of melted tallow for each chicken to be fed. Do this twice
a day and you will have the very best of milk-fed poultry. The
troughs and all feeding utensils must be kept strictly clean, and the
chickens kept in slatted pens so that all droppings fall down below on
the ground and the chickens are clean and wholesome. Too much
cannot be said about cleanliness in this matter, for filthy feed troughs
soon rob even a chicken of its appetite, and when the appetite fails,
the birds may as well be killed as they will not put on any more flesh.

Broilers that have been raised four weeks as breeders or layers
should be raised, and four weeks with less exercise and plenty of
green feed and dry food are in prime condition and about the right
age for making milk-fed chickens. They will also stand the cramming

RAISING BROILERS 55

that is necessary in order to get them in condition. To have them
about three months old when ready for the table, there has been no
feed lost, no time spent in useless feeding and your runs can soon be
ready for the next lot.

The Rapid Plan

To use this plan it is absolutely necessary to start with good
strong chicks that have been starved 72 hours after leaving the in-
cubator.

Being sure on this part, start in and feed them every 2 hours.
Commence at six o'clock in the morning and feed every two hours
until you have given them seven feeds. Don't overfeed the first ten
days, because if you do the chicks will get stalled and go back on
their feed. The last feed in the evening may be the one exception,
for then they should have all they can eat of chick food. During these
first ten days the food should consist of something easy to digest, such
as stale bakers' bread soaked in milk, rolled oats partly cooked but
not pasty. Green food ad libitum, cooked vegetables, cooked rice and
even a little dry bran, but the cooked foods must predominate. A
boiled liver and some vegetables cooked "in the water, then pin head
oats mixed in last and just let steam a little, the liver being chopped
all through the feed, makes a great dish for them. Animal food is
one thing a chicken rarely stalls on.

By this method of feeding it is possible to make a broiler plant
pay a good profit. Where the hens are not stimulated to heavy egg
production there will be no diarrhoea, unless the brooding is wrong,
no leg weakness and very few chicks dying.

To succeed with broilers the parent stock must be strong enough
to give the chicks vitality to overcome these things. I have known
cases where the chicks lived ten days and then commenced to die
like flies. When the parent stock has been fed on too much starchy
foods, it reacts worse on the chicks than too much meat diet, that is,
there are always more losses.

CHAPTER XVII

FEEDING FOR EGGS

We have discussed getting eggs for hatching purposes, so that in
at least the second generation we would have stock that would be so
full of the vital spark they would not only live but that they would
have enough of that vitality to transmit to the progeny.

That is the foundation to build on, and anything less than perfectly
healthy, vigorous fowls are not fit to breed from. Breeding from
sickly stock is like building a house on sand without a foundation.

In this chapter we are going to talk about eggs for commercial
purposes and how to get them both winter and summer, always pro-
viding you have the foundation to work on. For you can't make sickly
hens lay eggs of any kind in quantities to pay. You may force them
a little with stimulants, but if the vigor is not there, they soon give
out. So we are presuming that you have the foundation built and are
all ready for business.

Commence your day's feeding with a light meal of either wheat,
or barley that has been soaked and processed for one or two days,
according to weather. Just at present, barley is much cheaper than
wheat, and the poultryman who expects to make money with chickens
must look twice at the price of a grain he is about to buy. The next
item of interest to him is, will the cheaper feed serve the purpose he
wants it for, will it bring eggs? If it will do this it is cheaper than
the other both ways. ^Barley does bring eggs if fed right, it is a strong
food and hens do not relish it quite as well as they do wheat, but we
don't need to consult a hen's taste, only her needs and barley fills
her needs for an egg ration.

Now about nine o'clock, give the hens their green feed or processed
oats if you have them and if feeding dry mash, of course the hoppers
should be opened up, so that the hens can help themselves. At noon,
if you do not feed dry mash, give a fairly good feed of moist mash,

Even if you do feed dry mash a small feed of moist mash will be
very acceptable to the hens about noon; hens seem to relish it. If
you have sour milk with which to mix the mash you will get better
results.

If the hens have dry mash before them, they will need no further
feed until the last meal, which should be of good sound grain, unless
you are well supplied with green feed, in which case give them some

SPROUTED OATS FOR EGGS 57

to pick at, or a few roots such as mangel wurzel or other beets, or a
cabbage head. Plenty of succulent feed pays a big dividend in eggs.

Besides the feed, hens should be well supplied with grit, oyster
shell and bone. Bone is one of the most important factors in getting
commercial eggs; there is plenty of lime in bone and this in a form
most acceptable to a hen's anatomy. It can be supplied in the mash,
but if not supplied in this manner, then it must be kept where the hens
can help themselves.

If labor is not considered, there is not anything on this green earth
that pays better in eggs than sprouted oats. But it is a chore to
furnish a big flock of hens with enough sprouted oats to count. I
have been feeding sprouted oats for over ten years, so know what
I am saying, but as stated, it is a big chore. Oats to a hen is what
oats is to a horse. It is life and vitality.

All horses that are to be depended upon in times of stress are fed
on oats, which gives strength and fleetness to the race horse and they
will give strength and endurance to your hens to keep on laying all
the year around.

Two feeds a day of sprouted oats wilj give you eggs in winter,
when nothing else will. I am speaking now in general, but I am going
to tell you how to feed each breed or rather each class of poultry
separately.

There are a great many mistakes made by feeding all alike. It
does not pay, because their needs are not all alike.

Different Breeds Require Different Treatment.— All the small active
breeds can stand a little more of the fattening foods, such as corn,
than the heavy breeds. They do not put on so much flesh, so in place
of the barley or wheat, cracked corn or Egyptian corn can be served
for the morning meal, or if preferred, for supper, especially in winter
when eggs are wanted for hatching.

But for the large breeds no corn should ever be fed, as they get
too fat internally. Make them scratch for the most of their living
and you will have strong, healthy hens and chicks.

CHAPTER XVIII

BALANCED RATIONS, WHAT ARE THEY?

In the last chapter it was stated that there are many mistakes
made by feeding all alike, because their needs are not all alike.

The reason all breeds of fowls need different treatment in feeding
is one of temperament. The active breeds can digest more food with-
out injury to themselves than the heavy breeds. So if you feed any of
the small breeds corn in the ration they can use it to good advantage
in building up the tissues of the body that are used up in activity,
while foraging around almost aimlessly. If you feed corn to the large
breeds that are content to stay where they are put and spend no
energy in rambling around, they use the corn to lay on more fat and
flesh. Corn is a flesh and fat builder and in balancing a ration for
the different breeds we have to keep in mind what each article of food
is used for. Or rather what use the hen will put it to, according to
her build.

What Is Protein? — Protein is the name given to all nutritive sub-
stances that contain nitrogen. It is a general name because protein
includes albuminoids, and these are found in the white of egg, in
milk, in the blood, etc.; casein (the curd) of milk; myosin, the basis
of lean meats, and muscle and the gluten of grains. More than that
it includes such things as a gelatine obtained from hoofs, gristle,
bones, extracts of all animal matter, fish and other things too numer-
ous to mention.

What are Carbohydrates? — These are the starches obtainable from
grains, vegetables, the livers of animals, the sugars that are found in
all grains, fruits, milk and a cellulose from the fibre of plants.

What Fats Are. — The fats include all grease from animal flesh, fat
of milk, fats of vegetable oils, yolks of eggs, and that which is found
in all grains and vegetables.

What Are Minerals? — All grains, all vegetables, and one may say,
all animals, contain mineral substances in more or less quantities. It
is chiefly the mineral substance in the ground that all plants feed on;
the vegetable lives on the mineral. Therefore all foods contain some
minerals, but bones contain very little else. Please remember that
minerals are classed as phosphates of calcium, sodium, magnesium,
etc., and every living thing contains them.

BALANCED RATIONS 59

What of These Substances in the Feeding of Hens?— The office of
protein is to build bone, muscle, tissue, hair or feathers, and is nec-
essary to keep the animal body in repair. It renews and keeps up
the animal organism.

The office of carbohydrates is to maintain the heat of the body,
maintaining motive energy, and any excess over the needs of the body
is converted into fat.

Fats also maintain the heat of the body and furnish motive energy;
if a fowl be, at any time, kept without food the fat furnishes what is
required in heat and motive power until all the extra fat and flesh is
gone, then death steps in.

The vegetable proteins never fill the place of the animal protein,
both iare necessary and both fill the wants of an animal organism to
produce results.

Ordinary foods rarely contain sufficient mineral substances for
hens that are laying eggs, hence we must provide for the shell.
Minerals supply the material for shell making, feather making, and
the egg itself must contain mineral or the embryo could never develop
into a chick. In the growing chick, it is necessary for the growth of
both bone and feathers and it must be in that form that is the easiest
to assimilate, in order that the chick make quick growth. Bone, in
any form, oyster shell, grit and even good coarse sand furnish free
mineral substance and if given plenty of these, neither hens nor
chicks will ever suffer for want of minerals.

What a Balanced Ration Is. — A balanced ration is one where the
protein contents have a certain definite amount as compared with
another certain definite amount of carbohydrates, fats and minerals.
It is the effort of man to regulate the needs of nature. A balanced
ration, to be of any account must be compounded from a list of animal
foods, grain foods, vegetable and mineral, in such proportions as to
act as substitutes for bugs, worms, seeds, grasses, and pebbles the
fowls would find if at liberty.

The Processes of Digestion. — The processes of digestion are chem-
ical in action, or rather, they are reactions. Hence so much of one
substance is always required to make ia change in another substance.
To illustrate, it requires fat and lye to make soap, just those two
ingredients, but more than that, it takes so much, fat and so much
lye, or the fat will not mix and we still have, in part at least, the two
separate articles, fat and lye; the chemical reaction does not completely
occur until the right amounts are mixed. In a similar way, the di-
gestive ferments can only fully act when the food is mixed in right
proportions. Concentrated foods, like protein, if given alone, would
pass out of the system unused, in part, and must be mixed with other
food of a bulky nature so that the digestive ferment can operate
on the whole.

60 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Cooking Vegetables. — When vegetables are cooked and fed to
hens the digestibility is increased, but the sugar escapes in the water.
Now if the water is used to mix up a mash in which the contents are
protein, carbohydrates and fats, the sugar from the water is im-
pregnating the whole mash, and while the sugar is almost immediately
absorbed into the system, it has started the action of the others and
each will be taken up in turn to use for either egg making or flesh.

Feeding the Different Breeds

And now we come to that one point where so many people make
mistakes in feeding. The large breeds, such as Orpingtons, Rocks,
Wyandottes, Rhode Island Reds, Langshans and Cochins, are all of
quiet, contented dispositions, satisfied to remain inside a very low
fence. It never worries them to be fenced in at all, they eat what
you give them and make the best possible use of the same. There-
fore, to feed them a lot of food that furnishes motive power, is waste.
They are so well feathered that winter weather, even down to zero,
would not send them to hunt cover, and certainly no rain storm.
When the small fowls are huddling up in corners out of rain or wind,
these others are quite comfortable and shelling out eggs. So they
do not require so much heat-making food and if it is given to them,
as in the case with the other food, they make the best of it, some that
are of good laying type, will use it for eggs, others use what they
can for flesh, and much of it passes away as ash.

On the other hand, the Leghorns, Anconas, Minorcas, Andalusians,
and all breeds of light weight require more food of a starchy nature,
because they are more active. They require more heating foods
because the body is smaller and does not generate heat sufficient to
withstand cold or wet weather, neither are they so heavily feathered,
and all these things must be taken into consideration in feeding.

CHAPTER XIX

FEEDING THE BREEDERS

This is the most important chapter in the book for those who
produce eggs for hatching whether for themselves or hatcheries.
And right here I am going to make a very radical statement, and that
is "that you can't hatch chicks that will amount to anything from
stock that has been stimulated by a too stimulating diet for more
than one generation."

It can't be done, because their vital organs have been so over-
worked that they have no vitality to put into the egg. What is not
in the parent stock cannot be transmitted to the offspring. The feed-
ing, then, of the breeding stock, should be considered more than it
is, but the facts are, people only consider the quantity of eggs they
can get, and quality remains an unknown feature of poultry raising.
But in the end the price has to be paid in losses, so it is far better
to learn in time.

Now the question is: What are the stimulants for poultry, and what
constitutes a stimulating diet?

First among stimulants are drugs, condition powders, poultry
mustard, Cayenne pepper, etc. Some of these are sometimes useful
in cases of sick fowls, in fact everybody uses such things in times
of need, so that even drugs have a place in poultry culture, but their
place is not in the feeding or dosing of breeders. If breeding poultry
are not in fit condition to breed, make them so by removing the unfit
and feeding the best on good sound grain and vegetables.

Second, and now we come to the ration proper, of fowls. Drugs
are neither food nor drink, therefore not to be classed as a diet or
ration. The greatest stimulant we have in the food line is green bone,
or fresh ground bone as it comes from the butcher. If this is fed
to breeders, it must be in very small quantities, say one-quarter ounce
to each hen and only two or three times a week. The next is beef
scrap, in fact all kinds of animal food act more or less as a stimulant
to poultry, and yet some is necessary to keep them in a natural healthy
condition. So it is not with the animal food itself that we find the
harm, but in the quantity that is fed to produce eggs. A little ground
bone, or meat of any kind is all right and may be called a proper
article of diet, but when you feed more than a hen would be likely
to get under natural conditions, then it is harmful.

And now the third and most dangerous stimulant, I say dangerous
because it is generally considered so harmless, is mash. I don't care

62 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

whether it be dry or moist mash, if it is fed in quantity to breeding
hens it is harmful to the chicks that are hatched from the eggs. It
will produce eggs, yes, and eggs that will hatch, but if fed in such
quantities as to over-stimulate the egg organs, the chicks will be
hard to raise, many of them will die, no matter what care is given
them, and nearly all of them will have some form of diarrhoea.

Having gone so far, it is now my place to go farther and tell you
what constitutes a proper ration for breeders, that will not prove
harmful to hens or chicks, nor unprofitable to the breeder.

Hens must be treated as you would other animals, that is as near
to a natural condition as is possible for us to go without losing out.
That is our part of the deal, to watch the financial end. And I claim
that if we take care of the quality of the eggs the breeders lay, that
the financial part will adjust itself.

How much profit can we make by hatching one hundred chicks
and only raising fifty of the one hundred? We have taken up the room
in the incubator that might have been used to hatch good chicks;
we have spent some of our own time turning eggs that could have
been spent in better and more profitable ways; we have used up oil
that costs money, vegetable feed that could have been used other ways
besides energy and patience galore to hatch fifty chicks that would
not, or could not live, no matter what you did for them because the
vital spark was too weak. I learned the lesson many years ago and
have done my best to tell others, but the method of mash feeding is
too alluring to give up after once getting started with, so each one has
to learn from experience.

A short time ago a Pomona poultry man came to ask me what was
the trouble with his chicks, he said the first hatching did finely, then
they commenced to die like flies and yet he gave them the same care
and everything that was possible, yet he could not raise them. I
told him the trouble was in his feeding system and that during the
early spring, when he got his first lot of eggs, the hens had been
having a rest and were in better condition than later, so that the
chicks inherited a little more of the parent energy.

He said, "I believe you have the right idea, but why don't you say
more about it in the journals?"

I have said it more than once, 'but few people want to wait long
enough to get results, mash feeding brings quick results and that is
why it holds favor. They look at the present and forget the future.

My Method of Feeding. — This is no get-rich-quick scheme, but it
will give you fertile eggs from which you can raise, with proper care,
at least 95 per cent of the chicks hatched and the difference between
95 per cent and 50 per cent is quite large, so that it ought to make
you some money, if not make you rich.

MY METHOD OF FEEDING 63

In the morning, feed a light feed of barley that has been soaked
and dried off, or wheat, say a quart to fifty hens in deep litter. Make
them scratch for this early meal, scratching starts the blood to cir-
culate and makes the hens warm up to business. If the weather is
cold, water them with fresh water either drawn from the well or from
the hydrant. Water is always warmer when fresh than if it stands
in the drinking vessels all night.

At about nine A. Mr, give them a feed of sprouted oats, all they
will eat, and at one o'clock give a little dry bone in the litter or three
times a week a feed of beef scrap or fresh ground bone.

At three o'clock another feed of sprouted oats or barley, and for
the evening meal as much wheat in the litter as they will scratch for,
they won't want very much.

If there are any roots or vegetables give some of them to the hens,
only don't feed anything of too watery a nature. To vary things, if
you can not get bone feed, a little moist mash at noon made in a
crumbly state, not wet, and feed just a little for each hen, not enough
to gorge her.

This is no starve-out system but a natural, healthy system of feed-
ing without stimulating any organ in the "hen's body.

By this method of feeding it is possible to nourish the hen's body
so that what eggs are laid will have a positive potential energy, to
furnish the chick with a working base for life.

The egg organs of a hen that has been stimulated for heavy egg
production by lots of meat, mash and poultry condiments are under
the microscrope seen to be in an inflamed condition.

Healthy organs are always of a pinkish color; when that changes
to red, there is always more or less inflammation present. And when
eggs for hatching are produced under such conditions the chicks
inherit this tendency to inflammatory diseases. They may break out
in various ways, provided they live to maturity; some will have
rheumatism, others diarrhoea, and some may be all right apparently,
but have very little stamina.

But a good wholesome method of feeding will bring them back
so that the second generation will be strong and healthy fowls. This
could not be done if fowls were very long lived because it would
take much longer to undo the mischief.

Government Work For Poultry Industry

During the past few years the Government has done some very
good work for poultrymen. When experiments are made by the
individual it always carries a bigger loss than the average man can
afford. Then again, the tests fail to satisfy many people who are so
built that they can only believe that which is given by authority.

64 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Several years ago I experimented along the lines given below,
which are taken from Bulletin No. 145, by Horace Atwood, and issued
by the West Virginia Experiment Station. The bulletin is entitled
"Some Facts Affecting the Weight, Composition and Hatching of
Hens' Eggs." The author says:

"The feeding of green feed had no effect on the size of the eggs
produced, as was shown by the experiments* reaching over a period
of an entire year. Throughout the year the average weight per hun-
dred eggs was 11.89 pounds for fowls receiving green food, as com-
pared with an average of 11.88 pounds for fowls that did not receive
any green food. At the conclusion of the test the eggs laid by the
pen without green food averaged larger than those of the other pen.
But, and here is the point, the pen receiving green food made an
increase in production of 26 per cent. And yet there are poultrymen so
foolish as to neglect this one great means of increasing egg produc-
tion and lessening the food bills at one and the same time.

"Liberal feeding noticeably increased the weight of eggs produced
and also the percentage of fertility. As was to be expected, liberal
feeding resulted in much larger production than when the hens were
scantily fed. It may seem to some that there is no occasion, at this
late date, for demonstrating or discussing such an elementary point,
but as a matter of fact a large proportion of those who keep fowls
especially on the farms, are still of the opinion that it pays to half
starve hens, so that they will forage and collect a considerable por-
tion of their food on the range. I doubt if any flock handled in this
way, even on the farm, ever gives as profitable results as they would
with more liberal feeding. As this bulletin points out, heavy feeding
increases the size of the eggs as well as the number.

The fertility of eggs in the scantily fed pens was found to be low,
but the eggs that were fertile hatched practically as well as a similar
number of fertile eggs from the heavy fed pens, and in all the tests
made the per cent of losses of chicks from the scantily fed pens
were smaller.

There was greater uniformity throughout the season in the per-
centage of the scantily fed pen. Hens on a full ration lose heavily
in fertility as the season advances because of their inability to main-
tain their vigor indefinitely. The only practical means of keeping
up the vigor of the breeding stock through a long hatching season
is to restrict production to what may be called the natural physio-
logical limit.

This scientific test bears out what I have told you in another
chapter of this book, on feeding the breeders. Hens that are stimu-
lated past what they would lay under fair, natural conditions do not
endow the progeny with enough vigor to make much of a fight for
life. At the first little hardship, or change of climatic conditions,
they go under, and are only to be counted as "has beens." I have

OVER USE OF STIMULANTS 65

seen chicks die like flies, even when every condition that one would
expect them to need was filled, simply because the parent stock had
been over fed and stimulated to lay eggs, regardless of what happened
to the chicks that were hatched from them.

Any breeder who will believe and act on this for just one hatch
will be more than convinced that this is the truth, and if he is honest
with himself he will never overfeed his breeders again. If he is selling
eggs to others, he should not aim to sell cheaper than the other
fellow, because he will lose out if he does. But charge according to
quality, and if people prefer to pay for chicks that may or may not
live, why the breeder who sells what he knows will live, can better
hatch his own and sell at three months old.

There is so much to be learned about feeding that no wonder busy
people don't learn it, even in a life time, but we all need to learn
enough to get a good working basis for present conditions.

CHAPTER XX

FATTENING AND PREPARING FOWLS FOR MARKET

It is not uncommon to hear people say they have some poultry
ready for table purposes, and they are sold for that purpose, when
they are but just in good condition. There is a good deal of difference
between being in good condition and being finished, or prepared for
market.

Before fowls are really fit to sell for table fowls, they must be
confined to a limited space where exercise is limited. Then, again,
there must be a proper food; if we only want to fatten them that is
easily done with corn, as corn will fatten anything. But if we want
to get flavor and quality with the weight it is necessary to go to a
little more trouble than throwing down some corn.

First of all, the chickens must be cooped up, it matters little what
kind of a coop is used so that it can be cleaned and so that the birds
can be fed from the outside. This is the most important feature, the
keeping of the chickens out of the feed they are to be finished on.
After cooping it is best to just give water and feed very light for a
few days. Get them hungry in the start and never spoil their appetites
by feeding too much. That is the whole secret of putting flesh on
cooped chickens, no matter what age or anything about it.

Sour milk or buttermilk if it can be had at reasonable prices will
pay a good dividendy not only as a flesh maker but it keeps the
chicken toned up to its appetite.

Among the foods that are best known are ground barley, ground
oats (these do better if the hull can be taken out) ; good wheat mid-
dlings and cornmeal or ground corn and bran. It is not really neces-
sary to feed all of these at one time, but take one as a base and add
any one or more to it and feed for that day. Pea meal is a very
old fattening diet that makes good meat, but ours is not a pea-
growing country, so our fowls are not likely to get it. If bean meal
can be had, this is a great addition to the list. The fowls being cooped
and starved until ready to eat anything, should be fed, sparingly at
first, of feed mixed about as thick as batter and mixed with either
water or milk as it can be got. After the fowls have eaten, the troughs
should be taken away and washed, put in the sun to dry and left
until the next feeding time. Three times a day is considered about
right and at each feeding the fowls must be left just so that they
could eat a little more. If they once get stalled, it is hard to get
them back. Feed all the green feed they will eat about twice a day

PREPARING FOWLS FOR MARKET 67

and keep other fowls away from them. If they can be put in a semi-
darkened place so much the better as they will put on flesh more
rapidly.

Three weeks is considered as long as it pays to keep them up,
and they s'hould be in good flesh to begin with. During the last week
put in every feeding about a tablespoonful of tallow to every bird, a
little salt .added to the feed makes it more palatable. Some do not
give any water, considering the thin feed sufficiently moist to serve,
but I always give water to drink and have not noticed any bad results.

At any time when the feed is not cleaned up as it should be, it
must be kept from them one meal at leiast, two if necessary.

The pens must be kept sweet and clean; if the weather is hot,
add a little carbolic acid to the water the coops and troughs are
washed in, as this keeps them sweet better than anything else.

It pays better, of course, to get private customers for fowls that
have been fattened and prepared like this, but if you have to sell on
open market or to commission men, it pays, because once they have
bought your birds they will know what 4o expect and the price will
be raised the next time and they will want more.

This is always more satisfactory than if a person has to beg a
market, especially if the market happens to be overdone with the
same size of birds you have to ship.

If the birds are for private trade, they should be kept without food
and water for at least twenty-four hours before killing. They are
much easier to clean and will keep better when this is done than if
the birds are fed the last day.

Killing. — Have an old case knife ground down on both sides until
it resembles a sharp pointed spear, and is not over a half inch broad.
About two or three inches long is right. Now, when ready to kill,
have the knife sharp and kill the bird by sticking the point of the
knife in the roof of the bird's mouth, giving it a twist after it enters
the brain. This is the cleanest and quickest method of killing.

CHAPTER XXI

BALANCED RATION FOR HEAVY BREEDS

It must be understood that in balanced rations, green feed, grit,
charcoal and all condiments are left out, being outside the term of a
"balanced ration."

The day's ration should commence with a feed of grain, in deep
litter to induce exercise. The grain may be either wheat, oats or
soaked barley, or it may be a little of all three, but never corn.
About nine o'clock feed some form of green feed, and if you are just
selling eggs for commercial purposes, feed a small amount of moist
mash about noon. The mash must contain one to four to be equally
balanced. That is if you have a quart measure you fill it once with
animal food, such as beef scrap, fish meal or meat meal, and four
times with the carbo-hydrates.

This is not scientifically correct, but it is as near as we can get
it without the different food values being analyzed by experts. Some-
times bran is lacking in protein and an expert would make it balance
with something else, and this, of course, cannot be done with crude
measurements. The "quart" is used because it is the smallest measure
used for ordinary purposes and it can be multiplied as many times as
is necessary.

The following mash is as good as can be made for all breeds of
fowls that are likely to put on flesh. It is not so much the mash
itself that causes troubles, but the quantity that is fed. For this
reason do not allow more than one good handful for each hen of
moist mash and a little more of dry, for one day's feeding.

Wheat bran, 200 pounds; ground barley, 50 pounds; ground oats,
50 pounds; alfalfa meal, 50 pounds; ground bone, 25 pounds; salt,
5 pounds; charcoal, 5 pounds; beef scrap, 25 pounds; fish meal,
40 pounds. Bone meal or ground bone does not contain quite as high
a protein as 'beef scrap or fish meal, so there is a little allowance
made for that and the protein contents appear to be a little higher
than they really are.

A good mash for all light breeds such as Leghorns, Anconas, etc.:
Wheat bran, 200 pounds; cornmeal, 100 pounds; wheat middlings,
100 pounds; ground oats, 50 pounds; ground barley, 50 pounds;
ground bone, 25 pounds; beef scrap, 50 pounds; fish meal, 50 pounds;
charcoal, 5 pounds; salt, 5 pounds; alfalfa meal, 50 pounds; soy
meal, 25 pounds. The alfalfa meal is optional and can be either given
or not according to whether the hens have plenty of green feed or

MASH FOR FEEDING HEAVY BREEDS 69

not. It has nothing to do with the balanced ration, but if hens do
not get enough green feed it is helpful to increase the vegetable
protein.

Another thing, the barley meal can be increased to take the place
of cornmeal with good results even with Leghorns. Barley is a
strong food and will answer every purpose, when ground, that corn
will, except that it works a little slower in fattening.

This mash may be fed in a hopper and kept before Leghorns at
all times, and will give good satisfaction. Other grains can be substi-
tuted for those mentioned, always keeping as near to the ration as
possible. Soy bean meal is a very rich vegetable protein that helps
eggs to come but is a little too fattening for the large breeds.

Cook up all the waste vegetables and wet the mash up with the
same liquor the vegetables are boiled in. Beans are about the only
thing chickens do not like and I never yet saw any that would eat
beans freely.

A change of food is always desirable, but it must be made gradual
or it may upset the fowl's digestion. "Go slow" is a good motto in
many respects, especially dealing with poultry.

CHAPTER XXII

THE MOLD THAT INJURES POULTRY

For some time we have fought shy of feeding any kind of food
that was affected with mold; and have been on the lookout for
information concerning it. That it causes bowel trouble, nearly every
one who handles chickens will admit, but we find among other things,
it is accredited with many other diseases, that are usually laid to
other causes.

Dr. Gushing was one of the first writers to discover that moldy
straw was a frequent cause of white diarrhoea in chicks. He told how
moldy straw was found in the crops of the chicks, and how the mold
spread through the system and developed characteristic nodules in
certain organs.

And now conies another man in Trinidad that 'has established the
fact that this mold has been the cause of an epidemic in "chicken pox."
This, he claims, is from feeding moldy grain.

A study of this mold with the scientific name of Aspergillus
Fumigatus, proves it to be the same mold that appears on bread.
Dr. Charles F. Briscoe, the instructor in Bacteriology at the Univer-
sity of Illinois, kindly gave this information about the mold in ques-
tion: "Origin — white bread; in the air passages and lungs of birds;
also in man. Color — a greenish or bluish gray growth. Fruit
Organs — The club-shaped ends of the fruit hyphae .are covered with
sterigmae from which extend rows of spores that are usually colorless.
The growth is best on bread and is rapid. Pathegenesis — Intravenous
injection of millions of spores in rabbits and dogs produced death
in a few days. Mycelia — Were found in the kidneys, heart and other
muscles and occasionally in the liver. Infection of doves and other
birds 'by inhalation of the spores produced a pneumonic or pseudo-
tuberculous disease. Natural affections of this kind are frequently
observed among 'birds. Occasionally they are met with in cattle
and horses, and at times in man."

In mycoses- of man, the lungs, ears, eyes and nose are subject
to invasion.

In 1897 Renon found that this mold developed on eggs during
incubation, and that it may contaminate the embryos contained
therein.

The most important treatise on this subject is contained in Bulle-
tin No. 58 of the United States Bureau of Animal Industry, Pul-

MOLD THAT INJURES POULTRY

71

Aspergillus Fumigatus, the mold that kills poultry.

monary Mycosis of Birds, and anyone who wishes more information
on this matter can obtain this bulletin by writing the Secretary of
Agriculture, Washington, D. C.

Readers will now see why I always advocate washing out both
incubator and brooder with a dilute solution of creolin. That it kills
mold spores I know. I also suggest that a teaspoonful of creolin be
put in the moisture pans so that the mold cannot develop during
incubation. Warmth and moisture breed it. A good supply of garden
soil should be used for bedding brooders and brooder houses. It is
important to refuse all moldy grain and straw, no matter how cheap
they appear to be, they are dear as a gift. It is also said that many
perons who work in flour mills and are supposed to have tubercular
disease, have really aspergillosis, or a disease caused by this mold
from eating moldy grain and living where the spores are present.

CHAPTER XXIII

EGG FOODS, OR CONDITION POWDERS

Recognizing that some of our readers may want to make their
own condition powders or egg makers, I will give a few that are as
good as the best.

The base of all good condition powders for either animals or
poultry is flax seed meal, either in its raw state (pure) or after
having the oil taken out. It is then called "processed" and in my
estimation cannot amount to very much in food values. Venetian
red, so-called, is, properly speaking, red iron oxide, and will bring
eggs, of that there is no doubt, but it has some injurious effect on
hens, because after being fed to them they never lay as well again
without it, hence it must be very stimulative.

Condition Powder No. 1

Capsicum 1 pound

Iron sulphate, powdered 1 pound

Magnesium oxide 1 pound

Venetian red 1 pound

Sodium bi-carbonate 1 pound

Sulphur 1 pound

Powdered chalk 2 pounds

Ground bone meal 2 pounds

Ground oyster shell 5 pounds

Charcoal 2 pounds

Table salt 2 pounds

Flax meal 10 pounds

Have all the ingredients in fine powder form and fresh and keep
in tight cans. Mix two scant tablespoonfuls in moist mash enough
for twenty hens.

Condition Powder No. 2

Fine ground mustard 5 pounds

Blood meal 10 pounds

Powdered Fenugreek 2 pounds

Saltpeter '. 4 ounces

Powdered gentian root 2 pounds

Ground ginger 4 ounces

CONDITION POWDERS 73

Flower of sulphur 1 pound

Table salt 2 pounds

Charcoal 2 pounds

Fine ground oyster shell 10 pounds

Black Pepper 5 pounds

Flax meal 10 pounds

Mix all together and give one tablespoonful to a dozen hens in
mash. The black pepper offsets the laxative qualities of the mustard
and blood meal, besides it is carminative and warming without being
too stimulating in effect.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE VALUE OF MILK IN THE POULTRY YARD

Poultry and ducks are carniverous in habit, and partly so by
nature. They do not belong to the same class of carniverous animals
as the dog, wolf, etc., but they must have animal food of some kind
in order to do their best. More properly speaking, they are insect
eaters, and ducks especially will not lay or thrive unless they are
supplied with a substitute for insect life. Ground fresh bone is the
nearest approach to insect life that we can furnish domesticated
fowls. But not many of us are so situated that we can obtain fresh
ground bone. Farmers are very rarely able to get it, living away
from centers where such things are produced. Now the next best
substitute is milk. Milk fills every requirement for poultry. The
man who has a flock of laying hens and enough milk to serve them
for drink is well off for a good supply of eggs. He can produce eggs
a great deal cheaper than the man who must buy beef scrap or other
animal food.

Not only will milk produce more eggs, but they will be of better
quality. Good, sound grain and milk together with a reasonable
amount of green food makes for a firmer yolk and a richer color.
And it stands to reason that the eggs will have a better capacity for
keeping longer than when the hens are fed on strong, highly flavored
meat food. Milk being rich in lime is also a great factor in shell-
making; this one item alone saves the hen's digestive organs, as she
has egg and shell material right to hand with the smallest amount of
labor.

For raising young chicks, there is no other form of animal food
that will make the growth of bone and muscle more so than milk.
It contains all the elements for feather, bone and muscle growth in
a much easier way for the c'hicks to digest than meat and fish
combined.

But it is in the fattening of all kinds of poultry that milk excels.
The U. S. Department of Agriculture has made extensive experiments
along this line, and in every case the use of milk in some form has
proven the very 'best for producing poultry meat of fine flavor and
quality.

Buttermilk and skim milk are the kinds most in use for fattening
poultry, usually sour milk. The sour milk has a tendency to keep
the appetite of the fowls sharp so that they are ready for every meal;

MILK AS POULTRY FOOD 75

it is also easy of digestion so that all of its value is appropriated by
the birds.

When a large number of birds are to be fed, the feed is mixed
in a large tub or trough with a garden rake, to the consistency of
thick cream, or so that it will drip from a spoon. In very hot weather
it is advis-a'ble to mix the feed a little thinner than in cool weather.
But if that does not satisfy the chickens, feed a meal or two of thick
feed. This has to be left to the judgment of the feeder some, as
he knows how the chickens are eating.

No water is given when this system of feeding is used — so it is
necessary to watch the chickens' needs.

CHAPTER XXV

THE MANAGEMENT OF POULTRY DURING THE SUMMER

California differs from all other states in the Union in summer
climate, and unless poultry is treated accordingly, it is not possible
to get the best results. Very little corn must be fed to layers, and
none to breeders. Old hens that are not intended to be kept over,
should be separated and given a two or three weeks' course of fatten-
ing. During that time they will lay more eggs and put on flesh at
the same time, unless they become broody. At the end of the fatten-
ing period, dispose of them, it makes more room for the young ones.

The question of profit in poultry is very much dependent on the
management of the sales department. Nothing that does not pay
its 'board bill and a little towards other expenses can be retained at
a profit and it should never be kept through the molt.

Some poultrymen make a clean up every fall, but I find it pays
best to get rid of the old hens before the molt commences. Go over
them in June, then again in July and separate the hens according to
age. After the last going over give the stock that is to make the
winter layers more room, by opening gates and taking down a little
wire. If the male birds have been removed and it is possible to turn
the hens into a green pasture or kale plot this will be a real vacation
for them. The older birds can be kept laying by feeding plenty of
egg-making food and an additional amount of green feed, while those
intended for breeders during the fall months should be given a rest
and this can only be done by cutting down the feed. Give just
enough to supply the "bodily needs of the hen, nature always attends
to that first, and it is the surplus feed the old dame uses for egg
production.

Plenty of shade, good cool water and green feed with a light
feed of grain morning and night will keep up the body and give
all the organs a rest.

If there is no natural shade, in the way of trees, if you plant a row
of sunflower seeds along the east and west sides of your poultry
yards and keep them watered and the soil stirred during April and
May, by June you will have splendid shade that the breeze can pene-
trate. There will be no panting for breath, no running in houses
out of the sun, but the yards will be as cool and moist as in early
spring.

It is surprising the effect shade has on laying hens, with a cooling
diet and shade they do not seem to know that it is summer; there is

VALUE OF SHADE IN SUMMER 77

very little broodiness, as compared with hens that have no shade,
and the eggs come merrily.

The young stock should be given all the range possible and a
good growing feed kept where they can help themselves.

During the heat of the day, chicks do not want much to eat, but
they like to be out early in the morning foraging, and late at night.
It is a chick's delight to catch the insect life that ventures out after
a warm day.

A few rows of kale plants will furnish both the forage and shade
for a good bunch of chicks. The growing chicks will need a little
meat, or milk is better if on hand; in facti, milk is the very best animal
food for either old or young poultry at any and all seasons, and
especially so during the summer season. Sour or clabbered milk
furnishes bone-making elements in a free condition that is easy to
digest; for the laying hens it furnishes animal food and lime for the
egg shell, but to those hens we desire to rest it should not be fed
too freely or they will go to laying more eggs.

To the hens that are to be disposed of before winter, animal food
may be given, in order to get all out of them that is possible, but for
stock that is to be kept over another >ear, whether yarded or on
range it is better to feed very little concentrated food.

Ventilation. — Another important feature in summering fowls is to
give plenty of ventilation in the houses. If it is desirable to face the
houses north, as it is in this locality, the houses can be raised from
the ground about four or six inches by placing blocks under each
corner. The air can then circulate all around, and being under the
perches no fear need 'be entertained of danger from draughts. Facing
the houses to the north with underneath ventilation gives a cool
house night and day; it also prevents mites from breeding under
the sills of the houses, as they frequently do when the houses are set
on the ground.

No Fast Rules. — As each locality has some little difference in cli-
matic conditions, there can be no set rules for all alike and while we
face our houses to the north some may do better to face them to the
east, south or west, but which ever way they face, they must be well
ventilated if the fowls are to do well and keep healthy.

It is well to remember in this connection that dark, damp places
are the breeding place for mites, so let in the light. If your houses
are closed up take out one end or side, even if you think you must
replace it for winter. Barrels of air are necessary in our climate for
all poultry and the old idea of night air being dangerous is done away
with. When left to themselves the chickens will sleep in the trees
with air all around them, and their combs are the indicators of good
robust health. So let us be generous in the matter of air and give
the fowls all that is good for them.

CHAPTER XXVI

THE MOLT IN CALIFORNIA

Many experienced poultrymen say that the molt is a perfectly
natural process, uncontrollable as to season and duration of time.
But with all due deference I disagree with them. The molt can be
controlled in both ways, that is, as to season and duration.

For hens that I know are strong and up to the mark in age and
vitality, I commence the molt by separating them from the rest and
giving them a cool, shady place in which to chew the cud of yester-
day. Plenty of water and air but little else for three days, then half
of one regular feed once a day for the next three days and this is
given at night.

About the sixth day, the feed is increased a little. About the
seventh day, if the feathers appear loose the hens are either turned
out or given more room and are fed all the succulent green feed
they will eat. As they are pretty hungry by this time they will eat
an enormous amount of green feed and this starts the feathers to
loosen faster. And from this time on they are given plenty of green
feed, and all other rations are increased. Animal food is demanded
as a feather grower, bone and mineral. Plenty of grain, and this
should be given in variety. In the morning, feed oats and wheat,
at noon barley, in the evening wheat and barley or a little Egyptian
corn, high protein and low carbo-hydrates and fats. Sprouted oats are
one of the best feeds for molting hens as also is barley. Barley
appears to be at its best after soaking about five hours and after
being drained, left standing in bulk eighteen hours.

Some hens lay moderately during a part of the molt. None appear
to lose any health or vigor, and unless the feathers are left lying
around no one would know the hens were molting. The new feathers
replace the old so orderly that the hens are never bare or ragged
looking like some are. The males do not seem to get the new feath-
ers as quickly as the hens, and sometimes it is necessary to help
them by pulling the feathers from the head a few at a time.

What Are Carbo-hydrates? — Carbo-hydrates embrace all the by-
products of the mill, all shorts, middlings, rolled oats, wheat bran, soy
bean meal, etc., all roots that are grown under ground, such as pota-
toes, carrots, beets, parsnips, etc. If these vegetables are served raw,
they are tetter for poultry than if cooked. Cooking breaks the cells
and makes quite a chemical change in the food product.

To HELP THE MOLT 79

Now, this is where so many people fail in getting a quick, even
molt, they serve as much, if not more of the mash feed to the molt-
ing hens than to those that are not molting. This makes flesh but
not feathers, and during the molt feathers are at a premium. Raw
ground bone, if it can be bad, can be served once a day to advantage,
and also a little mash every other day will help, but the idea is not to
crowd the system with carbo-hydrates. I do not mean to say that
the hens should be deprived of them altogether, but that protein
comes first and carbo-hydrates last. Sunflowers possess oil and
minerals tooth and they can be fed in small quantities at first, increas-
ing as the demand for new feathers increases. Green feed contains
more mineral than any other form of feed, perhaps, except animal
food, so the more green feed the chickens eat, the quicker will they
get over the molt and be back to laying. The molt is, at least, a long,
profitless period for the poultry raiser and if the unproductive period
can be lessened it will surely be of great benefit to all.

It must be kept in mind that lice and mites are no aids to a quick
molt. The hens must be kept clean and their roosting quarters be
both clean and well ventilated. If these- things are looked after your
hens will be back to laying in sixty days without fail.

CHAPTER XXVir

THE GENERAL PURPOSE FOWL

There are several breeds of fowl that come up to the ideal in
both eggs and meat, when we get the best specimens. These are
what we. mean by a general purpose fowl, a breed that will lay a fair
average of good sized marketable eggs and when it is time for her
to 'be sent to market will bring the cost of raising and caring back
in meat.

This can not be done with the small breeds because the carcass
will not weigh enough, nor will the public pay the top price for what
they do weigh.

For an egg farm the small breeds are the favorites, and there are
reasons for this that do not appear in print very often, because every-
one seems to be afraid to speak what they think for fear of hurting
someone else's feelings or some other foolish thing. Now, this is
all nonsense, because there is no breed of chickens or animals in the
world that is going1 to please everybody. We are all built on a
little different plan, that is, our likes and dislikes are our own, just
as much as our clothing or money is ours, and it is one of the greatest
blessings of humanity that there are a variety of good things, some
one of which suits every one of us.

After raising a great number of the different varieties of poultry,
and thinking each variety the best ever, I finally took up with Orping-
tons in 1904 and will stay with them as long as I keep a chicken,
because they fill the 'bill as one of the best general purpose fowls
that was ever bred. Hens that will lay near the two hundred egg
mark, all through a flock and will dress seven or eight pounds of
good, wholesome chicken meat do not find rivals every day; and any
flock of Orpingtons that are bred and raised right will do this. Take
them from chick to market and they are satisfactory all through.
The chicks are hardy, easily raised, quiet and easily kept in bounds.
They grow like weeds and until they commence to run to leg are
fit for the table at any time. After they commence to make long
legs it is better to leave them for soft roasters. The pullets will
commence to lay at six months of age and lay good sized eggs that
will bring the same price as hen eggs.

For those who like a yellow legged fowl there are the rocks of
all varieties, all good and as handsome as the best. The Rhode Island
reds and whites; the Langshans, black and white, are another good

AMERICAN OR ENGLISH CLASS 81

old breed, lacking the yellow legs but good general purpose fowls.
The Wyandottes are also general purpose fowls and these can be
seen in all colors. No other breed of fowls have quite as much
variety in feather and most of them are beautiful. Like the Orping-
tons the Wyandottes are very quiet and docile, while rocks are more
pugnacious. There is good fighting blood in the Barred Rocks, but
if you get a good strain they are wonderfully good fowls.

We see a few specimens at a poultry show at odd times of the
old breeds, such as the dark and light Brahma, the Dorking and
English Red Cap, but their day has passed; the newer favorites have
taken their place. And while we had a real liking for some of them,
I think it is a case of the "survival of the fittest."

At the present time we have so many good breeds, and all colors,
both solid color and parti-colors are to be found in each breed, that
it would appear as if any fancier can get just what he likes best, and
as it has been said many times, "It is not exactly the breed that
spells success but the man behind it."

This is true, for some men will not succeed with any kind of poul-
try, because they are not adapted to the work, while others succeed
with any and all kinds.

Neither does it take any more to feed an Orpington hen than a
small hen of any -breed, because she utilizes every particle of food
for the 'business of egg or flesh making.

As shown previously, the general purpose fowl embraces the
American class, the English and the French, and nearly all colors
and varieties can be found to please everybody, as also the color of
shank and skin for those who have a prejudice or a liking.

There is one thing to remember in opening up a general purpose
farm — all these fowls, except the French breeds^ lay a colored egg.
And when eggs are plentiful, these eggs are discriminated against,
generally to the tune of one cent a dozen. When eggs are scarce,
as they usually are in winter, they bring top price just as the white
egg does. So this is such a small matter it is scarcely worth
mentioning at all, 'but that this question generally comes up when a
person is trying to decide and it is well to have the facts. I believe
the prospects for selling eggs by weight was never better than at
this time, and whenever that occurs, the breeds that lay the dark
egg will surely come into their own.

For a general purpose fowl, there can be no mistake in choosing
a breed from either the American class or the English. Get good
birds to start with and keep them good 'by introducing new blood
which tends towards vigor and health. Unless the intention is to
breed for the fancy, you need no line breeding chart or other frills.
Find a good, reliable breeder of pure bred stock and recruit your
flock by his 'blood once a year. In this way, by branding the chicks

82 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

of this product you can always know how they turn out and just what
they are.

Business methods must be used in the poultry business, as in
all others. It is the haphazard methods that cause failure. And it is
business to know what the stock you have is. That is the best asset
the poultryman has, and the only one of keeping in touch with progress.
New blood is what makes for vigor in chicks and the new blood is
best obtained for vigor alone, by crossing males of new blood on the
flock of females. For feathers it is best to cross on the female side.

The chicks from a cross on the male side are the ones that will
stand crowding as 'broilers, but if the pullets are to be raised for
layers they must foe separated as soon as the sex can be determined.
By following this rule the profits will be very largely increased.
Of course, care must be taken that the males are from good laying
stock and also of good type for the breed they represent, -as very
much of the success depends on the selection of males.

CHAPTER XXVIII

CAPONS

This is a branch of the poultry business that is not much followed
in California, and yet it can be made one of the most profitable side
lines of the business.

A lady near Los Angeles, who breeds Wyandottes, started to
raise capons for market some two years ago, and her experience
was that she needed a factory where she could turn out so many a
day. The S. P. and Salt Lake R. R. Companies would have taken
several dozens a week, and of course, she could not supply the
demand, because she had only a small place and a few hundred
chickens. This is not a supposition, for the lady told me the facts
herself.

Another fact I can vouch for in regard to capons is that of a
friend in Sonoma County who caponized some White Orpingtons,
that increased in size at a much less cost for feed when if they had
been left in a natural condition. The birds were just as quiet as hens;
he kept them in a very small yard and at the age when they would
have brought about ten cents a pound if the owner had kept them
so long, they netted him thirty cents a pound, and each one weighed
from ten to twelve pounds.

Now these are facts that I can vouch for, and it would appear
to me that there should be more enterprising poultrymen who have
a little ranch willing to try out this branch of the business. The fact
that capons are quiet, making no noise crowing or fighting and that
the meat is of such high quality, commanding ,a high price, should be
inducement enough.

Best Breed for Capons

As a matter of fact, there is no "best breed" for anything wholly.
The 'best breeds are always conditional, or dependent on what they
are wanted for. In the case of capons for railroad dining cars I am
told that a capon weighing from eight to ten pounds is the most,
desirable.

For this size capon the Wyandottes fill the bill exactly; these
birds have a good breast, the meat is of good quality and white in
color; or a Houdan and Wyandotte cross would be good.

The next in size would be the Barred Rocks, and by way of
improving the quality of meat, cross with Cornish.

84 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Favorolles .are good birds for caponizing; they are large and
have a good breast and the meat is white and of good quality.

The largest capons are those having a Dorking or Orpington
male cross on the Brahma hen. These cannot be improved upon for
size, quality of meat nor quantity of breast meat. And that is what
people want who buy capons. They do not want a lot of leg muscle
to fight with but all the nice, juicy breast meat that is possible to
get on one fowl.

This fact should be borne in mind when you attempt to create
breeds for capons: Always choose a male from a breed that carries
good breast meat. A White Orpington capon is just about as good
and as nice a looking capon as can be found and they will weigh
twelve pounds at one year old without any special feeding.

There is a great deal said about the enormous weight of capons,
but a great deal of it is just talk. It is not so much the gain in
weight that makes capons profitable, but the quality of meat and
the fact that you can keep them in peace in flocks that would not
be possible unless they were caponized. And this is worth consider-
ing if you have neighbors who object to much noise.

When the bird is raised to fryer size it has taken a lot of food to
make the bony structure. Now instead of selling then, when it is
just a question of how many cents you can make out of that bird for
your trouble, if you can hold him over to finish his growth, you can
count on a dollar for your trouble.

The increase in price for the capon over what is paid for the
fryer will more than make the difference besides paying for the
extra feed. If there was no money in fattening poultry and caponiz-
ing would the packers have men going around buying up farm range
stock? I think not, those kind of people have to be sure of a profit
before they venture into an enterprise. And yet farmers and poultry-
men for years have been in the habit of letting the very stock that
could be caponized and made into dollars go for a few cents.

CHAPTER XXIX

PREPOTENCY AND PROLIFICACY

This is a subject that poultrymen have neglected, or at least not
given it the consideration due it. Prepotency is that quality that
enables the parent stock to stamp their progeny with the same quali-
ties they possess themselves in a large or small measure. In the male
it has been paid little attention to, and yet it is through the male
line that the females are most affected. The male bird of the type
that has a big bump of prepotency is the best agency to breed up
a good flock of prolific hens. If he is the product of a prolific hen
and a prepotent sire, he will build up a poor flock into a good one in
two or three generations, provided other^ things are taken care of.

There are always several factors in anything and the breeding of
fowls is no exception to the rule. The factors that -affect prolificacy
are: First, parentage; some may call it heredity; second, selection,
for not all the offspring from properly mated, prepotent males will
always produce their kind. Therefore, selection must be paid atten-
tion to; and third, proper rearing. The latter includes several other
questions that bear on the rearing of a fowl.

Selection must be practiced every year; there must be developed
great digestive capacity, hardiness and activity. Proper rearing is
that which develops all bodily structure and organs normally. This
includes the bony structure feathering and internal organs such as
gizzard, egg organs and digestive tract. The birds must not be
rushed, but must grow gradually until mature.

Having reared such birds, the next step as factors in their pro-
lificacy is to maintain the characteristics as adults. They must have
ample opportunity for exercise, winter or summer, in order to keep
their digestive organs active. Their housing must be such as pro-
vides them with a dry house free from draughts while at roost, plenty
of fresh air at 'all times and scratching room for bad weather. Never
coddle them; too warm a house will make them tender and unfit to
go out doors to rustle.

The feed must be good in quality and a variety wide enough to
furnish material for egg making and bodily needs, there must be
plenty of it but none to waste. An overfat hen will not lay well;
neither will a lean hen. Try to maintain the happy medium.

Another important condition to promote prolificacy is absence of
all vermin. These pests irritate and annoy hens past all endurance,

86 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

and it is very certain that they cannot do their best when they have
to be under constant irritation.

The Hogan system of judging the prolific layers is a copyright
book from which to quote is an infringement, but to those who fail
to breed up and know the prolific hen from what has been said here
I would advise them to buy "The Call Of The Hen" as advertised by
Mr. Hogan.

But even the Hogan system fails in some cases. For instance,
when the hens are not laying at all, all signs fail, partially. In moult-
ing there is very little to judge by for nearly all the hens are more or
less out of condition, and a person must be a very good judge indeed
who can go into a yard, not knowing each individual hen, and pick
out the best layers.

In such cases there is no infallible way of telling, though if the
hens were laying, the trap nest would catch them even if other signs
failed.

Knowing And Breeding The Heavy Layers

There are quite a number of methods of selecting the laying hen
that to an observing person are as good as though the hens were
trap-nested, but the trap nest saves a person from exercising his ob-
serving powers and gives him exercise for the physical. Of course,
the trap nest is reliable and if we want statements to put on record
that is the way to get them. But the ordinary person has no time to
trap nest a lot of fowls; it is a slow job, and to prove anything must
extend over a length of time.

One of the best methods of increasing the productiveness of a
flock is to select only the very early layers. These should be banded
and the numbers entered in a book set aside for that purpose. These
early pullets should be bred from, and the pullets that come from
these watched again for early layers. These early pullets will usually
be found to lay a considerable number of eggs before the others
start.

Another method of selecting and breeding a flock of winter layers
is to hatch all eggs laid by the hens that lay the longest in the fall
without moulting. These pullets will invariably prove good winter
layers.

In selecting layers from a flock, three things should (be carefully
considered: First, the shape; second, the comb, wattles, and face;
third, the actions of the hen.

The shape, is what is called, type in breeds^ but no matter what
breed it may be, the laying shape is a hen that is wide behind, legs
well apart and having a long back. This gives great lung capacity,
big digestive organs and large egg bag. The crops of good layers
will usually be found full at night because they need the food and

KNOWING THE HEAVY LAYERS 87

will get it. The poor layers don't need but just so much to keep up
their bodily needs and their crops will be found to be a'bout half full.
If the fingers are greased and inserted in the vent, the size of the
egg bags may be determined, those laying heavily will have large bags
and the poor layers small ones.

The head of a good layer is distinctly feminine; that is, long and
slender, after the manner of a good milch cow's head. The color of
the face, comb and wattles in the laying hen are nearly always of a
bright red, especially in pullets that are just commencing to lay. A
pullet that has not commenced, 'but is about to commence laying, will
show a very bright red comb.

In hens or pullets that are about to lay, the plumage usually gives
a better and brighter luster; but those who have been laying heavily
will have very dingy looking feathers, while the poor layers are much
brighter in plumage. These things can all be observed best in a yard
where there are both kinds of layers to choose from. A hen that has
laid heavily all the season has had very little feed to spare for feathers
and they get very rough and faded, while her sister that has laid only
every other day or so could put some of-her time and substance into
feathers and so looks much nicer. Actions of the hen: Early laying
is one of the best indications of a good layer. A hen that is going to
lay will usually be found singing and chuckling to herself a good part
of the time. She is always alert, too, after the bits to be found, and
is generally hunting and digging after something; her spirits are too
high to let her lay around dull.

She should be in good condition, because neither a real fat hen
nor a real lean hen can possibly be a good layer. You want the
happy medium, and these are the hens that will be active without being
too nervous and restless. A hen that waddles like a duck when walk-
ing is not always a fat hen, if she is grasped 'by the abdomen and the
seeming fat is hard she is a good layer and that which appears to be
fat is muscle.

A little observation will enable anyone to pick out the best layers
in a yard. Drones never fight and rustle after their share of the
feed; this is one of the surest tests there is; they are "content with
little; they spend their time pluming their feathers or basking in the
sun or shade but not hunt around or dig. A good layer must eat, and
if it is to be found she will find it at home or abroad if given her
liberty; if shut in she will get a big share of all that is served to the
flock. A big layer is a 'big eater. Nature made her so.

CHAPTER XXX

THE MEDITERRANEAN CLASS

In the Mediterranean classes we find all the Leghorns; the Min-
orcas; Spanish; Blue Andalusians and Anconas, and each variety has
its admirers and fanciers.

White Leghorn Most Popular.— But on the California egg farm
where poultry is kept as a means of earning a livelihood the White
Leghorn is pre-eminently the favorite. The points chiefly in its
favor are that it lays the white egg of commerce, matures at a fairly
early age, can be bought cheaper than most other varieties, is hardy
and when given range is a good forager, because it makes no distinc-
tion between its owner's garden and his neighbor's. The same might
be said of all Leghorns but the popular opinion is in favor of the
white. As >a table bird it sells when the dealers can get nothing else,
but they do not crave for that variety^ perhaps because of the numbers
that are put on the market. But there is no gainsaying the fact that
a flock of good-sized, well-bred White Leghorns foraging on a Cali-
fornia alfalfa field does present a picture to foe admired.

The American Poultry Association has made a weight standard
for Leghorns, and that will stop the breeding of the very small kind,
at least among breeders who aim to exhibit.

The single comb White Leghorn is the variety bred on this coast,
rose combs being very scarce and kept just as fancy.

Color of Male and Female. — Web, fluff and quills of feathers in all
sections, pure white; beak, yellow; eyes, reddish bay; comb, face and
wattles, bright red; earlobes, white; shanks and toes, rich yellow.

For commercial purposes the White Minorca has been crossed on
the Leghorn, and this makes for a larger body, and also a larger egg,
but in that case you have white legs very often a mongrel bird at best,
and a possible loss of hardihood.

Single Comb Brown Leghorn. — The Brown Leghorn male is, when
well bred, one of the most beautiful birds. He has a proud carriage
all his own, as if he were handsome and knew it. A fancier will al-
ways prefer the Brown Leghorn to any other variety of Leghorn
simply because of the color and symmetry of them. But, along with
this they are excellent layers, and they have the advantage of stand-
ing the heat just a little better than most fowls. Perhaps one reason
why they are not more popular is that real good exhibition specimens
are hard to breed, as double mating must be resorted to to get good

.

MlNORCAS 89

birds of 'both sexes. Then again, there is a little game in them and
they are more on the fight than the White variety. This streak of
game also shows at times in the eggs which are not so pure white in
color -as the others. But that they lay more of them is a certain fact,
for I have kept both and a good strain of Brown Leghorns cannot be
beat as layers.

The single comb variety is most popular here and in size they are
decidedly in advance of the Whites. As egg producers they stand Al,
and the ta'ble qualities are slightly better than the White

Color of Male and Female. — Head of male is dark red, beak horn;
eyes, reddish bay; comb, face and wattles, bright red; ear lobe, creamy
white; neck, brighter red than the head with a greenish black stripe
running through each feather and tapering to a point at the end; wing
bows, rich brilliant red; primaries, black; secondaries, black with
streak of brown on lower edge; coverts, greenish black; back and
saddle, brilliant red with a greenish black stripe, tail greenish black;
breast, black; body and fluff, black; legs, yellow; toes, yellow or dark
slate. The hen is dressed in the more sober color of brown, both
golden and dark, yellow legs and toes and face bright, with red comb
and wattles. No prettier bird walks than a well-bred Brown Leghorn.

Minorcas. — There are three varieties of Minorcas, the Black, White
and the Buff. The last named variety was originated by the Lingren
Brothers of Kingsburg, California. Whether the California variety
can be called Mediterranean I do not know, but the white and black
are of the Mediterranean class. These are the largest of the Medi-
terranean class. Cock should weigh 9 pounds and that is a good
weight for a light bird. Hen, 7^, pullets 5% and cockerel 7%. Color
of male and female, black with black beak, dark brown eyes, white
ear lobes and dark slate color legs. The plumage, though black, is
set off 'by a lustrous green on the surface of both sexes, and this, with
the striking white earlobe and strong stately carriage of the male,
makes a picture worth looking at.

The comb of the male is large and upright while that of the female
droops on one side of the head.

The Minorca is noted for its large white egg. As a table fowl they
are not to be despised, though in the black variety their plumage is
against them. The meat is good, and only for the black feathers the
Minorca would be considered one of the best general purpose fowls.
They are usually kept where a select trade in eggs can be worked up,
as the eggs, pure white in color:, are of large size and good shape, also
they are laid in numbers. In fact, it is difficult to find a breed of fowls
that can outlay a good strain of Black Minorcas.

White Minorcas. — The white variety have the same weights as the
black, the only difference being in the white plumage, and white in-

90 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

stead of black legs, beak, etc. There are some very fine specimens of
both varieties in California.

White Faced Black Spanish. — This is a very old breed and a good
one. They lay extra large eggs, as large if not larger than Min-
orcas. Their chief attraction is the large white cravat, or face, as it
is termed. In a dry climate like ours the white faced black Spanish
fowl ought to be at its best, but some way very few specimens are
exhibited, even at the larger shows. It appears to be only a fancier's
fowl in this State, but in England years ago they were kept for their
great laying qualities.

Blue Andalusians. — The Andalusian is another of the class of
white egg layers, and it is a good layer, too. It also has the distinc-
tion of dressing in the National colors. It is a smaller fowl than the
Minorca but of the same type. It lays a white egg of good size and
the fowl is about the same size as the standard set for Leghorns.
Cock 6 pounds, cockerel 5, hen 5 and pullet 4 pounds. They are too
small to rank very high as table poultry, not common enough to take
their place on the utility egg farm, but for the small farm or the fan-
cier they are a good fowl.

Anconas. — These birds have been getting into favor as an egg
breed very much of late, and are certainly being called for in numbers.
Some of their admirers claim that eventually they will sweep this
Coast and toe the commercial egg fowl. They have no weight clause
in the Standard, but are supposed to be about as large as a good sized
Leghorn. They are rated as good layers of large white eggs; the
quality of meat not so good as the Leghorn. Disqualifications are,
red in earjobes covering more than one-half the surface; red in any
part of plumage; shanks other than yellow or mottled with black.

The claim is often made for all these small breeds that they are
non-sitters, but like a great many other claims it is not strictly true.
Some of these non-sitters are sitters of the most inveterate kind, and
even when given eggs they will leave them and go and sit on an empty
nest. Some, on the other hand, do sit and make good mothers; how-
ever, it only goes to show that whether a hen sits or not, nature in-
tended her to take a rest somewhere in her busy season, and if hens
do not sit they take the rest anyway.

CHAPTER XXXI

THE AMERICAN CLASS

In this class are included all the rocks, buff, white*, barred, silver
penciled, partridge and Columbian. All the Wyandottes, silver, golden,
white, 'buff, black, partridge, silver penciled and Columbian, Javas,
black and mottled. Rhode Island Reds, and Rhode Island White and
Buckeyes.

In size the Plymouth Rock family are medium: the standard
weight for a cock being 9Vz pounds and for hens 7%. This is the
same, no matter what the color. But a great many Rocks make heav-
ier fowls than that. The Barred Rock is a difficult 'bird to breed as an
exhibition bird, many fanciers after being successful with other var-
ieties fail on this. In the class of a utility bird or general purpose
fowl it is one of the best for a farm,, quiet in disposition, easily kept
in bounds by a four-foot fence, it makes a good layer of rather dark
colored eggs, and when ready for market, tickles the palate of an
epicure.

The fancier has something to try his genius in the Barred Rock,
and if he fails his birds are still worth all the time he has given to
them as general purpose fowls. The legs and skin of all varieties of
Rocks are of that color so beloved by the colored preacher, who calls
for a yaller-legged chicken. Yellow legs and skin are no longer a
fetish in California, however, as we have learned that the color of
skin in just "skin deep" and neither flavor of flesh or quantity of same
is dependent on color.

The White Rock.— This bird has all the good qualities of the Bar-
red Rock and a few more. Being white and solid colored it is easier
to breed as an exhibition bird and this State can show some wonderful
specimens, that could no doubt win at large eastern shows. Then,
too, as a utility bird it scores, for many claim it is a 'better layer than
the Barred variety. But the laying qualities are greatly dependent
on the strain and no reliance can be placed on anything but personal
knowledge. Anyway, the White Rock is a good general purpose fowl,
hardy and quiet in disposition. The hens of both these varieties are
good mothers and layers. They are at their best at two years old,
and for profit should not be kept over that period, unless for the
fancier.

Buff Plymouth Rock. — This bird has all the characteristics of the
Rock family and a few others that have been bred in by color. The

92 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

lovers of the Buffs claim a greater egg capacity for their favorites,
and this is just possible, because, while the buff color was being bred
in there had to be some other blood introduced, and if this foreign
blood was of a good laying breed, it would certainly affect the pro-
geny some. The same weight, build and color of skin and legs are
to be found in the buff variety as in the others.

The Silver Penciled Plymouth Rock.— These are very beautiful
birds, particolored, with the perfect carriage of aristocrats and the
dress to match. They have only to be seen to be admired, and for
a small home place where one likes to have nice birds around them
the silver penciled rock would fill the bill.

The Partridge Plymouth Rock. — This is another triumph of the
breeder's art in the Rock family. The Partridge Rock is the most
beautiful of all. Its bright red plumage mixed with black, yellow
legs and bright face make it a striking object. And it has claims of
egg laying that makes it a bird for the small home and fancier, but
all these particolored fowls are beyond the skill of the farmer and
average poultry raiser. They are strictly fancy breeds for the man
who has the time and taste to give them the care they must have to
give satisfaction.

Wyandottes. — The same rule applies to the Wyandottes. All the
fancy feathered varieties like the Silver Laced, Silver Penciled and
Partridge, are birds for the lover of fine feathers. They all have
sterling qualities!, too, but they require too much care for ordinary
places. The business kinds of Wyandottes are the White, Buff and
Columbian. The White Wyandotte is a good practical breed. They
lay large brown eggs and in paying quantities. The meat is excellent
in quality and if bred up to standard they are a fair sized bird. Stan-
dard weight of all Wyandottes is cock 8% pounds, cockerel 7%, hen
6%, pullet 5l/2 pounds.

The Wyandottes have a peculiar shape or type, a little unlike all
other breeds, in that the back is broad and short. The body is round
and deep and the small rose comb fits close to the head, giving the
bird a full, round appearance. As a market fowl the Wyandotte ranks
Al. The Orpington and Wyandotte are in one class in the San Fran-
cisco market and bring a little higher price than any other breeds.
Though I do not think this is the case in eastern markets where a
yellow skin and yellow leg holds the premium. This is a high com-
pliment to the intelligence of our people, who judge more by taste
than from any old myth about color. The skin and legs of all Wyan-
dottes are white, the meat is juicy and of good flavor, and the fowls
are quiet and docile; easily kept in bounds and always ready as broil-
ers (for which they are noted), fryers or roasts.

.Rhode Island Reds and Buckeyes. — During the last few years this
breed of fowls has created quite a stir, but while they are good layers

RHODE ISLAND REDS 93

of dark colored eggs, their persistent broodiness and toss of color
seems to go against them. Standard weights are the same as in the
Wyandottes, except the pullets, which is given 5 pounds as the weight.
The skin and legs are yellow. Like all new breeds they held the
stage for awhile and some real money was made by the fanciers. They
make good foragers on a farm but soon deteriorate in plumage no
matter what price you pay for a start. The size and color of eggs
are against them as a commercial egg laying machine.

They are, however, hardy and make good on the farm where they
can have range and shade. They are pre-eminently an American breed
and take the name of the place from which they originated. The
Buckeyes are a separate variety that were originated by a lady living
now in California. They were very similar tc the Rhode Island Reds
except for the comb, which is a pea C'jmb. Now the Buckeyes are ad-
mitted to the Standard. The weights are 9 pounds for cock; cockerel
8 pounds, hen 6 pounds, and pullets 5 pounds. In color and shape
as in other qualities, the two breeds are very similar and each variety
has its admirers.

CHAPTER XXXII

THE FRENCH BREEDS

The Houdan is by far 'the most popular breed the French have.
It is a very old breed, and in some parts of this State is very well
liked, but in many parts the top knot or crest is against the bird be-
cause it is a harbor for lice, fleas and is also a hindrance to the birds
in protecting themselves from the common enemy the hawk. The
Houdan is a good layer of large white eggs, these eggs are the size
of well bred Minorcas and command the best price. The birds have
large breasts and the meat is good. They are one of the best breeds
I know of to cross with on other white egg breeds, but to be good the
cross must be of female Houdans to a male of the other breed.

The Houdan is really a black plumaged bird but the feathers are
stippled or penciled with white, and as the birds get older the white
markings increase. They are quiet and do very well in a low fence,
but they should never be mixed with other birds of a more aggressive
nature, as being so timid they fall back from the feed and let the
others have all of it. The Houdan has five toes. The chicks are so
hardy that it is hard to kill them with a club, and if the crest could be
bred out I know of no better fowl for a ranch fowl that is run for
profit. Standard weights are, cock, 7%, cockerel 6l/2, hen 6% and pul-
let SV2. The cock is tall and stately like the Minorca, giving an ap-
pearance of being much larger than he is, while the females are
shorter of leg. The comb is V shaped and a flock of well bred Hou-
dans are a good investment in localities where they fit in.

Crevecoeurs and La Fleche. — Of these two varieties of French fowls
very few are found in California. They have black plumage and are
a little larger than the Houdans, the Standard calling for half pound
more in all classes.

The Polish. — Polish fowls, like the French, run largely to crests
and beards. As they are more of a fancier's fowl we will not take up
much time with them. There are the White Crested, Black Bearded,
Golden, Bearded Silver, Bearded White, and the non-bearded var-
ieties of these colors. As pets and fancy, for anyone with the time and
taste, these little birds appeal. They lay fair sized eggs and plenty
of them, but are too small to be marketable.

The Hamburgs. — These are another of the small varieties that are
from a fancier's standpoint beautiful in colorings and symmetry. In
my young days they were the common fowl for everybody and were

THE FRENCH BREEDS 95

called "Dutch every day layers," and it is a fact that they did lay
every day. But the eggs are too small to go in our markets, so out-
side the fancy, they don't appear to have much call. They are indeed
beautiful in marking and coloring and are sprightly, well proportioned
birds.

The Campines. — There are the Golden and Silver Campines. These
birds hail from Belgium. They are really very little larger in appear-
ance than some of the Hamburgs, but they have had a big boom the
past two years. Personally I do not know much about them but sus-
pect the boom will fall in and the legitimate trade be turned back to
standard breeds. These birds lay a white egg of good size, but the
egg is about all that can be made from them. They never can be
called a general purpose fowl at the best.

Buttercups. — This is another new breed that is trying for honors
Its admirers claim for it the 300 egg a year hen. It is a small bird,
with a comb shaped like a buttercup,, from which it takes its name.
Several years ago when the name first 'became known here I sent east
for a setting of eggs. The claim for these birds is that they lay a
white egg, large in size and more of them than any other breed. Now,
that is saying a whole lot in a few words/ The eggs I sent for came
in due time, and every one of them was of a creamy color that could
never be stretched to white, no matter how strong the imagination
was. They were of fairly good size and I gave them to two good
hens, so that if one had any accident the other had a chance. One
chick hatched, and after keeping that six months, an Indian's dog got
it, and that was my last Buttercup. But I see some at the shows once
in a while and so I am satisfied.

CHAPTER XXXIII

THE ASIATIC CLASS

This class is what are really the heavy breeds of fowls. It in-
cludes the Brahmas, Dark and Light; the Langshans, White and
Black; and the Cochins, Buff, Partridge, Black and White.

In England and the eastern States these large heavy birds were
at one time very popular, but here in California we see but very few
of them and these are held by fanciers. They are too large, and too
heavily feathered to be very good in a warm climate like ours. Though
the Langshans and Brahmas have many friends, even here.

The Langshans are large, majestic birds heavily feathered to the
toes. They take a long season to mature in but are good winter layers
of large brown' eggs. The Standard weight for these birds are not
so high as that for Orpingtons, yet they give the appearance of being
much heavier, probably on account of the legs being so heavily feath-
ered. Standard weight for cock is 9% pounds; cockerel 8 pounds;
hen, 7% pounds and pullet 6^2 pounds.

They make good table birds, but very few except French cooks
like them on account of the color of the skin of the black variety.

The Brahmas. — These big quiet hens were great favorites of mine
forty years ago. That was the heyday of their prosperity. I got some
eggs from the Earl of Derby and walked five miles after them. And
to tell the truth, I like them yet, but at the same time, I do not think
they are profitable in this climate.

Standard weights for Brahmas are, cock 12 pounds; cockerel 10
pounds; hen 9% pounds and pullet 8 pounds.

The Brahmas are good layers, good sitters and mothers and being
so heavy they do not ramble at all, but they are usually clumsy and
kill chickens by stepping on them.

Cochins. — We still see a few of the big fellows at the shows
simply because every bird living has its fancier and admirer and the
Cochins appeal to some people. To me they are nothing but a bag
of feathers.

While they look massive, they are in realty not as large as the
Brahmas. But at one time they were quite popular as table birds.
Standard weights are, cock 11 pounds; cockerel 9 pounds; hen 9J4
and pullet 7 pounds.

THE ASIATIC CLASS 97

The Asiatic class are not very numerous in California, the smooth
legged varieties and breeds of fowls being considered best for our
climate. The heavy feathering on legs and body makes it look more
difficult to keep them free from vermin.

The Brahmas, both light and dark}, are very handsome birds and
make fine roasters, but they require a long time for their growth, and
we have other breeds that can mature in half the time and be laying.
For the small ranch that wants a good sized fowl and has not much
room the Brahma is better than turkey. They never ramble, are not
very heavy eaters and they do make a delicious roast. The eggs are
rich and of fine flavor but not laid in quantities to suit a modern poul-
try man.

CHAPTER XXXIV

THE ENGLISH CLASS

The English class comprise the Dorkings, White, Silver-Gray and
Colored; the Redcaps and all varieties of Orpingtons. They all are
what may be termed a general purpose fowl, are good layers and ex-
cellent table fowls. The Dorkings are among the oldest breeds of
fowls and have always been liked. The male is large, broad in the
back and low in shank, giving him a solid, compact looking body. The
female is broad and with a length of back that gives the idea of roomi-
ness for egg making. And the old-fashioned Dorking came pretty
near to being an egg machine. The skin and flesh of all Dorkings are
white, and they lay a large white egg. They have five toes, a four-
toed Dorking would meet disqualification in the show room. The
Dorkings &re of three varieties, the Silver Gray, which is the most
popular here, the White and Colored Dorking. The Standard weights
for the Silver Gray are cock 8 pounds; cockerel 7 pounds; hen 6Vz
pullet 5%. The Colored Dorking runs one pound heavier on all both
male and female^ while the White Dorking is between the two. There
are not a great many fowls of these varieties in California, not be-
cause they don't do well or anything is against them, but probably
because newer breeds fill the bill and the old breeds are neglected.

The Redcap. — This is another old English variety that is hard to
beat, yet it is not found in numbers in California. Lancashire and
Derbyshire are the two English counties where Redcaps are bred to
any great extent. As layers, there is no breed of fowl that can beat
them, of that I can speak, for I have kept them for years, but have
none now. They lay a white egg of medium size and the meat is white
with a gamey flavor, skin is white and legs of a dark slate color. Stan-
dard weights for cock is 7% pounds; cockerel 6 pounds; hen 6 pounds
and pullet 5 pounds.

These are the only one breed of fowls that I know of in any class
that are absolutely and truly non sitters. I have kept them at dif-
ferent times and had stock from different places and never yet saw a
Redcap stay on the nest five minutes after it laid. The fowls when
mature are healthy and hardy, they are good layers during the spring
and summer, but like most of the non sitting varieties do not lay as
well in the winter months as the heavier feathered breeds. They get
their name from the comb which in the male covers the head, forming
a cap. They are very handsome particolored birds that require no

THE ENGLISH CLASS 99

skill to breed the right feathers, being so old they breed true every
time. Color of female, golden brown and greenish black; color of
male, rich dark mahogany red, golden brown and lustrous greenish
black. It requires an artist to describe a good specimen of English
Redcap male. Each feather is so correctly marked with a spangle
or half moon and all are so arranged that the bird is a real picture.

Orpingtons. — If the Redcap were an early love the Orpingtons are
the last and best love*, for I do not ever expect to give up Orpingtons
as long as I keep any fowls at all. These are the largest of the smooth
legged breeds. There are several varieties but none very extensively
bred in California except the Buff, Black and White. These three
are the recognized standard varieties of Orpingtons.

Fanciers spend money freely to keep up and maintain the type
and beautiful color of their favorites. The Buffs, with the rich golden
color both under and surface; the Blacks, the rich lustrous black that
judges demand, and the Whites, free from foreign color and brassiness.

The skin and meat of all three varieties are white. The legs and
feet of Whites and Buffs are pinkish white and the Blacks are black or
slate color.

All three varieties are popular and no one can justly say that one
is better than the other. The Buffs and Whites in pens side by side
do not differ in egg production so that it can be noticed. The only
real difference is in the personal taste of the owner of each color.
The legs are rather short, standing well apart to carry the weight of
flesh. Standard weight for cock is 10 pounds; cockerel 8^2 pounds;
hen 8 pounds and pullet 7 pounds. And I have hens that have been
famous layers weighing ten pounds. But Standard weight is a good
size for all practical purposes and if kept 'busy they will not accumu-
late fat.

The Orpingtons have made a reputation for themselves as the best
winter egg producers we have, and the reputation is increasing by
leaps and bounds, because the fowls live up to expectations when
given half a show.

The chicks are hardy, quick growers and until they begin to run to
leg are always ready to sell for broilers or fryers. As roasters they
are world beaters and the most remarkable feature of the Orpington
hen is, that it continues to pay its board until six or seven years old.
At three years old they are in their prime and will lay quite as many
eggs as in the first year if kept from putting on fat. This can be done
with exercise and correct feeding.

Buff Orpington. — This variety is in color buff, a golden color all
through when for exhibition. Earlobes, wattles and comb all red and
with the golden buff of the feathers fitting in makes a pretty picture.
Color of shanks white or pinkish white, medium comb having five
points. Positive white in earlobes or any foreign color in plumage is
a disqualification.

100 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

White Orpingtons. — With the exception of color of plumage the
same description answers for these. Plumage is white, and the feath-
ers must be free from foreign colors, but creaminess, or what is
termed brassiness, is not a disqualification, though it is a defect. Our
climate is hard on all white birds and the white Orpington is not an
old enough breed to have had the defect bred out. Bleaching and all
other external methods of changing a brassy bird into a white one is
but a temporary change, the brass comes back, but when it is bred
out it stays out.

Black Orpingtons. — These are the most majestic of all the Orping-
tons, but as I have never bred any I can not speak from personal
knowledge. However, they are accredited with all the good qualities
of the others and for city dwellers, where there is much dust and
dirt, they sure should be the favorite.

All the Orpingtons are good layers of good large eggs with a
brownish color, though many White Orpingtons lay a very light col-
ored egg. The winter season is the Orpingtons' summer, for they love
cold rainy weather and shell the eggs out as if the sun were shining.
They make good mothers usually, commencing to lay before quitting
the chicks. In fact, many times they stay with one bunch of chicks
until ready to sit again, but if not needed for that chore they can be
put in a yard with the male and they will forget all about it.

CHAPTER XXXV

GAMES AND ORIENTALS

In the Oriental class we find the Cornish. This bird is a cross
that was originated in Cornwall, England1, by crossing a black breasted
Red Game with a Red Aseel from India. The Derby Red Game was
a large bird as I remember them, with very heavy thighs and legs.
This shows in the Cornish, also the massive breast, the bone being well
set in gives a rounded appearance and there is an abundance of good
meat on the breast.

The Cornish are bred chiefly as table fowls and their close plumage
and clean legs make them well fitted for this climate. Around Los
Angeles are several flocks of goodly numbers and the show rooms
are fairly well supplied with good specimens. It is not claimed for
them that they make high egg records, still eggs from game birds
rank high and the meat is of the first quality. Standard weights are,
for cock 9 pounds; cockerel 8 pounds; hen 7 pounds and pullet 6
pounds. The Cornish are well set up birds, giving an appearance of
great strength. The legs are set well apart as in the old days when
their ancestors combatted in the pit. These are the largest of the
Game varieties and with the exception of a very few bred by fanciers
there is no extensive breeding of other game breeds, except in
Bantams.

Game Bantams. — The Black Breasted Red Game Bantam is the one
mostly exhibited in our poultry shows, so we take it that must be the
most popular breed or variety.

These little fellows call for ounces instead of pounds in the Standard
of weights, and a bird that is too heavy is disqualified. Color of male
is: Head, light orange; eyes, red; comb, face, wattles and earlobes,
red; neck, hackle, light golden; wings, shoulders, black; wing, fronts
black; wing'bows, red; wing coverts, lustrous black, forming a bar
across the wing; primaries, black, except lower feathers, which should
be 'bay; secondaries, part of outer web forming wing, bay, remainder
of feathers, black; back, bright red; saddle, light golden; tail, black;
sickle feathers and tail coverts, lustrous black; breast, black; body
and stern, black; thighs, black; shanks and toes, willow green.

Color of female same, but on a more sober plan. All cocks must
be dubbed. Standard weight is: cock, 22 ounces; cockerel, 20 ounces;
hen, 20 ounces and pullet, 18 ounces.

102 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Ornamental Bantams. — These little fellows are far more popular
than the fighting kind and these are the kind parents should encourage
their boys to breed. Among Ornamental Bantams there are the
Seabrights, Golden and Silver, and these birds are really beautiful
in color and symmetry. Then, too, the plumage of male and female
is alike, which makes it easy for a boy to breed good specimens.
Also they are wonderful layers and as the body is a little larger than
that of the game varieties, there is more to eat when one is to be
used for the table. Cock's weight is 26 ounces; cockerel, 22 ounces;
hen, 22 and pullet 20 ounces. They have clean legs, upright carriage
and well spiked rose comb. In the Silver variety the plumage is
silvery white, each feather evenly and distinctly laced all around with
a narrow edging of lustrous black.

With the Golden variety, the plumage all through is of a golden
yellow, edged around with the lacing of black. Both varieties were
originated by Sir John Seabright, whose name they bear, and no man
could have left anything better for the children of the world than
these two varieties of miniature fowls.

Rose Comb Bantams. — This breed is a clean leg, close plumage
breed. There are but two colors, black and white. This and the
different color of legs are all the variety to be found in this breed.
Both have rose combs. Comb, face and wattles are red, while the
earlobes are white. Standard weights same as Seabrights.

Booted White Bantams. — These little fellows are pure white, the
vulture hocks form the boot. They appear to be on stilts when
walking, as the feathers on the legs must be stiff. Standard weights
same as Seabrights.

Brahma Bantams. — The Brahma Bantam must conform to the
shape, color and general makeup of their larger 'brothers. They must
be feathered down the leg, have the same pea comb, face, comb and
earlobes red. They are just simply miniature Brahmas, both light
and dark. The little hens are good layers, good setters and excellent
mothers. Standard weight is for cock, 30 ounces; cockerel, 26 ounces;
hen, 26 ounces and pullet, 24 ounces.

Cochin Bantams, Buff, Black, and White. — The Cochin Bantams,
of all colors, are more largely bred, hence more popular than any
other breed. The blacks are perhaps not quite as much in evidence
in the show room, because it does not need much discrimination in
color, a good bird is more easily picked out and if all other points
are right, it stands a show to win. With the Buff variety it is quite
different; one person's idea of a "Golden Buff may differ several
shades from another person's idea, and especially from the person
who happens to be the judge. So, there is always more competition
in colors than in Black or White varieties.

GAMES AND ORIENTALS 103

The Cochin Bantam is a good layer, not only that, but if you want
eggs in winter and have just the smallest kind of a yard with a small
tight-roofed box to set in it, you can have eggs all winter long for
your own table. Then, if well fed and hatched early they make a
good, big plump broiler that nothing can beat, and they can be raised
just as easy as any kind of feathered birds. The hens are good sitters
and good mothers, protecting with all the powers at their command
the chicks entrusted to their care. If they see they are likely to get
their 'brood hurt by cats or anything too large for them, they will
set up such a commotion that the whole neighborhood will turn out,
thinking it is a fire.

It is safe to say that the little fellows have more than their share
of intelligence. Cochins and Brahmas are among the very best of
the Bantam family and while they like petting, they do very well if
just fed and given ordinary care.

Standard weights for all Cochin Bantams are same as that for
Brahmas.

CHAPTER XXXVI

DUCK CULTURE IN CALIFORNIA

The past two years I have received so many inquiries about duck
raising that this part of the poultry industry demands attention.
Ducks are the one thing that can be raised to advantage on town
lots, or on very small holdings. It does not require either a great
amount of money or room and that is why it can be done successfully
by women. It is not really necessary that breeders be kept, for
nearly all varieties of ducklings can be bought from hatcheries. For
those who can find room for a few breeders, there is more profit to
be made because the eggs will be at hand and they can set at any
time they are ready, and this is not always the case where ducklings
must be bought.

I will, therefore, take up the care of the breeding stock first, as
the foundation of all success lies with the breeders. If you have a
flock of young ducks on hand, select your breeders from them, taking
those with the best developed bodies and earliest signs of maturity.
Those hatched in April are the best for breeders. Now allow one
drake to four ducks, and if you are on a farm or anywhere that has
range, turn your ducks out on range, those intended for breeders.

Young ducks will commence to lay early in December in this
climate, but old ducks very rarely commence until February. Breed-
ing ducks can be fed very lightly if turned out, a little mash morning
and night, made from wheat bran and middlings, is enough.

Along in October it will be time to house them, and begin to feed
better, if you want early eggs, and as this is where the profit comes
in, I expect you will want to have it. After October first give a mash
morning and night as follows: One part bran, one part middlings, one
part cornmeal, one part alfalfa meal, five per cent beef scraps and two
per cent grit and oyster shell. Give them all they will eat of this
morning and night, and all the green feed they will eat at noon.
Keep water in the yard or house, if you have nothing better, a candy
pail set in a hole in the ground does very well, but they must have
water, to bathe in to insure strong fertile eggs.

About November first, increase the quantity of beef scrap to ten
per cent. Lift the ducks up by the neck to see how thin they are, as
you must not let them get too fat. If they keep too thin, increase
the amount of cornmeal and ,add a little whole grain, such as wheat
and cracked corn, to the rations. When they commence to lay, they

TYPICAL CALIFORNIA POULTRY HOUSES

FLOCK OF WHITE LEGHORNS

DUCK CULTURE IN CALIFORNIA 105

must be fed heavier, as they soon get poor if not fed plenty. Pekin
ducks should lay from 75 to 100 eggs without stopping, but they won't
do it if not fed right.

Don't forget that it requires good judgment in feeding breeding
ducks, you must keep track of the condition of the layers.

There are fourteen different breeds of ducks in the United States,
but only three or four varieties are ever seen much of on this Coast.
The Aylestmry ,and Pekin stand first in favor, they are both good
layers and make excellent table fowl; the Muscovy has some friends,
but is generally fought shy of as being the mud hen of ducks. The
Indian Runner is much in favor as a layer of nice white eggs, though
not all Indian Runner ducks lay white eggs, for I have seen green
ones among them. But the Indian runner does not fill the bill for
green ducks; for this purpose there is none better than the Pekin.
And if you have Pekins, you will not be disappointed in the results
if you do your share.

Duck eggs hatch best in the incubator at a temperature of 102 to
103 plenty high enough, and the 102 to 102^ will give better results
than the higher figures.

Carry them for two weeks at 102, the third week sprinkle the eggs
once a day when you take them out to air and turn, and increase the
temperature to 102%; the fourth week, sprinkle the eggs morning
and night; the last four days before closing up the incubator and
when you do close it up, increase the temperature to 103 and do not
let it get under that until all are hatched.

Brooding Ducklings. — When they hatch, put in brooder and give
warm water to drink in a vessel that they can't get into with anything
but their bills.

Watch the ducklings for about two days and teach them where
to go for warmth, then, when they learn that, your troubles are
almost over. Ducklings are the easiest thing to raise in the whole
gamut of poultry, and the most interesting. But there are some
things that must be done, and a few that must not be done if
you want to raise them. The two most important things to do is to
be sure to serve water when you serve feed, because the eating de-
pends on the drinking. The water must be in a dish deep enough
to admit of the bill going in up to and over the eyes; if it is not, they
will get sore eyes and present a most pitiable aspect.

The next thing to remember is that though water is essential, it
must be warm water for at least ten days. The reason for this is
that cold water causes cramps.

Feeding the Ducklings. — The very best feed I have found for
ducklings is Spratt's Chick Meal. Cracker crumbs are also excellent.
They come high, but will give your ducklings such a start that you

106 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

won't mind the price. With either food, warm water and a nice
warm brooder, ducklings are in clover, and will grow like weeds.

The next best thing for a few days is rolled oats and stale bread
soaked in milk. At two weeks old, you can change them gradually
to a mash as follows.

Bran, one part; middlings, one part; corn meal, two parts; five per
cent beef scrap, a little coarse sand and as much chopped lettuce as
they will eat; mix the mash with just enough water to mix readily,
adding some of the chopped lettuce, and feed lettuce between meals.
Sprouted oats may be fed at any and all times, and they will cer-
tainly grow. As they increase in age, so also must you increase the
animal food. Ten or even fifteen per cent animal food of some kind
must be fed if they are to be sold as green ducks at ten or twelve
weeks old.

Five Meals a Day. — At all the large duck ranches on Long Island,
all feeders are out with the first meal of the day at six o'clock in the
morning, and the ducks and ducklings both are fed as regular as the
clock, five meals a day, all they can eat of a properly balanced food.
That is the secret of their success, regularity and a well balanced
food. I have seen people trying to raise ducks, who actually did
not know the nature of ducks or their needs. Such people fail in
the nature of things, but how much 'better it would be to learn the
needs of ducks first, then raise them afterwards.

A Good Finishing Mash For Ducks. — About two weeks before
the ducks ,are to be killed, the green feed should be omitted, as it
injures the color of the flesh. The following mash can be relied
upon to give good results both in quality and quantity of meat.

Corn meal, or ground corn 2 parts; ground oats 1 part; ground
barley, one part; white middlings or low grade flour, 2 parts; beef
scrap, 1 part. Now in measuring parts, the same measure should be
used all the time; to 1 quart of ground oats, barley and beef scrap
each, you add 2 quarts of corn meal and 2 of middlings or flour. Thus,
in this mash, the beef scrap is one part in seven; this is rich food,
but is only to be fed as a finishing food and only three times a day;
if fed too often on such diet, the ducks would surfeit.

After ducks quit laying in the summer, give this mash two weeks
before a Jewish holiday and send them to market. Duck raisers
should post themselves on the Jewish holidays and prepare to make
shipments for them, as they are in great demand during those times.

Dressing Ducks For Market

This is one feature in raising ducks on this CoasJ: that is not much
used, because we sell nearly all live products alive. This saves a
lot of work that would be done by inexperienced hands and places

DUCK CULTURE IN CALIFORNIA 107

it in the hands of those that are experienced. Still if there is a call
for ducks in a local market it is well to know how to kill and dress
them.

Hang them in pairs on a line, head down, the killer goes along
with a sharp knife and sticks eac'hi one in the roof of the mouth, at
the same time hitting it a sharp blow on the top of the head, and
pulls out the main tail and wing feathers. He passes on and a
picker takes up the job of picking the first duck. Take the duck
down as soon as dead, wash out the mouth and proceed with the
picking. Or if to be scalded, have a pail of hot water and a pail of
cold handy to dip the fingers in. Take the feathers from the breast
first, then turn over and follow along the back, clean, lay on a
board out of the reach of flies until all are scalded, then finish up.
Every sign of feathers and down must be picked clean; after that
is done, have a bucket of hot water and one of cold, as before, dip
the ducks, one at a time, in the hot water, then immerse in the cold
and leave until all animal heat is gone from them. The dipping in
hot water, then in cold is called plumping, as it adds to the appear-
ance of the ducks and does no harm it should always be done, if
we want our products to look the best. „

When the ducks are cold, wipe off with clean cloth, wrap in white
paper and ship as soon as possible.

CHAPTER XXXVII

TURKEYS IN CALIFORNIA

There are seven distinct varieties or breeds of turkeys, but on
this Coast the most popular are the Bronze and the White Holland.
The Bourbon Red and the Narragansett are bred on a small scale by
fanciers, but the commercial breeds are the Bronze and the White
Holland. The former is the king of all turkeys in regard to size,
the White Holland being the smallest breed of all.

Where there is range, the Bronze is the most profitable, but for
small holdings and acreage the White Holland will give better sat-
isfaction, 'because coupled witlh its smaller size is docility and an
inclination to stay at home and be satisfied. It will even content
itself in good-sized yards without any range at all, but as the turkey
never has been thoroughly domesticated, it stands to reason that
any variety will do better on range. Turkeys do not like the re-
straint of yards for any length of time, and unless natural conditions
are given them there is a certain amount of loss that no amount of
care or feed will offset.

The foothill lands of California are the turkeys' paradise. In
most localities they can roam the hills, picking up acorns that drop
from oak trees, wild vines and seeds and the insect life that always
are a part of such growth. For the rancher with a few acres of hill
land there is not anything that will pay a better dividend than a good
flock of Bronze turkeys.

Fix up a few high perches in the barnyard and feed them a little
when they come home at night and it is not often a band of turks
will leave their home, unless scared away by some animal. They
have a sense of safety in human nearness, hence, prefer to come home
rather than stay in the woods.

Mating and Handling. — When turkeys are properly mated one
may hope for a large measure of success, if other conditions are right,
but if improperly mated nothing will go right and the measure of
success will be very meagre. There must be no inbreeding, no weak-
lings of either sex, and neither male nor female must be too young
or immature.

Old hens are preferable, and if young ones must be used, they
should be at least over one year old, for a small flock a good strong
yearling cock may be used if he 'has good bone and size, but for a
larger flock a two-year-old male will be the proper thing. Always

TURKEYS IN CALIFORNIA 109

choose one that is large and well-boned, and has good color and
finish because the male influences the color and general appearance.

Have the hens as near alike as to size and appearance as is pos-
sible; if one is tall and lanky and another short legged .and dumpy
they will never appear as a good flock, neither will they fatten alike.
The short legged full breasted turkey will not ramble so much as
the long legged, lean, lanky type, neither will they require so much
feed to fatten them and get ready for market. And these are things
one wants to consider in mating up a flock for breeding.

In this California climate I have seen hens running around with
broods at Christmas, and that as far north as Sonoma County. But
unless the nest is in a very sheltered place the eggs are liable to get
chilled. So the better plan is to remove the first few eggs, leaving a
nest egg, and when the hen 'has laid half her clutch, if she is to be
allowed to set them herself, give them back to her, and just cover
the nest at night with an old piece of cloth.

Usually the hens lay from eighteen to thirty eggs, but I have
had hens lay fifty and as high as seventy-five before wanting to set.
But as a rule this is later in the season; the hens that lay first will
not lay more than thirty.

But these first eggs are the ones that should be hatched and raised,
for the large Thanksgiving turkeys. The later ones can be carried
over for the Christmas holidays.

A Good Turkey Nest.

An old barrel with half the staves taken out, the end being set
down in the ground on the! windy side and dirt thrown up to the
staves, makes .a good, well-sheltered turkey nest. If a length of
tar paper or some other roofing paper is fastened over the full
length it will be better especially in counties that have heavy winter
rains. A turkey likes to feel secluded, and if water and feed are put
under the cover of the barrel and vermin kept away there need be
no fears as to the results with such a nest.

During the laying period the hens should be well fed on food
rich in protein, and it is well to not let them out of the yards during
this period until all the hens have laid. If given their liberty before
laying, they are very likely to hunt up a nesting place of their own
where it would be hard to keep track of them.

It takes twenty eight to thirty days to hatch turkey eggs, ac-
cording to how the eggs were cared for after being laid, and how old
they are.

When it is possible, several hens should be set at one time, and
each should be well dusted, at the time of giving them the eggs, with

110 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

insect powder, then again in ten days, and a final dusting the day
before the poults are due to hatch.

If turkey eggs are hatched under hens the same precautions should
be taken so that the poults can have a clear start.

Caring For The Poults.

Young turkeys are very tender, and the large turkey lice, if the
hen has not been thoroughly cleaned, will go straight from hen to
chicks. When this happens, the fight is on, and unless the chicks
are from a very robust stock, it does not last long.

When she is hatching, make sure of this lice question by examina-
tion, and if the hen is clean, make her a sort of enclosure, three-
cornered, with three twelve-inch boards, the original barrel nest
should be left as it is for the hen to shelter in and the boards will
keep the young ones from straying away from her. Having done
this, let her have the quiet and privacy she desires until all the eggs
are hatched. If there is any danger from skunks, weazles, cats or
rats, one-inch mesh wire should be fastened over the board fence,
otherwise it may be left open. For the first few days, I think the
ideal food for young turkeys is a chick feed containing little or no
corn. At least I would feed chick feed twice a day and curd, hard-
boiled eggs and a plain custard of eggs and milk, together with onion
tops cut fine, lettuce and even a little grated garlic mixed in the curds.

They must be watched constantly for signs of lice, for once they
gain a footing the vitality of the poults is on the down grade. When
the poults are about ten days old the lice problem may be solved
by purchasing a small box of Mercurial ointment from a drug store.
Find out what strength it is; most good ointments are 75 per cent.
This should be mixed with an equal amount of clean tallow, well
worked together with a knife blade, then take a piece as large as a
bean and rub below the vent. Rub well into the skin; all lice go to
the vent to drink, and they can't stand mercury. The mother hen
may be treated in the same way; the reason I do not advocate the
use of this ointment before the tenth day is the extreme susceptibility
of the poults to any strong poison, but after the tenth day they will
stand it that strength. Until then, depend upon the insect powder.

It is of great importance that the young be kept growing and to
that end the feed must contain plenty of protein and feather making
material, but fed in such a manner that they do not get surfeited. It
is better to keep them a little hungry, feed little and often and give a
variety.

Range is very desirable, but care should be taken that they are
not out in the dew while very young. When they can get berries and
insects, short grass and weed seeds, there is very little trouble with
them. Once they have "shot the red" they are considered safe.

TURKEYS IN CALIFORNIA 111

In starting in, it is always best to purchase stock from two parties
widely separated so that there is no danger of inbreeding, for to in-
breeding is due that fatal of all diseases of turkeys, "Blackhead."

It is claimed that even when all the food must be purchased, turkeys
can be raised at a cost of eight cents a pound; Whether this includes
losses from disease or not I do not know. All statistics are more
or less misleading because all facts are not included. However, there
is and will be good prices paid for all the turkeys that can be raised
on this Coast for a great many years, if not for all time.

Turkey Troubles. — The diseases that attack turkeys are similar to
those of chickens in general. They get roup if crowded in poorly
ventilated coops, canker in the mouth, head and eyes from cold or
filth, and diseases of the crop and intestines. What will cure a chicken
will cure a turkey. But the very best cure in all cases is prevention,
one ounce of which is said to be worth a pound of cure, but believe
me, when it comes to turkeys, one ounce of prevention is worth many
times a pound of cure. Turkeys are a good deal like sheep, they
soon give up. A sick turkey has no ambition to live and it is hard
to arouse them.

"Blackhead" is the one dread of turkey men, and yet, on this
Coast, it is very rare, and when properly bred it is never seen. The
following mixture will often eradicate it even after it gets a good
start in a flock:

Sulphur, 20 grains;
Sulphate of Iron, 2 grains;
Sulphate of Quinine, 2 grains;

mix the above and divide into two rather long pills, giving one to
each turkey weighing six pounds or over; under that weight, this
quantity may be divided into three pills.

Another good liver medicine is Podophyllum; and yet another that
has been very successfully used in all kinds of turkey troubles is
"Carters Little Liver Pills." These are sold at all drug stores as a
cure for liver troubles in mankind, and I know of several cases where
they have <been used for turkeys and chickens both. Give plenty of
onions and chopped garlic with the food and very little else will be
needed.

Fattening Turkeys For Market. — To make a success of fattening
turkeys, it is better to have them all of one size and as near one
age as possible. This can easily be done by sorting out the largest or
first hatches of the season and putting them into separate yards.

Fix one or two good high poles for roosts before putting the birds
in the yards and arrange the feed troughs so that you will annoy the
turks as little as possible after they are put in fattening quarters.

Give them plenty of water, but no food the first day, unless they
get too restless, then a little grain may be fed.

112 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

The second day commence giving a moist mash as follows: barley
meal, wheat middlings and bran, equal parts; add a little salt, just to
flavor it and only feed what the turkeys will eat up readily. At noon,
change ground barley for ground oats and feed as before. For the
evening meal, cracked corn, all they will eat. By changing the ground
feed every meal you not only give the turks a variety of food that is
more appetizing than all one thing, but you are improving the juici-
ness and quality in general of the meat. After about a week of this
diet, they will get tired of it in spite of the change. Then boil up a
big kettle of small potatoes, put in a handful of salt while cooking
and any fat or grease of any kind that is on the premises; when the
potatoes are soft, take a masher and mix in ground barley as you mash
the potatoes. If cracklings can be obtained, boil a good lump, say
ten or fifteen pounds in the potatoes and mix all together with the
barley or ground oats, but not middlings. The latter is too sticky to
use in boiling water. This can be fed to the turkeys as long as it
lasts, and they very rarely get tired of boiled potatoes. In fact, if
potatoes are plentiful on the farm, the whole course of fattening may
be with this boiled mash, using barley and oats as the ground feed in
turn. Any kind of vegetables that happen to be plentiful may be
used, but nothing is quite as good a flesh former as potatoes. The
corn lasts longer and that is why it is fed at night so that the system
is absorbing some food all the time. If the feed is all mixed cold it
is better if it can be mixed a part of the time with sour milk.

We know many turkeys are fed on a corn diet solely, and they
are fat, too, but an all corn diet while it fattens, it does not give the
meat any flavor and the breast meat is always dry. .The ground oats
and barley make juicy meat as well as fat meat. Feed all the green
feed the turkeys will eat, at least once a day, and twice is better. If
there are no cracklings to be had, either beef scrap or tallow must
be used the last two weeks of fattening. Unless milk is plentiful, in
which case the meat can be omitted, but tallow during the last week,
at the rate of a tablespoonful to eac'h turkey once a day should be
given. A great deal depends on the grease, though it matters very
little what kind it is so that it is wholesome. Turkeys fed on this
plan will always insure a high price, and most farms have small pota-
toes that are fit for nothing but feeding.

In shipping to market, always put birds of one size in a coop, as
near as possible, it often gets you a better price, besides it is direct
information to the commission man that you are not a novice in the
shipping business, and he pays more attention to the shipment. Put
the address of the party the shipment is made to in plain view, also
a return address of your own, so that your coop will come back.
This is part of the deal and all shippers should insist on their crates
being returned. The farmer needs to be business-like in his dealings
with others, and demand his rights.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

RAISING GEESE PROFITABLE

The goose is one of the very earliest birds known to have been
domesticated. It is, in fact, so long ago that it is not definitely known
how long, but certainly a long time. Mr. Weir says "It is possible
that the ancient Britons may have kept geese for amusement and
not for food." Maybe, but I don't believe it; the goose is England's
national bird, just as the turkey is the national bird of America. No
Christmas dinner is complete in England without a goose and very
few Englishmen will keep anything for amusement that he likes to
eat. And I know many other people of all nationalities that like
geese, too.

There is not very much of a market for them in Southern Cali-
fornia, but San Francisco is a good market for both live and dressed
geese; and as our population takes on a more cosmopolitan character,
which it certainly will do after the opening of the Panama Canal, the
market here will be better.

Geese are long lived, so that it pays to get good ones in the first
place and then keep them as breeders. William Rankin, a veteran
goose breeder in the East, cites one instance of a goose owned in
Boxford, Massachusetts, which was the property of one family for
101 years, and was then killed by the kick of a horse. She had laid
fifteen eggs and was sitting on them when a stray horse approached
too near the nest. She rushed off to defend her eggs seized the
horse by the tail, and was killed by a kick from him.

Some breeders claim that geese seldom get too old to be good
breeders, while there are others who prefer their breeders to be from
two to five years old. But where I came from in England, those who
raised them kept breeders twenty-five to thirty years old. Sometimes,
though, it happens that ganders will show favoritism and if they do
this when young they will get worse as age increases so that most
all the eggs will be infertile. So it is better to change the male and
retain the females.

These cases are cited just to give an idea or two to guide anyone
who wants to breed and raise geese. Personally, I am a lover of
geese and had intended to keep a small flock here, but found that they
stripped my young trees of their leaves. When the trees get larger
so as to be out of their reach I will get a few more. They are easily

114 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

managed and can stand pretty close confinement if necessary, but, of
course, like all other birds, do better with plenty of room.

I have kept geese in England, in Dakota, in Sonoma County, Cali-
fornia, and two years ago got me a trio here. And in all these places
the geese were the same, always ready to do their part, always gentle
and easily kept in bounds, better than the best watch dogs that were
ever invented, and when given range on grass the least expense and
least trouble of anything I ever kept.

The man who has a piece of low grass land that can be fenced in
— a very low fence will serve geese — can not put it to better or more
profitable use than investing in a few good breeding geese. And right
here in California we have the best climate in the world for raising
early geese. And it is the early goslings that pay. If you want to
turn grass into greenbacks, raise geese. But if you have a small
orchard of young trees and no grass, for the sake of your own
temper and the trees, don't raise geese.

Varieties*. — While you are about it get the best — there is no money
in scrub geese. The Toulouse geese of French origin, are green in
color, with a white belly and a streak of white around the bill. It is
a good layer and easily fattened, but there are very few pure bred
geese of this variety to be found from the fact that it has been
crossed so much on the common grey goose.

The Embden goose is the leading variety in this country; it is
among geese what the Pekin duck is among ducks — one of, if not
the very best of all varieties. Pure white in color of feather and
meat both, a pair of young ones well fed will weigh as high as forty
pounds. While they do not lay quite as many eggs as the Toulouse,
the feathers bring more money, so that makes up the difference.

The African geese are as large as most of the Embden and Tou-
kmse., and it is claimed for them that they are more prolific than
either. The ganders are active and sure breeders and mate promptly
with any variety of geese. This latter quality is certainly in their
favor, as not all geese will do that. They can also be mated with
five times as many geese as the Toulouse and twice as many as the
Embden. The drawbacks to this variety are: First, it is hard to pick;
second, its skin and bill are dark colored. Just so long as our people
buy to please the eye rather than to nourish the body, these small
things count in the price of an article and so many good varieties
of both geese and other fowls are held back by this prejudice.

The veteran goose breeder referred to before, William Rankin,
says: "I think the most perfect goose is the pure 'bred African, as
they lay more eggs, mature earlier and make more pounds of flesh
in the same time. They are very vigorous and hardy, and you will
nearly always raise all you can hatch." He ought to know what he

RAISING GEESE PROFITABLE 115

is talking about and I know of one California breeder who raises the
African geese to perfection.

The Brown China geese are also a valuable addition to the list of
varieties, but are not very well known on this Coast.

Mating and Caring for the Breeders.— Whatever variety your
fancy may choose, you can learn from the breeder of it how many
females to put to one male, for breeds differ in this respect. The
male should be longer in leg than the female, as length of leg gives
him activity; he should not be -burdened with an abundance of fat,
yet be in fair flesh; his eye should be clear and bright and if he easily
takes to the warpath, as indicated by his stretching his neck and
hissing at objects or people, you may know he will make a good
breeder.

If there is no water, that is, running water, there must be a trough
or artificial pond of some sort — some contrivance for them to get in
to mate. Dig a hole in the ground and build in a shallow cement
basin, say 2x3 feet for a small flock. This basin or pond must have
a pipe hole in for a J^-inch pipe at least; the pipe need not be very
long, just so that it carries the dirty water away. When water is
needed in the basin a plug or cork can t>e inserted in the pipe hole.
If the water is only a foot deep it will answer the purpose, but two
feet would be better.

Near the water should be built the shed in which the geese are
expected to lay, sleep and hatch their young. Almost anything in the
form of a shelter is good enough, so that the nest is in the dry for
winter, and a little shade from the sun for summer. The quieter a
place for nesting, the better the goose will like it, and if the rays of
the sun strike it a part of the day it will be kept sweeter.

Feed. — The laying geese do better on grain such as barley, oats
and wheat. Corn to too heating and fattening. If the weather is cold,
give a mash of ground oats, bran and rolled barley. Boil cabbage,
beets, turnips, or potatoes and mash, then mix in the ground grain.
When cool, feed to the geese in reasonable proportion to the number
but do not get them too fat.

Some take the first eggs away, but this hinders the goose from
sitting and causes her to keep on laying. So if early goslings are
desired, it is best to leave the eggs and furnish the goose with some
loose straw for her to cover up her nest when she leaves it.

Hatching. — Sometimes hens of the large breeds, such as Orping-
tons, Langshans, Rocks and Cochins, are used to hatch goose eggs,
but they must be in good condition or they cannot stand the strain.

It takes thirty days to hatch goslings and then sometimes the
little fellows are slow. I have seen it take thirty-two days. But it is
best not to hurry matters, except that a little hot water may be

116 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

poured around the nest to create a steam. Be careful that it does
not touch the eggs or the goose.^

When allowed to sit her own eggs out the goose will usually lay
from twelve to fifteen eggs, though there are cases where a goose
lays twenty and over before sitting, but these are exceptions. A
goose is generally good for one hundred eggs in a season, but they
won't all be laid in time enough to hatch. However, they are good
to use in cooking and one will go as far as six hen eggs in making
cake, crullers, etc.

If goose eggs are to be hatched by hens, see that the hen is well
supplied with good, nourishing food during her incubation and kept
strictly free from lice. Treat the eggs as recommended for duck
eggs hatched by hens, that is, sprinkle at least two or three times a
week during the second .and third week and every day during the
last week with warm water. Do this just before the hen returns to
the nest. The goose carries the water in her feathers to the nest.

Feeding and Caring for the Goslings.— The treatment of ducks is
very applicable to goslings. Warmth is the first requisite; soft food
and warm water to drink for the first few days. A little bread soaked
in milk or some cracker crumbs make a good feed for the first few
days, but very little is eaten by them at all for three days. After
they begin to eat well, make a mash of one part stale bread soaked
in warm water, one part middlings, one part alfalfa meal and two
parts bran with five per cent beef scraps, a little coarse sand and a
pinch of salt. As they grow older, add corn meal and increase the
beef scrap until you are feeding twenty per cent of beef scrap and
two parts corn meal. If baker's bread can be bought cheap, that may
form a big share of the mash. Do not let the goslings get in water
if you want to sell as green geese; it hinders them from putting on
flesh. Give them water to drink in a dish that will reach up to the
eyes and always fill it at feeding time. That is all the water they
need for health.

A little clean straw for a bed is about all they need at night if
the mother goose is with them, but if they are being raised by hand,
it is better to give them a good warm box and see that it has a wire
front to protect them from cats and other enemies. Also, and this is
the most important item in the rearing of goslings and it will pay
those who are interested to read and heed what is here said. Be sure
you provide a shelter from the sun, for hot sunshine kills young
goslings.

Few Ailments. — Except cramps on account of being given cold
water or allowed to swim in it, I do not know of any ailments that
attack goslings. They have no lice, no roup, no canker, nothing but
just good wholesome health and if you will let them, they will attach
themselves to you or any member of your family like a pet dog and

RAISING GEESE PROFITABLE 117

guard you and your home from invasion by an enemy. The wonder •
to me is that everybody with a little spare land does not keep a few
geese. x They will furnish the family with the choicest meat it is
possible to get at the lowest cost and the feathers will sell for from
twelve to fifteen cents a pound for colored and twenty-five to thirty
cents for white feathers.

Old geese have a disease called "rattles" that is akin to roup in
chickens. Give a little physic like salts in the mash and keep clean.

CHAPTER XXXIX

PIGEONS FOR PROFIT AND PLEASURE

The man without a hobby is almost as miserable a being as a
woman without a fad. The fact is both of them lack the interest in
something outside themselves to keep the fires of youth burning. If
you want to live and enjoy the pleasure of living have a fad or a
hobby and ride them till you get tired, then change for another. My
fad has been chickens for a good many years, but now I am in that
stage where I am on the fence because I have taken up with pigeons,
too. And to the beginner in pigeons I would say that the very best
way to start is to go slow. Begin with a few pairs and learn their
ways and needs before venturing in too deep. The pigeon fancier
must have the same patience and perseverance that a good chicken
man or a gardener has when he plants seeds in the ground. He
knows he has planted the seed, but there are perhaps a dozen enemies
to attack his plants, so that he never knows what he will get until
it is safely harvested. The pigeon fancier must await the mating,
unless he buys mated pairs, the production of eggs, the incubation,
the growth of the squab in the nest and the feathering into full
beauty before he can reap any reward. But it all comes so natural
and each stage follows the other in such orderly growth that the
interest is carried along to the finish. For boys I cannot conceive a
more interesting, and if conducted on business principles, a more
profitable pastime.

Years ago the pigeon fancier and dog racer of the old country
were considered the toughs of a community, but late years I have
many times wondered if the love of those birds and animals was not
the saving grace that made those men and boys human, and without
which they would have been toughs indeed. I don't believe it is
possible for a boy who really loves birds and animals to be evil;
his mind has not got the right turn,

Breeds. — But to get back to pigeons: The fancier will ask what
breed is best to keep? And in that as in the keeping of most pets,
there must be the personal likes to be considered as well as profit.
For a person to buy what they do not like is not the way to improve
it and get the best out of it. Then, again, we must know what we
want them for. Is it for squabs, racers, or just something to have
as a hobby? If squab raising is the object, there are several good
breeds to choose from. First in numbers on this Coast, I believe,

PIGEONS FOR PROFIT AND PLEASURE 119

are the Homers. They are prolific, good nurses and of medium size.
If Homers are crossed on the Hen, Runt or Dragoon the progeny
will be larger and bring a better price. But the Belgian Carneaux is
at present holding the stage as the best squab pigeon. These birds
are larger than the Homer, quite as prolific and excellent mothers
and nurses. The prices on these birds are higher than the Homers,
because there are not enough of them to make them cheap, nor will
there be for some time, as prices in Eastern States are being held up
by a scarcity.

The Loft.— Now for the loft, for after all that is the first thing to
think of, even before the pigeons are bought. In California we do
not need any expensive buildings for pigeons any more than for
chickens. All that is required is that it must be a shelter from rain
and sun, be safe from cats, rats, hawks and mice.

The cat proposition can be taken care of by putting the wire
netting of the fly under ground several inches. Rats must be exter-
minated, for there is no safety for the pigeons while they are on the
premises; mice, too, must be exterminated, for they often cause
trouble by making their nests in the nest where ,a pair of pigeons are
hatching and by disturbing them cause them to forsake their young.

One of the largest pigeon plants in California had nothing but
just a roof over the nests of their breeders until the heavy rains of
the winter of 1913 washed a great portion of the plant away. I think
our stock ought to be better sheltered than that, but any ordinary
poultry house can be converted into a pigeon loft by adding nests
to the house and a good sized fly outside. Each pair of pigeons needs
two nests with one lighting board.

Furnish the birds with tobacco stems and oat straw to make their
nests of and a bath in the fly and that will solve the question of lice.
At least it has done for us so far, as all our pigeons are clean and
free from lice, mites or any kind of vermin.

Feeding. — Like all other kind of birds or animals, the better
pigeons are fed, the better results can be expected. Good feed
includes good sound grain, a variety of it and green feed, grit, char-
coal, salt, oyster shell, etc. Red wheat is better than the white
varieties. Kaffir corn or cracked corn hemp and Canada field peas
make a variety that will keep pigeons healthy and in good breeding
condition. Not too many peas should be served when the birds are
breeding, as they are very fattening. But when there are many squabs
to be fed, extra feed should be allowed for them. For a pen of fifty
birds we give three quarts at a feeding, , and when there are many
squabs, at least a pint extra should be served. In addition to this
they have lettuce, rape or kale which ever is being fed to the chickens
at the time, once or twice a day. And these birds have done wonder-
fully well. Sometimes I think a little broken rice and millet seed

120 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

make a nice change, but that is just optional, as they do very well
without it.

Care. — The feeding must be done regularly, especially during the
breeding season, because if the birds have to wait over the usual
time the task of feeding the young is neglected, or they are fed so
irregularly that they do not grow as fast as they otherwise would. The
watering, too, must be attended to and a good supply of clean water
kept in a clean earthen crock for drinking and a large open pan for
a bathtub. This should be changed every day, because a lot of birds
make it very dirty.

At least once a week the nests and floor of the houses should be
cleaned out and whenever a pair of squabs are in a nest they should
be cleaned out for this is where mites will start if anywhere.

Pigeons in health show a bright, lustrous eye and bright plumage,
which in sickness goes dull and lusterless, so that it is easy to tell if
a bird is off its feed.

Like all other species of the feathered tribe, pigeons molt, and
sometimes the molt goes hard with them, but a little extra care and
watchfulness will help tide them over. A little extra hemp and a
little flax seed or sunflower seed at this time will be acceptable and
help in the molting and the feather building process. For a tonic
give a little Douglas mixture in the water. A tablespoonful to a pint
of water is about the right proportion. Directions for making will
be found on another page.

Hatching. — Some authorities claim that the squabs hatch in
eighteen days and others say sixteen, but unless the first egg is
removed from the nest and a dummy egg put in, one squab will
hatch before the other. So when the first egg is hatched it is better
to remove it, mark it and mark the nest you take it from, then keep
in a small box covered with a cloth in a moderately warm room.
When the second egg is laid take the dummy out and replace the
first egg and in eighteen days your squabs will hatch if there has
been no disturbing influences around the parent birds.

In four weeks' time your squabs will be ready for table, nice, fat,
plump delicacies that invalid or epicurean alike will be glad to get.

I do not know of anything in live stock that gives such good
returns for the amount of labor and money expended.

Catching Pigeons.— Pigeons should never be caught by the leg.
If you are not adept enough to catch them on the fly, with the hands,
make a net. Anyway don't try to catch them by the leg, for you may
break it.

Diseases of Pigeons. — Presumably pigeons are heir to as many
diseases as chickens, but if the general health of the flock is kept up
there will not be much danger from disease. Sour crop seems to be

BREEDING PEN OF PEKIN DUCKS

A MERCED COUNTY FLOCK OF A THOUSAND TURKEYS

PIGEONS FOR PROFIT AND PLEASURE 121

•one trouble they are afflicted with, and if a little bicarbonate of soda
is put in the water the pigeon will cleanse the crop and contents
itself very quickly.

Canker. — This is similar to canker in fowls. A bit of bluestone as
big as a pea in a quart of drinking water will dispose of that in a
few days.

Roup or Cold In the Head. — For simple cold in the head, sneezing,
etc., a dose of Epsom salts will generally be found effective. When
there is roup with sneezing, the birds must be examined, and if neces-
sary the heads dipped in peroxide of hydrogen. Give one or more
dozen pellets of spongia dissolved in the drinking water. Watch
for results, and if necessary dip the heads again.

Worms. — Small pieces of garlic may be put down the throat at
times, or a dozen pellets of santonine dissolved in the drinking water.
As pigeons do not eat meat or drink milk, I cannot conceive of them
being very much troubled with worms.

Diarrhoea. — This is caused by musty food. First, change the food,
thus removing the cause, then give ipecac or a little lime water made
as directed in another part of this book. „

Indigestion. — Give nux vomica and change the bill of fare slightly,
adding some hemp seed. If sour water runs out of crop give a little
bicarbonate of soda in water.

For Lice. — Dust with any good insect powder, and grease the head
with olive oil and creolin.

Sore Eyes. — Cause is usually filth and overcrowding. Bathe the
eye in witch hazel and peroxide. Just a few treatments will cure.

CHAPTER XL

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES

If poultry were treated in a more natural manner, they would
not have very many ailments, but two-thirds of those who keep poul-
try do not have the least idea of how and what to feed nor what a
chicken can stand. For instance, I sold a boy a little bantam hen;
the day was very warm and I told him that it was not really fit to
take out so far, but he insisted he could take her safely. Now,
instead of going straight home, he went to some races, spent four
hours watching races ,and left the poor little hen tied on the handle
bars of his bicycle. She died a week later and then he thought I
would make his loss good. But he paid for his experience as we must
do if we are to build characters. If I had made that loss good it
would have been no lesson to the boy at all. Now he knows that
bantam hens won't stand any such treatment.

Sickness and accidents are sometimes unavoidable, but not often.
Sometimes the birds of the aif carry disease around, and in such
cases we are helpless.

Diseases may be classified as those of the head, throat and lungs.
This group of ailments includes colds, roup, canker croup, bronchitis,
diphtheretic roup and pneumonia.

Colds. — In common colds where there is sneezing and running of
the eyes, the remedy is a quick physic at once and find the cause.
If it is caused by a draught of cold air coming through cracks,
remedy it at once; if it comes from climatic changes, give physic in
a little warm mash. The physic that serves the best is Epsom salts
or common coal oil. Allow about half a teaspoonful for each chicken
and see that it is well distributed in the dry mash before mixing with
water. In case oil is given, mix the oil with the quantity of water
to be used in the mash and mix well after. In the drinking water
put a few pellets of spongia, about one dozen pellets dissolved in
half a gallon of water will do. Spongia is the homeopathic remedy for
roup (croup in children or chickens), and it is a good one; humane
and quick to act if sufficient is used. The trouble is that it is high
in price, hard to obtain and by the time a person gets it his chickens
are often past cure. If kept on hand it will be found reliable and
easy to use. For the sure enough roup, the cold that has been neg-
lected until it has that roupy smell that one never forgets, spongia
will help by giving in the water to drink, but the head, nose and eyes
must be bathed in a disinfectant besides.

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES 123

For this purpose Kreso dip No. 1 is very good, but almost any of
the germ destroyers on the market will answer. Roup is a germ
disease and when you know that, it is easy to find a cure. As a last
resort dip the fowl's head in coal oil and give a bromo quinine pill.
This will cure when everything else fails, but coal oil is harsh treat-
ment and it is better to use milder remedies.

Fowls that have had roup should never be put in a breeding pen,
for the offspring will have a weak spot in the same place. Dispose
of them, no matter how much they are worth.

Canker. — Canker is not always caused by colds, neither is it always
roup. Sometimes male birds get it by fighting through wire fences,
and again I have known it to be caused by dirty, foul feeding grounds.
Canker is generally described as a cheesy matter, but it is more in
the nature of an ulcerative sore on the inside of the mouth. It
affects the mucous membranes of the mouth, eye and throat. The
surest and quickest remedy for it is to apply a bit of powdered blue-
stone direct to the ulcer. Take a stick and make a little paint brush
with a bit of clean cotton, wet the cotton, dip it in the bluestone and
swab the sores. Scrape off the old sore and apply again; about twice
will cure it.

Diphtheretic Roup. — A great many people seem to think this
disease is a sort of chronic roup, but the odor from it is not the same
as that of roup. Both are contagious and infectious, but the diph-
theretic roup is far more deadly in its action. When a fowl has an
attack of it the remedy must be applied promptly, for the hen soon
begins to show signs of losing strength and flesh. If only one bird
is attacked it is better to kill and burn her at once, move the rest to
fresh ground and give all a tonic so as to brace them up. It comes
on so suddenly that I have thought the birds carried the germs in
their mouths, for I have seen odd cases spring up where no sick
birds had ever been kept and in all such cases where the trouble was
found out and the sick fowl killed at once, the disease went as sud-
denly as it came.

Symptoms. — Fowl's body and legs are hot, comb is hot and of
much darker, brighter red. Later as the fever decreases it gets
paler. The throat is patched with white almost like a child's throat
in diphtheria. Any attempt to remove these patches results in bleed-
ing. Breath is foul and of a distinctly different type than roup smell.
When you are sure it is diphtheretic roup, take the fowl in the left
arm, holding it partly under the arm with the head well out and pour
good strong peroxide of hydrogen down its throat until it ceases to
foam. As soon as it stops foaming take the swab as mentioned in
canker, dip in powdered bluestone and swab the throat out with that,
or drop the dry powder on the spots; it will burn it out. Bluestone

124 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

and nitrate of silver are the quickest remedies, but unless the bird
is a valuable one it is safer to kill it and cremate the body.

Pneumonia. — If hens are kept in good health and given plenty of
fresh air, this disease will never trouble us in this State. Debility
and closed-up houses are responsible for the condition called pneu-
monia. The remedy lies in your own hands; namely, open front
houses and good feeding.

Diseases of the Liver. — These liver troubles are nearly all caused
by wrong feeding, and the general impression is that they are caused
by too much animal food in the form of beef scrap. But this is not
so. Most of it is caused by too much of the carbon-hydrates or
starch foods. And the worst of it is that until the fowl is dead,
there is nothing sure about what disease it had. And now here is
another cause of liver complaint — too much condiments, too much
Douglas mixture and copperas solution in the water. Throw it out
and give pure water to drink and less condiments. The liver is the
most abused organ in a fowl's anatomy. Cut out some of the starchy
foods, and turn them on a grass run if possible. Mix castor oil in a
little mash feed, allowing a teaspoonful for every hen, then add
water to mix all just crumbly. Get a small vial of homeopathic podo-
phyllum. These can be dissolved in the drinking water a few days
and with proper feeding the fowls will soon be all right.

Going Light. — This disease is often called consumption, but it is
nothing of the kind. Sometimes a hen will begin moping. She stops
scratching and seems to take no interest in anything; keeps going
lighter and lighter, until she is nothing but a handful of feathers and
bone. I have seen where a good run would change things, and that
is the first remedy to try. Set some small boy after her with instruc-
tions to keep her on a run. Of course, if it is an old case this will
not do any good. The trouble is caused by the oil glands getting
stopped up. If the gland, found among the tail feathers, can be
reopened the hen soon recovers. If it cannot get reopened, annoint
the parts with some kind of animal fat; goose oil is good or mutton
tallow. Give the hen a little sulphur in feed if she will eat and she
has a chance to get over it, but if not attended to, she will always die.

Liver Diseases Include Congestion, Inflammation, Hypertrophy. —

As stated, nearly all disease of the liver is due to wrong feeding; that
is, an overfeeding of a ration too rich in starch elements. Potatoes
are very little but starch; so is the taker's bread fed as table scraps.
The scraps consist mainly of potatoes and bread. The liver is the
most abused organ in the anatomy of a fowl because it must work
overtime to make up for the mistakes made by the feeder.

In the first stages of congestion, the symptoms are very similar
to those of enteritis. There is a lack of color in comb and wattles,

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES 125

a watery diarrhoea, dark at first, then changing to a nasty yellow.
After a while the comb turns dark red or purple color and the fowl
mopes around without ambition.

If these symptoms are noticed and the fowls properly treated all
will be well, for nature is quick to respond. Drop all starch foods
such as corn meal, potatoes, and flour and if the fowls can be turned
out to grass, let them have little else for a few days, so that the liver
has time to rest. If they cannot be turned out to grass, give any
kind of litter to pick over and get exercise. Nux vomica in the drink-
ing water, ten or twenty drops to a pint, keeping away all other
water, will soon effect the change. If nothing else is handy give
bicarbonate of soda and bisulphate of magnesia in small doses for three
or four days.

If the congestion is not stopped, inflammation soon follows. The
symptoms of inflammation are heavy 'breathing along with the
diarrhoea and a lowered vitality. The fowl gets poorer all the time
and has great thirst, with an almost total loss of appetite.

Treatment. — Clean out the bowels with castor oil dropped from a
spoon or dropping tube. The treatment must be individual now as
the birds refuse to eat and every minute is time lost. Follow this
with tincture of nux vomica, half a teaspoonful to a quart of water.
As the birds are thirsty they will take the medicine that way. Keep
them perfectly quiet and as soon as they will eat feed boiled rice
sprinkled with cinnamon. It takes prompt treatment in these cases,
for they don't last long.

Hypertrophy of the Liver. — This disease is much more common
in parts where fowls are fed largely on corn and kept housed up
during the long winter months. It is due to these two conditions,
overfeeding of overheated food and not enough fresh air and exer-
cise. I have never had a case and have not heard of many. If fowls
get too fat it is a good idea to give a dose of physic in the mash
about once a week and that will prevent a tendency to enlarged or
hardened liver.

If podophyllum and nux vomica are kept on hand in a poultry-
man's medicine chest, he never need fear losing any case from indiges-
tion or liver complaints. These two homeopathic remedies act
silently but surely without distressing the liver af all.

Diseases of the Egg Organs. Their Cause and Cure. — The fact
that there are more cases of egg-bound in late winter shows that an
over-fat condition of the abdomen is the greatest cause of egg-bound
in hens. It is not always too much feed that causes fat. More often
it is lack of exercise and feed of too fattening a character. Active
hens like Leghorns very seldom are victims of egg-bound, and from
this it can be seen that the trouble is preventable.

126 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Hens that are inclined to put on fat should be fed in deep litter
and nothing of a fattening nature fed on the side. Ground bone
rather than beef scrap should be the meat diet. Egg-bound hens are
liable to die of heart trouble, as the straining to dispose of the egg
causes great disturbance in the cardiac region.

Symptoms of Egg Bound. — The hen is restless, often going on
the nest and leaving it several times, the tail feathers are droopy as
if the hen were in the rain. Sometimes the hen can be helped by
passing an oiled finger around the egg passage, then give a table-
spoonful of olive oil to drink. Holding the hen with the vent over a
bowl of hot water will cause the muscles to relax so that the egg can
pass. But prevention is much surer and better. Keep hens from ac-
cumulating fat on the abdomen and there will neither be egg bound
nor many soft shelled eggs.

Inflammation may occur with egg bound condition or it may be
caused by too much condiments that have irritated the inner lining
of the egg passages. This is a very serious disease and must be given
attention or nothing will save the hen so affected. Unless the egg
can be removed and the fat be reduced at once the case is almost be-
yond help before being noticed.

If the inflammation is caused by a broken egg or a retained egg
the cause must be removed 'before we can hope for a change for the
better. Bathe the lower part of the abdomen in warm water, give a
few drops of fluid extract of ergot and after injecting olive oil man-
ipulate gently with the fingers until the egg can be reached, then
remove it. Feed very light for some time and tone the hen up with
a little iron tonic.

Soft Shelled Eggs. — This is not exactly a disease but it is not a
normal condition. Anything that is not normal must be abnormal,
and an abnormal condition generally ends bad. Hens will some-
times drop soft shelled eggs from fright, even when not frightened,
if there are strangers around, or dogs. Worms are also exciting
causes of soft shelled eggs, but the most frequent cause is an overfat
condition of the abdomen. This is easily cured if the fault is from
overfat condition. Make the birds work for what they eat in deep
litter, cut out a large portion of the starchy foods and feed more al-
falfa in the mash feed to counter balance the mill feed. See that the
hens are well provided with oyster shell, grit, etc., and give a heap-
ing teaspoonful of sulphate of magnesia in a pint of drinking water,
keeping it before them for one day and given twice a week. If this
does not reduce the fat, turn them out on grass and feed nothing else
for a week.

Peritonitis. — No one has ever known of a fowl that got better and
lived with this disease. It is an inflammation of the membrane cov-
ering the organs in the abdomen. The fever runs high, from 105 to

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES 127

110 degrees, and the most humane thing to be done is to kill and bury
the bird at once, as a cure is impossible.

Dropsy. — This is more an indication of other diseases than a dis-
ease of itself. Anemic fowls or those in dirty quarters sometimes
develop dropsy. There is a watery gathering between the tissues.
The fowl has a fatty, baggy appearance, but on being picked up you
find it poor and thin with this collection of water instead of fat.
Tonics, such as nux vomica, a teaspoonful to a quart of water, or
arsenate of iron, one grain to a quart of water, will be helpful, or
homeopathic pellets of arsenicum. But the conditions must be im-
proved, cleanliness and good nourishing food will work a cure.

Break Down. — This condition and dropsy are often mistaken one
for the other, though quite different. Break down is a baggy condi-
tion of the abdomen caused by fat. Hens fed on a corn diet and al-
lowed to get too fat will break down. It rarely happens with pullets
of any breed and only hens that are inclined to lay on fat are afflicted.
When hens get in that condition, there is no use wasting time trying
to reduce the fat; it pays better to market them.

Vent Gleet. — When this condition arises there has been some ex-
citing cause, such as a broken egg or egg 4>ound will sometimes bring
on the inflammation. It usually begins with redness and a swelling
around the vent, followed by a white milky discharge. If the hen can
be caught and removed from the yard at this stage it will confine the
trouble to the one case. It always begins with a hen, unless a new
male has been brought from where the trouble existed, because it is
spread by copulation.

Remove the hen, and if it has gone long enough for crusts to form
on the vent, the male bird too, while the rest of the hens must be care-
fully watched.

Treatment. — Prepare a warm bath and have a can filled with a
solution of boracic acid and warm water. Inject this into the vent
and wash well all around with a soft cloth or sponge. Anoint the vent
with an ointment made by mixing sugar of lead and lard together.
The bath and boracic acid treatment must be renewed until the birds
are well. Cooling food, such as grass, roots and grain, must be fed;
no meat or exciting food while the birds are under treatment. And
the operator must keep his hands from his eyes or any susceptible
place until they are disinfected.

Leg Weakness. Rheumatism. Cramps and Bumble Foot. — Leg

weakness attacks birds that are inbred too much, but more often is
the result of acquiring more fat than the legs can carry. The first
thing to do is to reduce the feed, make the birds exercise more and
give more bone in the diet. Bow legs are also the result of a too
heavy body for the legs to support. These things only attack young

128 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

growing stock when the food is not well proportioned so that the
bony structure can keep up with the flesh and muscular parts of the
body. Symptoms of leg weakness are an unsteady gait, wabbling
around, sometimes giving right up and lying down, where it remains
an object of pity and contempt by its fellows. The bird should be re-
moved to a shady place and fed separately a little grain and fresh
ground bone. Keep it on that diet until the flesh is reduced, and if
it does not get strong there is no use fussing with it. Feed it up and
kill, as it will be a trouble more or less. It is noticeable that very few
pullets ever show leg weakness, but generally the fast growing cock-
erels that outstrip the rest of the flock. Give them milk to drink
along with wheat and ground bone, but no dosing.

Rheumatism. — This trouble is no respecter of sex, age or size, for
it attacks all alike that are in any way susceptible. The surest symp-
tom of rheumatism is the swelling of the joints, a contraction of the
limbs and a slight rise in the temperature.

Sudden changes in climate, from a dry to a wet, will sometimes
cause a sudden attack of acute rheumatism. If the bird is carried
over that period it often gets better and is not troubled again. It is
seldom fatal, though it has been known to reach the heart and cause
death. But a bird with rheumatic tendency is of very little value and
if more than one attack is had, the bird is better killed. Such fowls
should never be used as breeders even if theodbgeet y g m Ifssitgwild
should never be used as breeders even if they do get better, for the ten-
dency will be transmitted to the offspring.

The only internal treatment that will do any good is to add iodide
of potassium to the drinking water, fifteen grains to the quart of
water. But when this is given the bird must above all things be kept
dry and warm, or the remedy will be worse than the disease. Give a
straw bed and keep the bird dry while under treatment and it will
soon recover. >

Cramps.— -This disease very rarely troubles older fowls or chicks
raised by hens, or in fireless brooders. It is caused by overheated
brooders, overcrowding, and as in leg weakness the growth of bone
and muscle does not correspond, circulation is hindered and cramps
occur. The remedy is in giving the chicks more room, lowering the
heat and inducing the chicks to exercise by feeding the chick feed in
finely cut alfalfa or straw. Medicine is of no avail in such things, but
strict attention to good sanitary brooding will soon improve the
chicks and cramps will disappear.

Bumble Foot. — Bumble foot is almost unknown among the small
breeds. It is caused chiefly by a bruise, such as a heavy bird jump-
ing off too high a perch onto a board floor, would sustain. Or some-
times the bird gets a sliver in the foot that causes it to gather pus.

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES 129

This is where the name comes from; it is at first a slight bruise, tender
and hot, the circulation is impeded and pus begins to form. The bird
limps and as the disease progresses the limp is more pronounced
until the bird gives up and lies around. When the pus breaks the bird
gets relief, but unless the wound is looked after it gathers again and
the skin on the foot gradually hardens. The foot is swollen more or
less but the health of the bird not being impaired, very little notice
is taken of it. If taken in time and treated as a bruise the bumble will
not mature. Washing the foot in good strong vinegar and then put-
ting the bird on a straw floor away from board floors will prevent the
pus from forming. If pus does form the place should be opened with
a sharp knife and the whole foot tied up in a flaxmeal poultice. The
dirt must be kept out of the open wound if we are to cure the trouble.

Worms in Poultry. — There are two kinds of worms that are com-
mon to poultry — the "round worm" and the "tape worm." The
round worm, as its name implies, is round, while the tape worm is
flat. The round worm is much more common in poultry than the
tape worm, and is not very injurious except in too large numbers. A
few worms would not injure the health, but if a bird had a few hun-
dreds eating up its food supply, that would be injurious. So to pre-
vent the latter condition it is better to confine the worms to a limited
number, or better yet, to none at all. The round worm is seldom
passed through the bowels and many poultrymen do not know their
birds have them until one dies and a post mortem is held. The round
worm varies in size from one-third to five inches long. The head is
pointed like a sharpened pencil and its color is white.

When birds have very many worms they show it by the comb and
wattles being pale, the birds lose flesh and are thin, and often there
is diarrhoea.

The remedy for worms is santonine. Dissolve two grains for each
bird in warm water. This water to be used in mixing a mash that
has been previously prepared by mixing into it half a teaspoonful of
castor oil. Give this mash to the birds, seeing that all have a share,
and then watch for results. All the droppings should be burned.
Another remedy is turpentine and coal oil, mixed into a portion of mash
food, allowing half a teaspoonful of each to the bird. The prevention
of worms is much easier than the cure. It lies in feeding a little wood
ashes in the mash feed with a dose of Epsom salts about twice a
month except when birds are having much milk or meat, when it
should be given once a week, or a feed of garlic.

The Tape Worm. — Small brooder chicks that eat mice are sup-
posed to get these pests more than any other chickens, as the tape
worm in chickens is similar to that found in cats. Raw meat of any
kind will cause tape worms in young or old fowls, but very few people

130 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

give much attention to such things. Pumpkin seeds and garlic are
both excellent for tape worm, and in fact are good for both kinds.
Make the birds fast for twenty-four hours if you suspect tape worm,
then give a big feed of garlic cut in pieces and as many pumpkin
seeds as they will eat. If garlic were fed once a week to all kinds
of poultry the health would be improved and no worms would ever
get a footing.

Diseases of the Crop and Digestive Tract

The crop or sack through which is passed the food the chicken
eats is not very sensitive, but at times it gets packed from eating
food that contains too much fibre, and sometimes from too much
mash food that sticks. Again, when the digestion is not carried on
as it should be, the contents of the crop sours and we have a state
of fermentation set in that is carried all along the intestinal tract, if
not remedied. Many cases of diarrhoea start from crop fermentation.
And yet if taken in time nothing is easier to cure. If the crop im-
paction occurs through too much coarse fibre, there is danger of the
gizzard being affected, and in that case sometimes an operation is
the best way out. This is not a very difficult job, but unless the op-
erator has a steady hand he may be so long doing it that the bird
will lose strength. The first remedy in such cases is to get a little
olive oil or castor oil down the bird's throat in a little warm water,
then commence to manipulate the crop. Hold the bird's head down
and work gently, squeezing and pinching the food towards the mouth.
If the food is too thick to be moved, insert a rubber tube and pour
warm water into the crop gently, then work again until you give re-
lief. Wash out the crop with a solution of baking soda and water,
as this will prevent fermentation.

The Operation. — If the crop is in too extended a condition from
swollen grain to manipulate there is nothing to do but operate. It will
take two persons to work, one to hold the bird and the other to use
the knife. Pluck the feathers from the crop and make a clean cut,
lengthwise, of about two inches of skin first. Wait until the blood
stops running from the first cut before cutting the crop proper. Then
cut about one-half inch long into the crop and commence pulling the
food and other stuff out by degrees. Put the finger in to feel if there
is any obstruction, then if all is clear wash out with a little warm
water and salt, sew up the crop and keep the bird quiet for a few
days and feed a little soft feed.

Inflammation of the Crop. — This is caused by an irritation of some
substance such as paint skins, salted meats, pieces of unslacked lime
that set up quick heat in the crop. Old paint cans should never be
left lying around. Old sausage meat that has been put up in brine is

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES 131

an* irritant that quickly sets up inflammation of the crop and kills
too if it is not remedied at once. Mucilaginous drinks like flax seed
tea, milk and oil or almost anything that is soothing, poured down the
bird's throat will reHeve and cure, but it must be done promptly.

If lime is the cause, give vinegar and water, following with flax-
seed tea.

Indigestion. — This is more often the result of a lack of exercise
than anything else. A change in the feed and making the fowls ex-
ercise for what they get, will often set them right. Take away all
mash for a few days and give the fowls a few drops of nux vomica
in the drinking water for three days, then change off and give one-
eighth of a grain of strychnine to every quart of water for three days.
This will as a rule put the birds in good form, but you must keep
them occupied, for laziness is the mother of indigestion.

Gastritis. — This disease is generally twin sister to indigestion and
inflammation of the crop. It is an enlargement of the food passage
and results from irritation.

The symptoms are the same as indigestion, lack of appetite, diar-
rhoea one day and constipated the next. ^Bird strains and passes little
or nothing. A little boiled rice or wheat to which is added a small
amount of olive oil will be found to be the best feed for a few days.
Add one-tenth grain of arsenate of copper to every pint of drinking
water, and keep the bird quiet.

Diarrhoea. — Simple diarrhoea is an inflammation of the digestive
organs causing a looseness of the bowels. The discharges vary in
color, sometimes being whitish, and this is usually designated "white
diarrhoea." At other times the discharge is greenish or yellow, the
color varying according to the cause of the disturbance. The causes
are too much meat in the diet, climatic changes, cold wet floors for
the hens to stand on, foul drinking water, overdoses of mustard, pep-
per and condition powders of any kind, overcrowding and vermin.
Some one or ofrher of these things are at the bottom of all cases of
diarrhoea, and sometimes too much bran and other food of a laxative
nature.

The treatment consists in removing the cause, cleaning up in gen-
eral and changing the ration gradually. Violent remedies rarely do
any good. Keep plenty of charcoal where the fowls can have access
to it. Feed sparingly and put in the drinking water a few homeo-
pathic pellets of ipecac, about a dozen pellets to a quart of water. If
the cause can be traced to bad food, such as moldy grain or 'smut,
give arsenicum pellets.

If it is white diarrhoea, give two or more dozen pellets of aconite
in the drinking water for the first three days, then wash out the
drinking vessel and scald, after which give arsenicum pellets. These

132 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

homeopathic medicines work gradually and act sure. Don't think
because they are not violent that they are inactive, for the finer a drug
is, the surer is its action.

For old obstinate cases give a good dose, a tablespoonful, of olive
oil and follow with Carbo Veg. pellets in the water.

Enteritis. — This disease is very common among poultry that are
kept in yards where they have no shade in hot weather or when they
are allowed to eat putrid unwholesome meat. It is often mistaken
for cholera, something we do not have in this State. The affected
fowls are dumpy and inactive; the comb, pale at first, later becomes dark
almost purple. There is a dark colored or greenish diarrhoea, copious,
and sometimes with blood in it. Fowl's crop may be full of food or
nearly empty and it may keep up its appetite all through. If any die
and the body is held head down, a dirty, ill-smelling liquid will run
from its mouth. If examined after death, the liver will be found to
be enlarged, if the case is a new one, but as the disease progresses
the liver shrinks. The intestines are full of mucus and very much
inflamed.

This is a contagious disease, and the first thing must be to clean
up. Whitewash all coops, spray all runs with a good disinfectant and
burn all refuse. Isolate all sick birds and tone up the flock so that
they may be able to resist the disease. Provide good shelter from
the sun and plenty of pure water. Mix plenty of charcoal in the mash
and feed in a crumbly condition instead of dry, and let there be more
of middlings or shorts and less bran in the mash. Drop two dozen
pellets of Carbo Veg. in the drinking water and keep it up until as-
sured that your birds are cured.

Limber Neck. — This disease is caused by eating foul, rotten car-
casses and being exposed to the sun.

Symptoms. — Bird loses control of legs and muscles of neck, head
points to ground. Give olive oil and set bird in a cool shady place. Pour
a little hot water over top of head and let it rest.

Eye Troubles. — Sometimes chickens' eyes and the heads will get
inflamed and swollen when there is no roup.

For simple cases where there is no pus a little aconite in the
water will very often allay the fever, about ten drops in a pint of
drinking water, or ten to fifteen drops of tincture of euphrasia in a
pint of water and allow no other drink. Bathe the head and eyes in
a mild solution! of creolin and water or dilute peroxide of hydrogen.
If pus has formed, give the spongia tablets recommended for roup,
putting enough in the drinking water to make it strong and bathe in
diluted peroxide. Peroxide of hydrogen is a mild and effective anti-
septic in all cases where the head, throat and eyes are in need of one.

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES 133

Skin Diseases. — There are but three skin diseases that trouble
chickens and in nearly all cases their presence is due to some irritant,
more often dirt. Chicken pox is the most prevalent of the skin dis-
eases. The eruption may extend all over the body, under the wings
and wherever there is fluff, but is generally confined to the face and
comb.

Chicken pox it known by its scabby ulcers appearing in any part
of the body; a dirty sticky liquid issues from the ulcers, drying on
the surface and forming a dirty looking scab. The disease differs
from White Comb, in so far as the last named ulcers come to a
point and chicken pox does not; it just spreads.

The fowls are thirsty from a rise in temperature. Give a little
aconite in the drinking water or mix a little magnesia in the mash
feed once or twice to cool the blood. A little sulphur also is good
and for the sores carbolated vaseline put on warm so that it will coat
itself over is about the very best external remedy. But everything
must be cleaned up, all dirty litter, etc., and spray the yards with sulphuric
acid spray.

Fish Skin and Scaly Leg. — Fish skin and scaly leg differ so little
in appearance that it requires an expert to distinguish one from the
other. And yet in one case there is insect life at work, as in scaly
leg, and the other seems to be due to some functional disturbance in
the health of the bird. In fish skin disease it is well to tone up the
birds by a little better diet and annoint the legs with a mild ointment
made by melting a little lard and stirring in a few drops of creolin.

For Scaly Leg. — Wash the legs and feet in strong soap suds, rub
the legs when dry with carbolated vaseline or an ointment made by
mixing coal oil, lard and sulphur in equal parts, keep the treatment
up until the legs are clean.

Eczema. — While eczema is called a skin disease, it is generally a
sign of overfeeding of some nitrogenous food, therefore is more of a
constitutional nature, though it focuses itself on the skin. Generally
on the wattles and face.

There are generally several fine points raised on the skin. These
fill with a thin fluid which, when they break, run into each other; the
fluid runs out and forms a scab that hardens.

Give from ten to fifteen grains of Epsom salts in a little mash,
and homeopathic pellets of nitric acid in the drinking water. Anoint
the sores with carbolated vaseline, and improve the diet of the fowls
by feeding more vegetable food, roots, etc.

Useful Poultry Remedies

For Roup: Spongia; Hepar-Sulph and arsenicum.
For Swelled Head when no roup smell is present : Bryonia, and aconite.
Other remedies : Epsom salts, peroxide of hydrogen, coal oil, etc.

134 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

For Diarrhoea: Ipecac, Carbo Veg., quicklime, charcoal, etc.

For Worms: Santonine, Epsom salts, oil of turpentine, wood
ashes.

For Liver troubles: Podophyllum, Carter's little liver pills.

For Indigestion: Nux vomica, sulphate of magnesia, and olive oil.

Cathartics or physics: Castor oil, olive oil, coal oil, and Epsom
salts. The last is a mineral that enters largely into the body of all
living things, and it should be given at least once a month to chickens
that are confined.

Flowers of sulphur, another mineral salt that is in the blood, there-
fore necessary if fowls are confined.

Bicarbonate of soda. This should always be given first in cases
of sour crop. Sulphate of magnesia, nux vomica, muriatic acid, 3
drops.

The common salsoda of commerce is' useful to cleanse feed and
water vessels: at all times, but especially so when any contagious
disease is around. Simply dissolve in boiling water and wash the
troughs and all germs will die. Carbolic acid crystals are also good for
disinfecting, and in cases of wheezing colds three drops in half a
pint of water and given the birds to drink will often effect a cure
in a few minutes.

For Ointments: Creolin and lard, carbolated vaseline, sulphur
and lard, tincture of arnica, benzoated oxide of zinc ointment.

For Rheumatism: Iodide of potassium in drinking water. For
rubbing for same, camphor and witch hazel in equal parts; rub
daily, or rub with Venice turpentine.

Tonics: Carbonate of iron, mandrake, ginger, pulverized gen-
tian root, flour of sulphur and black antimony. Sulphur is either
tonic, cathartic or stimulant, according to quantity used.

Two Tonics

Below will be found two good general tonics that can be given
to the whole flock, once or twice a week, according as the fowls
appear in health and laying. For fowls that are moping and not
doing well it may be given once a day until the combs and ap-
petite show improvement.

Flock Tonics. — Linseed meal 4^2 pounds; powdered nux vom-
ica 2 ounces; powdered gentian root, 2 ounces; powdered cop-
peras 2 ounces; bicarbonate, of soda 2 ounces; powdered ginger 2
ounces; table salt 4 ounces; powdered mandrake 1 ounce. If the
fowls are doing well give one teaspoonful to every quart of mash
once a week; if not doing well, every day until there is change,
when all drugs should be discontinued.

POULTRY DISEASES AND THEIR REMEDIES 135

Douglas Mixture. — The Douglas mixture is not so popular as
it was years ago, but it is a cheap tonic that many people think is
all right. As it is astringent as well as tonic, it should be given'
sparingly for some troubles. This is an improvement on the oH
recipe for Douglas mixture and will give better satisfaction:

Sulphate of iron, quarter pound; aromatic sulphuric acid, 4
ounces; and one gallon of water. The aromatic solution is made
in alcohol, with tincture of ginger and spirits of cinnamon added,
and is much better for internal use.

To make: Place the sulphate of iron and the acid in a strong
earthenware pot; pour on the water and stir well with a stick.
Cover the mixture with a woollen cloth and leave for a day. Then
run off into glass bottles or stone jug and cork tight.

Dose: A teaspoonful to each half pint of water or the same
amount mixed in mash, every third or fourth day. The drinking ves-
sels must not be tin or iron; nothing except earthenware or wood.

Used and made right this improved tonic is a great addition to
the list of cheap poultry tonics. Like all cheap things, it was used in-
discriminately and got in bad repute..

CHAPTER XLI

PARASITES AFFECTING POULTRY AND METHODS OF
EXTERMINATION

While we are exempt from some of the various troubles of poul-
trymen in other States, we haVe an extra share of lice troubles, for
these pests nourish winter and summer in our mild climate, and if we
keep the birds free it must be one continual fight, not to get rid of
them but to prevent them getting a footing. Prevention is easier
than cure, even with lice.

Lice. — The true chicken louse is a six-legged large variety; they
do not suck the blood of chickens but live on the skin and feathers,
going to the vent to drink. When the numbers get so large that they
annoy the hen the poultryman begins to take notice, because the egg
supply is less, but if he would attend to it in time these pests can be
eliminated and kept down.

For laying hens and young stock before laying, the following
ointment will be found efficacious, and as one treatment will last at
least three months there is no reason for paying feed bills to support
millions of lice.

Get one pound, or half a pound, according to size of flock, of mer-
curial ointment, U. S. strength. Mix with this twice its bulk of good
tallow; mutton tallow is best. It must be mixed thoroughly or it will
not be good. Now take a small piece about as large as a bean and,
holding the chicken in the left hand with head under the operator's
arm, rub the ointment well into the skin just below the vent: Rub
in the skin well; the lice must go through that place to get a drink
from the vent; the ointment should cover a spot as large as a fifty-
cent piece and be well rubbed into the skin.

But this is not safe to apply to breeders, now mind what is said on
this subject; the mercurial ointment is harmless to the stock that are
used for commercial purposes, but ruinous to breeding stock.

Why this is so I do not know, but I do know, because I have ex-
perimented with it that the eggs do not hatch well; in fact, they are
over SO per cent infertile. The mercury was the cause of this con-
dition in two pens tried out at different times. So for breeding stock
we must resort to a good powder to keep the hens free, and if we
would get good results we must keep them free from lice. They
worry and annoy the hens night and day so that life is made miser-
able, and when hens are miserable they do not lay many eggs.

PARASITES AFFECTING POULTRY AND METHODS OF EXTERMINATION 137

The following is a home made lice powder:

Four and one-half pounds of plaster of paris.

One quart of gasoline.

Half pint commercial Cresol.

One pound flax seed meal.

Mix the gasoline and cresol together, put in some vessel large
enough to hold the whole, then mix in all the plaster of paris the
liquid will absorb. Spread on boards or sheets of paper to dry; when
dry mix in the flax seed meal and store away in cans. The object of
the flax meal is to act as retainer to the other ingredients. It holds
the powder in the feathers and makes the powder last so much
longer. This powder can be used safely on chicks of all ages and on
breeding stock too.

In dusting a fowl a great deal depends on the way it is done. If
imperfectly done, the lice will not be all destroyed and will commence
to breed again as soon as the first effects of the powder are gone.
Work the dust into the feathers thoroughly, then again in one week
from the time of the first treatment go over the fowl again and they
will be safe for a good long time. The flax meal holds the powder
in the feathers and lice cannot get started. -

Mites. — There is but one kind of mite; they look different to most
people, some being greyish in color and others ^red. The fact is they
are all red when they have been making a meal of poultry and grey
when they are starved out. They are oval in shape and have eight
legs. And by the destruction they cause one could almost say they
had eight mouths with which to suck. These are real blood-sucking
pests and soon rob a flock of hens of their ambition and health. If
the blood is the life, these pests sure go after the life of the hens,
and if let alone, will drain them dry.

They breed under perches in filthy floors, cracks and knot holes
in wood and wherever dirty, damp conditions are found around the
poultry house or yard.

To get rid of them it is necessary to clean up all old dirty places,
boxes, nests and wherever chicken droppings are to be found. For
small places where only a few fowls are kept, there is nothing cheaper
nor better than a can of Kreso Dip No. 1, obtained at any feed or
drug store, directions on can.

Kerosene Emulsion is also a good spray for poultry houses, and
if used about three days in succession no mites will be left to tell the
story. Shave one bar of brown laundry soap and put in a boiler with
one gallon of water. When soap is dissolved take from fire and pour
in gradually two gallons of kerosene, stirring all the while. When
about half cold, add one pint of crude carbolic acid and continue the
stirring until cold. It should be about as thick as cream and be well

•

138 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

emulsified. This will make fifteen gallons of liquid lice killer that
will work easily through a fine spray and get in cracks that you
could not possibly reach with a brush.

Fleas. — Whatever kills mites will kill fleas, but some things will
kill fleas that will not kill mites. The salt spray is a good flea
remedy but not very effective for mites.

Mix one gallon of salt with four gallons of water and spray the
ground where the fleas are thickest, do this a few times and the fleas
will all be dead.

Ticks. — In the southern and central parts of the State, ticks have
become quite a pest and many inquiries come concerning the getting
rid of them. Dust is not to be depended upon, though it would be
better than nothing. Ticks are of the same character as mites, that
is, they are blood suckers, and being so much larger than mites, it
does not take so many of them and they very soon kill a small flock of
hens. Therefore, when it is suspected that ticks are on the premises,
lose no time in getting after them.

The kerosene emulsion can be used as a spray, but something
stronger would be quicker. Also, if weather is good, it will pay to
dip the fowls and get rid of those on the bodies. Ticks always bury
their head in the body they attack, so in looking for them you may
mistake them for a burr or something. There is both a dark colored
tick and a light one, but they are quite large, flat bodies when empty
and round when full. As with fleas, a good cleaning up is the first
thing to do, and it may be necessary to take the building down, for
they have a trick of hiding in cracks under boards and in all kinds
of places you would not think of.

Make a dip of Kreso No. 1 and dip the hens in it, putting them
out to dry in the sun. Or Creolin and warm water, 1 tablespoonful
of Creolin to a quart of water, neither of these things are harmful
to the chickens or the feathers.

Spray the building with the following: Crude petroleum, 4 quarts;
crude carbolic acid, 1 pint; crude creosote, half a pint; carbon bi-
sulphide, half a pint. Use one quart of the liquid to one gallon of
warm water and spray the houses and ground around them.

Cresol Disinfectant. — Where the plant is a large one, and the cost
of materials mounts up, it will be found cheaper to make the following
which was sent out by the State Poultry Farm at Davis:

Three and one-half quarts of raw linseed oil; one pound, six
ounces Babbitt's lye or potash; one-half pint of water; eight and one-
half quarts commercial cresol.

Take a clean five-gallon crock and pour into it the three and one-
half quarts of raw oil. Dissolve the lye or potash in the half-pint
of water, allowing it to stand several hours to get cold. When cold,

PARASITES AFFECTING POULTRY AND METHODS OF EXTERMINATION 139

pour it very gently into the crock of linseed oil, stirring it constantly
all the time. Keep stirring for from 20 to 30 minutes until a smooth,
thick soft soap is formed. Then stir in the commercial cresol, which will
dilute the soapy mixture into a clear, reddish brown liquid. This is
a very powerful disinfectant and only three per cent of it is needed
to destroy all insect life. This makes a cheap, good disinfectant that
one can afford to use in quantity. No tick, flea, mite, or louse that this
gets near will ever live to tell the story. It can be diluted and used
to spray hogs and cattle in the spring time, when they get vermin on
them.

The Sulphuric Acid Spray. — This disinfectant is more as a cleanser
of ground than for vermin, wherever there are sick poultry, roup,
diarrhoea, or any contageous or infectious disease, the sulphuric acid
spray will be found useful. Materials: Sulphuric acid (50 per cent sol.)
16 ounces; water, 6 gallons.

Directions: Have the water in a barrel or large wooden pail.
Add the diluted sulphuric acid slowly, being careful not to splash any
on the flesh or clothing, as it burns either one. It is best to mix
just what you intend to use at once, and put on an old suit of clothes
to work in. Woollen will not burn so readily as cotton goods.
Carefully made and used, there is no better disinfectant, but it must
be used carefully and children kept away from it altogether.

Whitewash For Spraying. — Pour boiling water over sufficient quick-
lime to serve your purpose, cover over and let stand one hour, add
salt at the rate of one cupful to the gallon and to each gallon one
ounce of crude creosote. Strain through a burlap if wanted for spray
pump. If a little tallow is added to the lime wash, it will not peel
off so readily and will stand the rain better.

Creolin Spray For Brooder Houses, Brooders, Etc. — Creolin solu-
tion may be made any strength to suit the purpose it is wanted for,
and it is absolutely safe. It is far the best to use where small chicks
are to be housed.

Always get "Pearson" Creolin, eight ounces to six quarts of water
makes a very strong solution that will kill any insect or vermin it
comes in contact with, and yet to chicks or persons is practically non-
poisonous. It can be painted on woodwork, or on floors of brooder
houses or sprayed. When dry it is colorless, and there is nothing
to be seen, yet as a germ destroyer it cannot be excelled. Can be
used to spray brooder, incubator or anywhere about the house, barn
or poultry buildings.

A Good Roost Paint. — By painting the roosts, walls, etc., of
poultry houses with this liquid louse killer, lice will never get a footing
in the building. The fumes from it are too strong to suit mites or
other insects. One gallon crude oil, one pint crude carbolic acid,

140 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

one-quarter pound carbon bisulphide, one gill pine tar. Don't mix
until ready to use, as the carbon loses strength. Paint the roosts and
any other parts desired, then shut up the house for several hours.
Do this in the morning; in the afternoon, open up and air the building
well before admitting the chickens. They will not like going in at
all, tut if the building has been properly aired, it will not hurt them.

A Good Commercial Disinfectant. — Zenoleum has proven a very
good disinfectant and lice killer, and it can be bought at any feed
store if you do not want to mix your own. For fleas on small
chickens, use equal parts of creolin and olive oil or melted lard, and
half the quantity of coal oil. Apply very gently to head and neck,
as that is where the fleas congregate.

CHAPTER XLII

SECRETS OF THE SHOW BIRDS' TOILET

Perfect condition plays an important part in the securing of
prizes. A judge goes by the condition and appearance of the birds
at the time he passes on them. Condition, in a show bird, holds
the same relation as the "height of bloom" does in a flower; i. e., at a
certain period the bud will unfold its petals and gradually burst into
flower. It is then in its best condition — after which it will wilt. And
it is so with a show bird, when in bloom, his feathers will be lustrous
and plentiful, his head bright red in color, and the bird, at that time,
will be in its most handsome dress.

But the "bloom" of a show bird implies more than just the feathers.
It implies that the bird is in good physical condition; second, ripeness;
third, proper domestication. Then we say the bird is "fit." If it is
a good specimen of the breed it represents, it stands a chance to win.
Ripeness means that the feathers have arrived at the stage where
they have acquired the proper length and fullness, without the loss
of brilliancy and pureness of color. If the feathers have not arrived
at proper length and fullness, the bird lacks in symmetry. The arch
of the neck, the curve of the back and the depth of saddle are all
dependent of the proper length of the feathers. Yes, even the shape
of breast, carriage of the bird depends on the ripeness of the feathers.

Training. — For young birds that have not been confined, the pre-
liminary training must be to teach them to stand confinement, and
get used to being in a coop. This should be done gradually, at
first, say keep them in two or three hours, then let them out. Next
time keep them in a little longer, and finally keep them in all day,
then one or two days. Let them get acquainted with strangers as a
great deal of your success at the poultry shows depends on this. If
your birds are frightened and run back in the coop, very few will
stop to look at them, because there are more nice birds that are not
so shy. A well trained bird will pay very little attention to the noise
and hubbub around him, but will take it as a matter of fact.

Training Via The "Stomach Route."— When the birds have got
accustomed to the coop, it is then time to attract them to the front.
This can best be done by feeding them some appetizing food, such as
meat, fruit or something they are fond of. In a short time they will
eat from your hand. Don't hurry matters by trying to make them do
too much. When you have got so far during the day time, take out

142 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

a lantern and draw them to the front of the coop by lamp light. After
they get used to being called to the front of the coop and get recon-
ciled to their surroundings, take a light stick and pass it along the
back, as if smoothing the feathers. At first they will jump back, but
perseverance on your part will win out.

When they get so they don't mind the stick any more, put your
hand in the coop and stroke them with one or two fingers. Then
pass the hand around and stroke under the throat. Nearly all birds
can be tamed thus, they give in when you get around the throat.
Occasionally take a hen under your arms and go in front of the coop
where a male bird is being trained. He will then be looking for the
hen and will learn to expect either food or hen and be on good
behavior.

The Show Bird's Diet.— Always feed a variety of feed and often,
never giving too much of anything at once. I prefer good grain to
mashes, though a little moist mash once in awhile is good as an ap-
petizer. But grain makes firm flesh without fat, and a fat bird is not,
nor never can be called in good condition. A little, very little, raw
meat or fresh ground bone will help keep the appetite on edge, but
too much makes soft, beefy combs.

The Show Bird's Washing Preparations. — Use only soft water in
the washing of white birds and never use laundry soap. The genuine
French castile soap is the best all around soap for toilet purposes for
poultry.

Dissolve one and one-half bar of castile soap, two teaspoonfuls
of oxalic acid, two teaspoonfuls of pulverized chloride of lime, two
and one-half ounces of powdered borax and one ounce of ammonia in
two quarts of boiling water. Keep air tight and use as a washing
solution. Put enough in the first tub to bring out the dirt, then a
less amount in the second tub and none in the third.

After the birds have been thoroughly rinsed in two tubs of clean
water, prepare the blueing water. It is almost impossible to tell
anyone just the amount of bluing to use, because the blue varies in
strength so much, but the water should be about the same as one
would make it for fine white clothes. It is best to experiment first
with one or two birds that are not going to be exhibited, the bath
will do them good anyway.

The Method Of Washing The Birds. — You will need three or four
tubs to make a success of washing the birds, four is better than three.
By having plenty of tubs you can have the water all fixed beforehand
and go straight on with the operation. After experimenting with the
blueing, and having gotten the right shade, if the water is not per-
fectly soft, put in a tablespoonful of powdered borax to prevent the
bluing from clouding.

SECRETS OF THE SHOW BIRDS' TOILET 143

Put enough of the soap solution in the first tub to make a good
lather; take your bird by the legs with the left hand and set it down
in the tub. Let go of the feet and gently force the bird under water,
except the head. Hold it by one wing while you souse and paddle
around it with water with the other hand until the feathers are
thoroughly saturated. Then take a small hand scrub brush and scrub
along with the feathers. Beginning with the head and neck, pass along
the breast, abdomen and legs, then come back and go over the neck
and back route; taking the tail and all around the back portion, always
working with the feathers; then return to the wings, scrubbing each
in turn under and over so as to get all the dirt. When the bird has
been scrubbed all over, take a wash cloth or sponge and wash out all
the soap and dirt that will come.

Then put the bird in tub No. 2, with the water just about one
degree cooler than tub No. 1. Go over the bird in this tub more to
wash out the dirt that was loosened in the other, and to get out the
soap; when the bird looks clean, squeeze the water out of the
feathers as before and pass him along to tub No. 3, in which the soap
must be gotten out thoroughly. Souse the bird up and down to get
the clean water through the feathers, and if necessary, pour warm
water over the back. When all the soap is out, and not before, pass
the bird into tub No. 4, where the blue water is. This water should
have the chill taken off but not over warm; when the feathers are
well saturated with the blue water and to all appearances the bird
is ready for drying, squeeze the water out of the feathers and put
the bird on a table where several nice, clean cloths are ready. Wipe
him off well and put him before a fire, or if a nice sunny day, out in
the sunshine to dry.

Now the drying is, if anything, more important than the washing,
as unless the feathers are nice and fluffy they will never make a bird
look good to the judge's eye.

The drying pen illustrated is of the following dimensions; 6 feet
long, 5 feet high, and 2 feet wide. It is divided in the middle into
upper and lower compartments with wire netting on top of each.
The wire netting that forms the floor for the top compartment is
covered with double burlap that has been washed to take out any
coloring that might be in it. The back, ends, and lower part of front
are boarded; the four corner pieces are 2 inches square by 5 feet long.
There is a roost 4 inches wide on which the fowls stand, placed 2
inches above the wire netting top of the lower compartment.

A door is shown at the lowest part of the front, through which two small
coal oil stoves are inserted. This door is narrower than the opening,
so as to allow fresh air for the stoves.

More Stoves Can Be Used. — One small stove is required for every
two feet of space, or length. A pen 6 feet long will accommodate

144 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

8 to 10 fowls at one time. While these birds are drying, the washing
of the others can proceed, and things will move pretty fast.

The washed fowls are put on the perches and the front curtains
dropped to raise the temperature. If it gets too hot, pin the curtain
back; if too cool, lower the curtain.

But while the drying is going on, some one should be separating
the wet feathers (without removing the birds from the roost), as this
makes it easier for the hot air to pass through the feathers. After
the birds are partially dried, get a good-sized fan and open the door
a few minutes at a time to operate the fan. This fluffs the feathers
much better than if they are left entirely to the heat. Or if there
are more birds to go on the roosts, take the first birds out and stand
them on top of the coop, and use the fan until thoroughly dry.

When the birds are perfectly dry, take them one at a time by the
legs, head down, and sift powdered corn starch into the feathers.
This is merely to keep the feathers clean; dirt does not stick to corn-
starch. Before judging comes off, the birds will have shaken all of
it from the feathers, and no harm done.

The Straw Method of Washing Fowls.— Some fanciers clean their
birds' plumage by what is known as the straw method. About four
or five weeks before a show is coming off, the birds are confined in a
house with a board floor, and given a deep coating of straw to
wallow around in. It must be at least 18 inches deep to do any
good and two feet would be better. The straw must be clean and free
from rust or mold, and should be changed every few days in order to
keep it bright and clean. This straw is a great help, even though the
birds are washed at the finish, as it does take off a great deal of the
dirt and clean the legs and feet.

Cleaning Legs And Toes. — If the bird has been through the wash-
ing process he is now ready for the manicure act. Go over the scales
with a toothpick, work out all the dirt that did not get out with
washing, by rubbing in a little sweet oil and a few drops of carbolic
acid. When perfectly clean, polish the legs and feet with a little oil
of pennyroyal. Some use glycerine and wax, but pennyroyal polishes
and cleans much easier, and it does not stain white legs.

Oiling Comb, Etc. — The comb, face, and wattles of a bird can be
very much improved in color by the use of a little glycerine and al-
cohol. Mix equal parts and gently wipe all over the face, ears, comb,
and wattles. It can be done before the bird is shipped, and again
just before judging commences.

Train The Bird To Pose. — An old cock bird can be made into a
feathered grandstand player if you take the time. Take your bird
out at night, when you want to commence training him, for at night
they are more docile. If he gets excited, put him right back, then

SECRETS OF THE SHOW BIRDS' TOILET 145

try again another night. When you succeed in getting him to stand
at night, then take him out in the day time and try him. The one
spot where a bird is most susceptible is under the beak and throat.
When you can "tickle him under the chin" he is all right; you can do
what you want with him. Teach him to pose any way you want by
putting a stick on that part you want him to lower or raise. At first he
will be afraid of the stick, but he must be taught that the stick will not
hurt him, and the way to do it is by holding the stick over him while
you feed him tid-bits. Many a good bird loses a ribbon because he
is so wild the judge does not care to fight it out with him.

Preparing Colored Birds. — All birds that are to be exhibited must
have their legs and feet washed and put in fitting shape to be handled.
Just as much care should be taken with the legs, feet, head and other
points as if they were white. Now, having washed and manicured
the legs, feet, etc., and washed and colored the face, comb, and wattles,
take a good-sized silk handkerchief that is clean and dry and rub the
feathers all over until they shine. Keep going along with the feathers,
taking long strokes along the back, sides, wings and breast until
your bird just fairly glistens with polish. Of course, he is free from
lice; no decent fancier would attempt to send a lousey bird to a show.
When a colored bird is prepared right he is something worth looking
at, but, oh my, when his shanks and head are dirty, no matter how
good he is, he does not make a good appearance; and when he goes
to a show that's exactly what he is sent for, "to look good" to the
judge. No judge likes to handle dirty birds. It is not reasonable.

Bleaching. — For those who believe in bleaching feathers, the method
is given; every one has his or her opinion as to the value of it and
each must be the judge. It can be detected by any judge by the lack
of lustre in the feathers.

Wash the birds as directed, but do not use any blueing. Dry the
bird well with towels. Then take peroxide of hydrogen and wash the
feathers over, brushing it in with a tooth brush. Where there are
any feathers showing brassiness or off color, brush more peroxide in,
but be careful to keep it out of the bird's eyes and away from the
skin. After working the peroxide well into the feathers, put the bird
in a box with plenty of straw in the bottom, and cover him over to
dry and bleach. The box should be in a moderately warm room, but
not before a hot fire, as he must dry gradually. If all the sap is not
out of the feathers, repeat the process again. After peroxiding, and
the bird is well dried, take prepared chalk and polish carefully the
outside of feathers to give them a silky gloss. Some wash the entire
bird in peroxide, but that is really cruel and there is no need for it.

The above methods are all legitimate and are allowed by the
Standard; other methods, which are downright faking, can be done by
those who want to, but I will not be a party to it by giving informa-
tion about how it is done.

CHAPTER XLIII

KILLING POULTRY

After killing leave it to bleed and get your water ready if to be
scalded, but dry picked poultry is much better flavored. The water
must be near the boiling point, but not quite boiling. The bird must
not be dumped in wholesale, but the head must be kept entirely out,
and a cloth tied around it helps to keep it clean.

Cleanliness in preparing for market is a great drawing card.
People will always pay a little more for something that is clean and
properly prepared.

Unless the customer asks for it to be done, it is not customary to
draw poultry in this State. What is called dressed poultry is being
killed and the feathers taken off, wash the body and put in ice cold
water to cool off. The fowl is weighed before being drawn, and the
customer pays for the gross weight.

When sold to commission men or produce men, they prefer to
have them shipped alive. The fowls, to bring the best price should
be about all of one size and age and be in good condition; it goes
without saying that they should be perfectly healthy, because the
time is gone by when diseased fowls can be sold at any price. Remem-
ber that if a crate of fowls is shipped, the shipper gets the price for the
whole crate based on the condition of the poorest fowls in it; if he
mixes them to pass off a few scarescrows, they are all in sight, all
are handled by those who buy and no tricks can be played on these
men; they are up to all of them. This is a sure enough case where
"honesty is the best policy" for the shipper. If the dealer tries any
tricks you can come back at him full of righteous wrath and make
him come across with the goods.

Killing And Dressing Turkeys. — Turkeys are always dry picked
anywhere, so all that is to be done in killing turkeys and shipping to
market is to kill in a similar manner to killing chickens, only killing
what there are pickers to work at one time. When a bird gets cold
the feathers come hard, so just kill as needed for pickers and have
them in a fairly warm room, so that the birds will not cool off too
quickly. Leave a few feathers around the head, but pick clean as you
go, taking the feathers the way they have lain. Be careful not to
break the skin, for one break causes another, and the bird does not
look attractive when covered with broken skin.

If the turks are to be shipped, cool off in cold water, but don't

KILLING POULTRY 147

leave too long or it will be difficult to get them into shape. They
should be packed in barrels or clean grocery boxes, with clean paper
around to keep out all dust and other things, flies, etc.

Killing And Dressing Ducks — When finishing ducks that are to be
marketed either locally or shipped away, there should always be two
tubs or buckets of water, one hot and the other cold. Plunge the
duck into the hot water just a minute, then into the cold water; this
is called plumping, and it has a decided effect on the appearance of
the duck. This plumping must not be done until you are about ready
to pack.

CHAPTER XLIV

WHAT LOS ANGELES POULTRYMEN HAVE ACCOM-
PLISHED BY CO-OPERATION

Less than three years ago the Poultry Breeders' Association of Los
Angeles was content to hold an annual poultry show once a year, and
a meeting once a month, which was after the manner of an old-
fashioned experience meeting, except perhaps that the prayers were
not on the order of gratitude, but rather a growling against the
"powers that be," which in this instance were the go-betweens or
middle men that eat up the profit between producer and consumer.

Jos. E. Davis, who at that time was a breeder of Whited Rocks, was
also secretary of the Association, and he saw that the holding of a
show and this monthly meeting was of very little benefit to the poul-
trymen in general. Those outside of the fancy did not have any idea
that it was to their interest to be in the Association, and so held aloof.
Mr. Davis saw great possibilities for all the poultrymen, if they could
be brought together for their mutual benefit. He saw how such an
Association could help the beginner, who is so often lost on the rocks
of schemers who are always on the lookout for the unwary. He figured
that reliable information and the advice of practical men would ma-
terially affect the poultry interests of the southern part of the State.
With this end in view, he wrote an article stating what he believed
could be done by proper co-operation.

This paper set the poultrymen to thinking and they held a meeting
to discuss the project; and at this meeting the present Association
was born, with only $500 as a birthright. That was a small sum to
tackle the big interests with, and very few of those present realized
how "big interests" will fight when they get cornered.

But the die was cast; this handful of poultry raisers had set the
ball rolling into an enemy's camp that could, in a few minutes, throw
$50,000 into a fund to down them. But the enemy was short on
vision, too, and it took a little while for them to really consider the
Association in a serious way.

The Association at once opened up a store for the sale of poultry
supplies and for handling the eggs of the members. They hoped by
giving a strictly fresh article to build up a good class of patronage,
but the results have proven that the bulk of people are not willing to
pay any more for a strictly fresh egg than for what sells in the store

WHAT Los ANGELES POULTRYMEN HAVE ACCOMPLISHED 149

as a fresh ranch egg. The cost of candling, handling and delivering in
small lots ate up the profits on the local egg trade, delivery being the
largest item.

At the annual meeting on December 1, 1913, one hundred and seventy-
five poultrymen, and friendly interests, had invested nearly $8,000 in
money, which has had to work overtime, as so much of it has had to go
for equipment and development, that there was very little left to
handle the $15,000 or more sales they are making monthly.

Income. — The Association, though operating on close margins,
handle a great variety of articles; they buy and sell everything a
poultryman produces and uses is his poultry business. They have a
department that acts as a sort of clearing house for stock, here the
producer takes surplus breeders to dispose of; they sell hatching eggs
and baby chicks for members, they have a regular mail order busi-
ness, or shipping by parcels post, and, as Mr. Davis says, they have to
have efficient help and it is up to the poultrymen to keep their help
busy.

What Has Been Done and What Can Be Done.— Before this Asso-
ciation commenced business, the local commission houses used to pay
half price for pullet eggs and dirties; the ^Association at once began
a system of close grading, which has raised both the quality and price.
So far, the greatest difficulty it has had to fight, has been the short-
sightedness of some of its own members, who for the sake of the pres-
ent penny have sacrificed the future dime. But there always were and
always will be people so afraid to trust in themselves and their own
class of workers that they will give away all they have gained by
hard work to somebody with just a little more confidence in himself,
and we never doubt a middleman's self-confidence.

A short time ago, Mr. Davis tells me, a prominent commission man
made overtures to him for his aid to help "break the market." He
said if he could get hold of so many cases of eggs in one day he
could break the market and begin to "store eggs," which at the ruling
price paid by the Association he could not afford to do.

Of course, the help he sought was not given. It would have been
a joke for a co-operative Association to join in such suicidal competi-
tion as that, when its aim was to hold the market up so that its mem-
bers could live. But what can be said when an individual member,
for just one cent a dozen more than Association prices, sells his
eggs to this same commission man, who was only a few days before
trying to "break the market," in which case the member would have
been getting about five cents less.

When we consider that this Association has prospered in spite of
such handicaps as this, and many others, until now they are nearing
the place where they will be able to control the market themselves, it
makes us wonder.

ISO CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Storage of Eggs

Last year the Association made an experiment of storing 700 cases
of eggs. Heretofore the price had always gone down to bedrock in
summer because the commission men told the producers that "local
eggs" would not store. This theory is now exploded, for it has been
proven, that with care, the local eggs will store and come out perfectly
good. That alone is a victory for the poultrymen of Southern
California.

This year Mr. Davis outlined a plan for the storage of eggs by
members, which was as follows:

With reference to the cold storage eggs, your Manager suggests,
for your consideration, as follows: That members be permitted to
cold store eggs through the Association on the basis of one case
of eggs for each dollar paid in on stock. That the Association retain
the right to determine the quality of eggs to be put in cold storage
where it assumes the right to market the same. That the Association
credit the member for eggs suitable for storage at the rate of candled
prices on the day of arrival. That members wishing to cold store
eggs be required to notify the Association in writing of the number
of cases to hold for them. That the known cost of handling and
storing be shared equally by the member and the Association. These
charges are estimated to be —

Season storage per case $ .50

Season candling in and out, case 30

Season cartage, per case 10

Season insurance, per case OS

Season interest, per case 10

Season cases and fillers IS

Total cost $1.20

Charges to be paid by each 60

That the profits or losses be shared equally. That all eggs stored,
and which the Association is obliged to sell, be in unrestricted custody
of the Association. That the Association use its offices to secure loans
on eggs stored on the best terms possible. That four-fifths of the
amount borrowed be paid to members, and one-fifth be retained by the
Association until final settlement; this to defray expenses of handling
until a sale is effected.

This plan was pretty generally discussed and finally adopted, and
this season the Association has stored a great number of eggs for its
members that would have gone on the market for other commission
houses to store and bring out against them during the winter months.

Feed. — The Association puts out a dry mash that sells under the
name of Co-operative dry mash, that cannot be beat. They buy grain

WHAT Los ANGELES POULTRYMEN HAVE ACCOMPLISHED 151

when the capital is on hand to buy in quantity, otherwise there is
nothing to be gained for either party.

Baby Chick Business. — This has been one of the Association special-
ties. The baby chicks come from the members of the Association
who are able to give good strong chicks, and there has been an almost
unlimited number sold. They guarantee a full count of live chicks
delivered at the express office of the purchaser. That is going a little
farther than most shippers will do, so they have worked up a big
trade.

New Place of Business. — In order to get more room for expansion,
the Association closed a five-year lease on a large three-story building
and basement at 324-330 Los Angeles Street. The building has a
frontage of fifty feet on Los Angeles Street and one hundred and
twenty feet on Boyd Street, with a 220 feet good cement alley in the
rear with good sun exposure and room for advertising.

In this new place with over 24,000 square feet of floor room they
are going to grow. There will be plenty of room for all poultry sup-
plies, for feed, a general sales room for all kinds of live poultry, baby
chicks, brooders, incubators, etc., and the third floor will be given over
to the market poultry. Battery coops will be installed, for fattening
birds not ready for killing, and caring for shipments until sold.

Amount Subscribed to Date. — The most astounding feature of the
whole thing is that with the small beginning of $500, in a little over
two years, and sailing against adverse winds a greater part of the
time, there is at present, August 31, 1914, the sum of $129,000 sub-
scribed on the book and a great portion of it paid in. Membership is
$10 per 100 hens for stock subscriptions, which may be paid for
monthly, at the rate of one cent per hen a month for ten months.

The Association expects soon to be able to pay dividends, but at
present all money is needed for expansion. "Mind Your Own Busi-
ness" is the Association's motto.

The information given above is absolutely correct and comes from
headquarters. There are many more interesting phases of co-operation
that might be gone into, but this one instance of what has been done
in such a little time, in one of the worst commission-ridden cities of
California, ought to be sufficient to induce every poultryman in the
whole State to join hands and work for the mutual benefit for all.

CHAPTER XLV

METHODS OF PRESERVING EGGS

While the cold storage egg is for the city dweller, there are times
when the farmer who only keeps a few hens for his family needs is
obliged to buy the storage egg as his hens are molting.

By having a few chicks hatched at different seasons this could be
avoided, but as a rule it is not done and the farmer has to buy eggs.
As a matter of fact a farmer ought not to buy anything he can produce
because there are methods of preserving everything in times of
abundance.

The Water Glass Method. — This is the most popular, and if you get
a good article it is about as easy to do, and all things considered, as
cheap and practical as any method. Sodium Silicate (water glass
syrup), is a thick syrup liquid that differs somewhat in color and con-
sistency. The best is as near white as possible and the darker looking
it is the poorer are its keeping qualities.

I think druggists claim the dark variety comes from Germany; if
it does it is just as well to let them keep it at home, for I lost a lot
of eggs with it one year. Along in the winter they developed mold
spots on them and were not fit to eat; so when buying be sure and get
the white water glass.

As the strength varies some it is always better to be on the safe
side and make it pretty strong. Eight quarts of water to one of water
glass is about right. Boil the water then stir in the water glass and
set aside to cool. The eggs are better set large end up in layers, but
it takes more room than when packed sidewise, but as the yolk settles
to one side, it pays to pack endwise.

After packing the eggs pour the mixture over them cold and set
away in as cool a place as possible. Earthenware crocks or wooden
buckets, barrels, etc., are the best containers, but I have packed in five
gallon oil cans and never saw anything wrong. The fact that water
glass is sold in tin cans, gave me the idea that it was all right to pack
eggs in the same material and I used them whenever I was short of
crocks.

The eggs must be well covered with the solution and weighted
down with a board or some simple device. If intended to be boiled,
pierce the large end with a fine needle. For frying, baking or any
form of cooking, these eggs are just as good as the fresh article, but,
it must be understood that the eggs must have been gathered and
packed fresh.

METHODS OF PRESERVING EGGS 153

The best keeping eggs are those where the males are having a vaca-
tion and the eggs themselves gathered twice a day out of strictly clean
nests. Such eggs will keep under ordinary care better than eggs given
the greatest care that are not gathered right.

The Lime Water Brine Method. — This once was the method used
by bakers and restaurants before the storage egg became so popular.
Quick lime 16 ounces, table salt 8 ounces, and boiling water one gallon.
More can be made in same proportions.

To make, pour the boiling water over the lime, stirring well to keep
from burning, add the salt, and stir until it quits boiling. Allow the
mixture to settle, which may take a day or two, then draw off the clear
solution and pour over the eggs packed in earthenware crocks. The
eggs must be well covered and weighted down or the top layer will
not be good.

Other Methods. — In addition to these methods, eggs for family use
may be packed in salt and bran equal parts, the eggs being so packed
that no two touch. After one layer is complete put one inch of bran
and salt which must be fine, over the surface and commence another
layer. No expense attaches to this method as most families have on
hand a clean grocery box or two and .some salt and bran. The point
to remember is to pack just far enough apart so that the mixture
touches the eggs all around. If the eggs are allowed to touch there
would be no preservative between.

A little judgment must be used in all methods, for sometimes a
very little thing causes a failure. And it surely is handy to have the
eggs to fall back on at a time when the price is so good that we hate
to use the fresh laid article to make a cake that calls for half a dozen.

Any one with a cool, dry cellar can pack away all the eggs needed
for family use in this simple way. Years ago I packed eggs in Dakota
in May and June and had eggs all winter while those farmers that did
not go to the trouble to pack eggs went without.

INDEX

Page

Advantages of California in Poultry Raising 7

American or English Class 81, 91

Anconas 90

Asiatic Class 96

Balanced Rations, What Are They? 58, 59

For Heavy Breeds 68, 69

Bantams, Game 101

Booted White 102

Brahma 102

Cochin 102, 103

Ornamental 102

Rose Comb 102

Beef Scrap Feed Hopper 52

Blue Andalusians 90

Bowel Trouble in Small Chicks 32

Brahmas, The 96, 97

Broilers, Raising 53

Rapid and Slow Plans 53, 54, 55

Brooders — Brooding Systems 40

And Hovers 41

Building of 44

Fireless 45

For Outdoors 40

Stove Systems 40

Buckeyes 92

Buff Plymouth Rock 91

Business Methods in Crossing 82

Buttercups 95

Campines 95

Capons 83

Best Breeds for 84

Carbo-Hydrates, What Are 78

Chicks, Raising the 30

Simple Food Hopper for 51

Cochins, The 96

Colds and Canker 122, 123

Colony Plan 12

Houses 12

Condition Powders 72, 73

Co-operation at Los Angeles 148

Cramps 128

Creolin Spray 139

Crevecoeurs and La Fleche 94

Digestion, Processes of 59

Diphtheretic Roup 123

Disease of Crop and Digestive Tract 130

Diseases of Liver 124

Disinfectant, Commercial 140

Don'ts in Raising Chicks 37

Double Open Front House 17

Douglas Mixture 135

Duck Culture in California 104

Dressing for Market 106, 147

Ducklings, Brooding 105

Feeding 105

Feeding 105

Egg Bound 126

-Egg Tester, How to Make 50

Foods and Condition Powders 72

Eggs, Care and Management of 23

Feeding for 56

For Hatching 23

Packing for Shipment 24

INDEX 155

Preserving 152

Soft Shelled 126

English Class 98

Fattening for Market 66, 67

Feeding, Method of 21, 22, 62

Commercial Way 31

Different Breeds 60

For Eggs 56

Green Food 31

The Breeders 61

Use of Tomato Cans 50

Young Chicks 30

Fireless Brooder, How to Make 45

Fleas 138

Food Hoppers, for Chicks and Hens 51

Home Made 52

For 100 Pounds of Feed 51

For Beef Scraps 52

French Breeds 94

Game Bantams 101

Games and Orientals 101

Geese Raising Profitable 113

Caring for Goslings 116

Diseases 116

Feeding 115

Hatching 115

Mating and Caring for 115

Varieties 114

General Purpose Fowl „...., 80, 81, 82

George Hover, The 41

Government Work for Poultry Industry 63, 64, 65

Hamburgs 94

Hatching, Eggs for 23

Health 8

Heavy Layers, Knowing the 86, 87

Hot Water Pipe System , 41

How Young Chicks Look 28

How to Get More Pullets Than Cockerels 29

Incubator Cellar, How to Build 25

Care of Lamps 28

How to Run 26

Natural Hen 47

Temperature for Eggs 26

Some Don'ts 27

Inflammation of Crop 130

Intensive Poultry Farming 21

Killing Poultry 67, 146

Turkeys 146

Langshans 96

Large and Small Egg Plants 18, 19

Leghorns, White Most Popular 88

Single Comb Brown 88

Lice 136

Location 11

Los Angeles Poultry Association . . 148

Markets, Good 7

Mash for Heavy Breeds ^ 69

Mediterranean Class 88

Milk in Poultry Yard 74

Minorcas 89

White 89

Mites 14, 137

Mold, that Injures Poultry 70

Remedies for 71

Molt in California 78

To Help the 79

156 CALIFORNIA POULTRY PRACTICE

Natural Hen Incubator 47

Oats, Sprouted ] 31

Home Made Sprouter . 43

Sprouted, for Eggs 57

Open Front Houses 14 15 16

Double 17

Orpingtons ' . 99

Black ..100

Buff 99

White "... 100

Parasites Affecting Poultry 136. 137. 138

Perfect Brooding System 41

Pigeons for Profit and Pleasure 118

Breeds 118

Care 120

Diseases 120. 121

Feeding 119

Hatching 120

Lofts 119

Plymouth Rock 91

Buff . 91

Partridge 92

Silver Penciled 92

White 91

Polish, The 94

Poultry Business 9

Appliances 47

General Purpose Ranch 20

Houses 12, 14

Intensive Poultry Farming 21

Location 11

Management During Summer 76

Preparing Fowls for Market 67

When and How to Start 9

Poultry Catching Hook 49

Poultry Diseases and Remedies 122

Bumble Foot 128

Canker 123

Colds 122

Cramps 128

Diarrhoea 131

Diphtheretic Roup 123

Diseases of Egg Organs 125

Dropsy 127

Eczema 133

Egg Bound 126

Entritis 132

Eye Troubles 132

Gastritis 131

Going Light 124

Hypertrophy of Liver 124

Indigestion 131

Inflammation of Crop 130

Leg Weakness 127

Limber Neck 132

Liver Diseases 124

Peritonitis 126

Pneumonia 124

Rheumatism 128

Scaly Leg 133

Skin Diseases 133

Soft Shelled Eggs 126

Tape Worm 129

Vent Gleet 127

Worms 129

Poultry Remedies 33, 133

INDEX .., 157

Page

Prepotency and Prolificacy 85

Pure Air for Chicks 39

Preserving Eggs 152

Raising the Chicks 30

Don'ts 37, 38, 39

Redcap, The 98

Rheumatism 128

Rhode Island Reds 92

Roost Paint, Good 139

Sandbox Construction 43

Shipping Eggs 24

Show Birds' Toilet 141, 142, 143, 144, 145

Small Chicks, Troubles of 32

Sanitation 32

Why Die in Shell 34

Small Plants for Eggs 18

Stimulants, Use of 65

Sulphuric Acid Spray 139

Ticks 138

Tonics 134

Trap Nests, How to Build 48

Turkeys for Market 108

Caring for Poults 110

Fattening for Market Ill, 112

Killing and Dressing 146

Mating and Handling 108

Nest, Good 109

Troubles Ill

Ventilation 77

White Face Black Spanish ." 90

White Rock 91

Whitewash for Spraying 139

Why Chicks Die in the Shell 34, 35, 36

Worms in Poultry 129

Wyandottes 92

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