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Profits in Poultry
Keeping Solved

BEST AUTHORITY ON POULTRY RAISING

SAVE LABOR, TIME AND EXPENSE

By
EDGAR BRIGGS

New Rochelle, New York

New Rochelle Pioneer Print

Mat

Copyright 1906
By

EDGAR BRIGGS

EDGAR BRIGGS
Author of “Profits in Poultry Keeping Solved.”

INTRODUCTORY

Just a few words here, in the way of introduction,
to those who have never heard of me or of my new
methods. I was born a poultryman, as my father be-
fore me bred fancy stock all his life. So, from a small
boy, I gathered the eggs, took charge of the poultry,
exhibited at the county shows and had birds of my
own when a small boy. I have bred fancy stock all
my life and tried the Winter Broiler business with
fatal results, as hundreds of others have done. I have
gathered up and buried and burnt enough chicks in my
lifetime to make me a millionaire, and hundreds of
others have done the same.

This led me to experimenting and also studying
nature to see if there was not a way in which they
could be raised,on a large scale without any loss. The
result is, at last, I have solved the probleih and I have
put off printing this book until March, 1906, to know
I was positively right before going ahead. I now
have 1,000 chicks in the same brooder house where
last year fully 60 per cent of all chicks died. Result,
not losing over 3 per cent of chicks put out, and a
healthier, rugged lot of chicks I defy anyone to show,
and 8o per cent of their feed is processed oats at a cost
of not over ten cents a bushel.

Follow my methods laid down in this book and
success is certain. Read every line carefully. You
cannot go wrong, and a fortune awaits the first in the
field.

Very truly yours,
EDGAR BRIGGS,

Publisher.

ONEITA MAY BRIGGS
OLIVE MARIE BRIGGS ELMER EARL BRIGGS

CHAPTER I.
How to erect and run a poultry plant for profit.

In these few pages of as few words as possible, I
am going to tell you how to erect and run a, poultry
plant on an entire new system for savifg labor and
making money. A plant for the farmer, for the busi-
ness man. A plant that can be run by an amateur, so
that one without experience can make it pay a profit
from the start. It is conceded by men who know,
that ninety-five out of every one hundred make a
failure in the poultry business. The reason for this
is because they go entirely opposite to nature in caring
for them. A hen in her wild state roosts in trees and
feeds on seeds of various kinds, worms and insects of
every description, and when you take her and shut
her up in a yard you make a prisoner of her. Under
such conditions you feed her on mashes of various
kinds until you get her sick and out of condition, and
the natural result is she does not lay more than one
half the eggs she is capable of, and in some cases not
an egg. Hens kept under such conditions in many
cases die of Roup or Cholera or other malignant
diseases.

Another very important thing we can learn from
the hen in her wild state. She always lays her brood
of eggs during the Spring time; hatches and raises her
chicks when the ground gives up a crop of worms and
various other insects, and by the time these chicks
are fit to wean, dry weather of Summer comes on and
worms and insects become scarce and the result is the
hen lays no more eggs during the year.

Now, in order to keep hens laying the year around, .
we must. produce Springtime conditions the year
around. And right here I want to say there is noth-
ing that can take the place of insects equal to green
cut bone, but this is very hard to obtain in most
places, and especially on a large scale. Therefore, as
a rule, we must use beef scraps in place of it.

10 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF
CHAPTER II.

Location.

First of all, we must have a suitable location.
This is a very important thing if you are going in
the poultry business as a business. If you do not own
a farm, by all means spend some time and get one
suitable for the business. I advise not less than fifty
to seventy-five acres. One with a nice big orchard
on it is most desirable. And by all means, get a
place with one or more streams of water running
through it: and if these streams are fed by springs,
so much the better. Under no circumstances buy a
place for the poultry business unless it is well watered,
for this is where the saving of labor comes in, and
the poultry will do much better—this is nature.

Get a place sloping to the South with gravelly
or sandy soil if possible. Sixty acres will carry five
thousand layers nicely and leave room enough to
raise six thousand voungsters if it is laid out right,
besides pasturing your horses, cows and various other
things you will want on a farm. An ideal poultry
farm should be inclosed with a five foot fence of wire
netting and two barb wires over this. Jt should also
have a base board of rough hemlock sunk two inches
or more in the ground. This makes a fence proof
against all kinds of animals, and there is nothing that
has more enemies than chickens. This is all the fence
you will need on your plant as a rule, unless vou go in
the fancy line, or in dividing your old stock from
your young; also in dividing your cockerels and
pullets. In these cases, you should fence in the fields.
Your hens must have free range, if you want results.
And you must remember the profit lies in eggs.
Therefore, an egg plant is what you must have to
make money, and a plant of this kind laid out right
and handled properly can be run by the labor of one
man most of the time, as under my system, labor is a
very small item—and labor has put more poultry
plants out of business than any other one thing.

POULTRY RAISING It

CHAPTER WI.

Laying out your plant.

First, to lay out your plant, we will take your
stream of water and build houses both sides of it, far
enough from the stream to keep on high ground. Put
your houses sixty to seventy-five feet apart, accord-
ing to your ground, keeping sixty Leghorns to a house
and fifty Wyandottes, Rocks or the larger breeds.
You must flock your hens, and then you will have
no further trouble, as nearly every hen will go in her
own house.

To flock them, put your sixty hens in the house
and keep them shut in for three days, letting them out,
on the third day, one hour before dark. Your hens
get acquainted in the three days they are shut up to-
gether, and will ever after run much together and
return to their own house. After trying houses of
various kinds and styles, I have never found one that
suits me so well as the one I shall describe, and I con-
sider it the most perfect house built at the present
time—and also the cheapest constructed.

A model laying house.

IO TN
Wa

het AN

SSS

House complete

CornéR Fost SFr. 10 In.

12 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

CHAPTER IV

Buildings.

First, I will give you a list of the lumber that
goes in such a house:

Three chestnut planks, 2x8xzo ft. long.

Thirty-three boards, 1x8x16 ft. long, tongue and
groove.

Thirty-three boards, 1x8x14 ft. long, tongue and
groove.

Twelve hemlock, 2x4-20 ft. long.

Four, 2x3-10 ft. long, for roosts.

Three windows, 8xio glass, six panes each.

This house is ten feet wide; twenty feet long;
four feet high at eaves, with a double pitch roof.
Made of tongue and groove boards, so that paper of
any kind is nbt required. A roof of this kind will

never leak, of any account, if put up with lumber well
dried out.

Diagram of Frame.

Top
2x4=/9FT. BIN. LONG
S
Ce)
&
‘9
2x4+=20 Fr Lone &
Nae
g
NS
SLI | LI ga

PLANK 2x 8= 20 Fr. LonG
Front View — Bottom

Cypress is the best of all lumber for these houses,
as it will stand the weather—far better than any other
kind, and it will last for many years without decaying.
White pine is the next best, and the only other kind

POULTRY RAISING 13

of lumber that can be used where no lining paper or
roofing paper is used. Second quality lumber will
answer every purpose if you use judgment in cutting
it and putting it on, but you must have your lumber
good and dry, then it will not shrink apart to any
account.

Use the best lumber on north side and ends of
house. I will show you a cut of this house. A view
of the frame will aid you very much in building your
first house.

i4 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

CHAPTER V

Front view of house.

I will now tell you very plainly how to construct
these houses, so anyone that can use a saw and ham-
mer ought to be able to build one.

First, square up your planks twenty feet long,
then take your third plank and make ‘two planks ten
feet long each. Now spike your twenty-foot plank on
your ten-foot plank, using twenty-penny nails, and
you have a box twenty feet long and ten feet four
inches wide, outside measure.

Now take a 2x4 and saw six pieces four feet long.
Then saw out of each one of these 2x8; these make
your corner posts and also your center posts. Spike
these firmly on your plank box, one in each corner,
and one in center of house, letting the 2x8 piece you
saw out come on your plank. Nail from inside and
let flat side come toward ends. This will make your
outside even. Then saw four pieces, 3 ft. 4 in. long,
to double your corners with. These nail from plank
up on each end. This will make them all even on
ends and sides. Now take a 2x4, just 20 ft. long, nail-
ing one on each side Aatways on top of your uprights,
even with ends and outside. Now take a 2x4, ten feet
four inches long, saw two inches out of each end, drop
this in center of house on your plank, which drops
bottom two inches below level of plank; spike firmly
both ways. This keeps your house from spreading
and is also your division. Take a 2x4 nine feet eight
inches long, spike this at end of house, away from
door, between your 2x4 even with top of plate. This
piece stays in and keeps your end from spreading and
is also used to nail your end boards to. Now tale
two more 2x4, saw ten feet three inches long, nail one
in center of house to upright under plate, nail the
other at end where your door goes in same way, using
a twenty-penny nail—just one in each end—as both of

POULTRY RAISING 15

these come out after your roof is on. These are used
to keep house from spreading and are also used in
putting roof on, as we lay a 20 ft. plank on them to
stand on in nailing the roof on. Now saw two sets of
rafters, each rafter 6 ft. 8 in. long. Heel must fit on
plate and have your top come together nicely.

Make a pattern and keep it for all future sawing,
as you may have trouble fitting the first pair.

Nail each set together on ground, then spike firm-
ly on end of your plates, even with outside in each
case. After this, put in your ridge a 2x4 19 ft. 8 in.
long. Spike this in peak, between your two sets of
rafters, letting flat side come even with South side of
house, and upper edge even with peak. Spike firmly
through end of rafters, using three spikes in each end.
Then fit a pair of rafters in center of house, raising
your ridge in center a little above level. Then put in
two crosspieces, three feet from peak on each side.
Spike firmly through end rafter and center rafter, as
your roof boards nail on these. Now set in your door
studding in center of end. Make your door about
thirty inches wide, according to the width of your
boards, and about six feet high. Put in a 2x4 on each
side, setting bottom on plank and sawing top to fit
under rafter. Now put a short piece on top and you
have your frame complete, except a 2x4 from door
frame to corner of house, to nail your end boards to.

Now you are ready for your siding. Take if you
use white pine, 1x8 16 ft. long boards. Take sixteen
boards, sawing each in four feet lengths. This gives
you 64 boards, four feet long. Begin at a corner,
nailing one inch from top of plate, as your roof boards
come over these and just pass it. See that you get
your joints perfectly tight.

After putting on both sides, put on your ends, up
and down, same as siding. Then for your roof saw’
your 14 ft. boards one half inch from center. This
makes one half just one inch longer than the other.
Now plain off your groove in first board. Let this
project one inch over end of house. Put on your south

16 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

side first, using your shortest board, nailing boards
about 3 of an inch from your peak, as your boards
on north side nail over these, and in this case you use
no ridge board.

Your roof boards should be very dry, and put
firmly together, and you will have no leaky roofs.

Next, saw out for your windows. In same end of
house you put your door.

Put two windows in center of this part under
plate on south side, by nailing a 2x2 for windows to
slide on. You slide this pair of windows both ways.
Put your other window in the other department, two
boards from center of house, and under plate, just the
same as the other pair, sliding it back. This is used
principally for cleaning the house.

Saw a hole for letting out fowls in first part of
house under your two windows, and put in a slide

Diagram of end of house.

Door

IOFFER
End

4ST

POULTRY RAISING 17

which you can slide sideways with your foot, fitting
this very loose.

Now put in your roosts. First, nail a strip up
and down seven feet from back end. Put a 2x4 block
on plank to keep this strip out so window will slide in
between. Now nail a seven foot strip from end of
house to your short strip, sixteen inches below top of
plate. Do this on both sides and on these boards lay
your roosts, 2x3 ten feet long. About five of these
gives sixty hens plenty of room. You can either notch
your board one half inch to lay them in, or let them
lay loose on your board. Do not nail them.

Now put in your wire netting partition in cen-
ter of house, a door of wire netting.

Put in your feed hoppers and nests, and your
house is practically complete.

18 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

CHAPTER VL.

Making of hoppers.

Your feed hopper should be made large enough to
take a bag of feed, one hundred pounds, which is sure
to last a flock of sixty layers a full week. To make
this, take a common hemlock board, twelve inches
wide, for bottom and ends, saw a piece two feet long
for bottom, two pieces three feet long for ends. Nail
these together, ends in bottom. Now use tongue and
groove boards for back and front. To put in your
back, fit your first board inside of ends, letting it come
on bottom in center of hopper and top edge of board
even with back of hopper, putting rest of back boards
even with outside. Better put rest of boards on out-
side. Now for your front put first board, one inch
from bottom and one inch from your other board, let-
ting top of board come even with outside front of
feeder. Then board up on outside. This lets your
feed come out in front. Now put a four inch strip
across front at bottom. This keeps your hens from
throwing out the grain.

Now make another hopper about quarter size of
this one for beef scraps. Make it in the same manner,
only make the throat of it fully 1% inches instead of
one inch, as beef scraps will not feed readily like other
grain and you will often have to give it a kick as it
will clog up easily. A nice way is to give it a kick
every night when you gather the eggs. You can also
make a three department box for oyster shells, grit,
and charcoal which should be kept before them at all
times—erit to grind their feed; oyster shells for lime
in making shells, ete., and charcoal for medicine.

POULTRY RAISING 19

CHAPTER VII.

Care of layers.

First, I will tell you how to care for three thous-
and layers with but little labor and you should clear
$3,000 a year from them.

If you have built your plant on a stream of water,
you will have no watering to do.

Keep your feed boxes filled at all times.

Never let them get empty.

Your main feed is best quality wheat screenings.

Your large hopper will take a one hundred pound
bag, which should last a full week, often two weeks.

You should make a round every week and fill all
your hoppers; one with wheat screenings, one with
beef scraps, and your three-department hopper with
grit, oyster shells and charcoal.

If your plant is built on a stream and inclosed
with a good wire netting fence, all the work you have
to do during the week is to gather your eggs every
night and give each flock of fowls two quarts of
cracked corn.

Remember, your fowls have wheat feed before
them all the time, so they can safely have a light feed
of another kind of grain every night.

A horse and wagon should be used for this work
at all times. A good gentle horse that can be left
standing and is afraid of nothing is what you want.

From November until April you will have to make
two trips a day to your houses. As cold weather
comes on, your windows will have to be closed nights
and should be opened again in the morning when the
sun shines and warms things up.

On this same trip, you.should give your hens
some green feed, either cabbage or mangel wortzels.

In case you have heavy snow storms, your hens
can eat snow and they will lay just as many eggs as
though they got to the brook to drink—and even more.

20 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

Your last trip at night, you feed each flock two or
three quarts of cracked corn, gather your eggs and
shut the windows. The slide which lets your hens
out is never closed.

This feed is for flocks of sixty layers and this
system will pay a good profit with but little labor, as
you can easily see.

You will not get an abundance of eggs during
the winter under this system.

You should keep the end of your house where
your nests, hoppers, etc., are, well bedded during the
winter, and throw your grain in it so as to give them
all the exercise possible.

Connie BY
RELIABLE.

Poveray
= JOURNAN,

Typical White Leghorns

POULTRY RAISING ai

CHAPTER VIII.

An egg plant for profit.

I will now tell you how to run a large poultry
plant for the greatest possible profit. This will re-
quire more labor, but will pay the most profit, labor
considered, of anything I know of at the present time.
I have experimented to my entire satisfaction, that
fowls to be kept in perfect healthy condition, should
have free access to feed at all times, and they will lay
fully one-third to one-half more eggs a year—and eggs
that will hatch, for they will be produced nature’s
way.
I have found nothing so good as good quality
wheat screenings to be kept before them at all times.
So you must keep a hopper of wheat screenings always
before them; also one of beef scraps; and they should
also have grit, oyster shells and charcoal before them
at all times. Now, if possible, in order to get your
great profit, you must have a free range plant, such as
I have described, and it should be a leghorn plant, and
of all the leghorn family there is none that will pro-
duce you more eggs and larger, finer eggs than the
single comb White Leghorns.

I am positive an average of 200 eggs a hen can
be produced under this system of feeding and caring
for them.

One good man could care for five thousand layers
during the summer, providing someone cared for the
marketing of the eggs. But for winter care, say from
November tst to April Ist, it would keep two men
busy, for my aim here is to tell you how to produce
-eggs the year around in the greatest possible number.

I will begin with the winter care, say November
1st, when your stock should all be properly housed in
the colony houses. I have told you how to build.
We will presume you have a leghorn plant of three to
five thousand layers. We usually have much cold
weather. during November in this part of the state.

22 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

Of course, you will have to vary this part of the sys-
tem according to the weather. Here you must use
judgment. The first thing in the morning, soon after
daylight as convenient, start out with a load of oats.
and give each flock of sixty layers not more than one
quart of oats each. If the morning is warm, open
your windows. If cold, leave your windows closed
until your next trip, after breakfast, about 8 to 9 a. m.

If morning is cold and freezing, you should take a
load of warm water and give each flock enough for the
day. The finest thing I know of to water a large plant
of this kind is a two gallon butter crock. Get the
low kind, for they are easily kept clean and require
but little labor in filling. Even if your hens have free
access to a stream of water, they should be watered
in their houses during the winter if you want a large
egg yield. In the morning, when your hen comes off
the roost, she is apt to be dry, especially if she is lay-
ing and it is very essential at this time that vour hen
should have warm water to drink, for cold water
would chill her and make her dull and all hump up and
the result is your egg yield stops.

When you go around with your load of warm
water, you can, at the same time, give your hens a
light feeding of green cut bone, not over a pint to a
flock. And about 11 a. m. give them a light mash,
about one and one-half quarts to a flock, composed of
equal parts wheat bean, ground oats, corn meal, and
Alfalfa clover meal by measure. Put in a little salt
and mix with hot water.

About 2 p. m. give each flock all they will eat
of processed oats. Feed this very liberal, as you will
find they will always be hungry for this and you can-
not over feed them on it. About four quarts to a
flock is about right. This is one of the greatest ege
producers I know of (and there is nothing which
makes eggs so fertile.

Your hen will eat these when she will look at noth-

ing else. It can be produced for ten cents a bushel at
the highest price—usually for eight cents a bushel. I

POULTRY RAISING 23

will tell you in my next chapter how to process these
oats. This alone is worth hundreds of dollars to any-
one who keeps a large plant, as I will prove to you
further on.

For your last round, just before sundown, give
each flock a quart of cracked corn in their litter, to give
them more exercise. Gather your eggs and close up
your windows. If weather is very warm, leave one
of your windows open or partly open in scratching
part. You must use judgment in these things. A
plant cared for this way during the winter should give
you fifty to sixty per cent egg yield, right through,
providing your pullets are laying age and your old
hens have passed through their moult.

You will see that I feed four times as much
processed oats as I do of any other kind of feed. Oats
to a hen is what oats are to a horse. It gives them
vigor and puts life in them, such as no other feed will
do. Always use the best clipped oats.

“If you follow these instructions to the letter, and
use judgment in keeping your houses from getting too
warm during the day, you will never fail to bring in a
load of eggs every day in the year. -

Always empty your water jars at night on this
last trip, so your hens will always be dry in the morn-
ing when you come around with your load of warm
water. This is very important.

24. BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

CHAPTER IX.

Summer Care.

For the summer care of these flocks, beginning
about April first, or as soon as the ground can be.
worked, take a strip of land along the ends of your
house, which end is most convenient, and plow a good
strip. If you have ten or twenty houses in a row,
plow the length of them all, if you can. Now sow this
strip liberally with oats, and if you can harrow this
every morning, so much the better; and sow lightly
of oats, three times a week, until the coming Novem-
ber. Do this all summer long, using a spring tooth
harrow, and your hens will work in this fresh ground
for this grain continually. As this grain keeps sprout-
ing and coming up all the time, vou will have spring-
time for these hens from spring until November. If
you follow this up, the result in eggs will surprise any-
one. The hen keeps right on laying all through the
summer and fall, and not even stop when she is moult-
ing. So I claim under these conditions a two hundred
to two hundred and fifty egg hen will be a common
thing, and flocks treated this way should average two
hundred or more eggs each, for you see the hens feast
on an abundance of worms and insects as well, and
they will not consume more than half the quantity of
beef scraps when treated this way.

In changing from winter to summer care, if your
plant is laid out on streams of water as I have advised,
you will have no watering to do, and just as soon as
you get to plowing your ground you will gradually
stop your green bone, also your mash and processed
oats, as your hens will get all these oats they can
handle, now started in their natural way in the ground.
The worms and insects they now get will take the
place of green cut bone, so all the work you have to
do during the summer is to cultivate this ground and
keep sowing oats and at night hitch up your horse
and give each flock of fowls about two quarts of

POULTRY RAISING 25

cracked corn and gather your eggs. If you follow up
this system, the hens will keep right at it all during the
moulting season. You must make your rounds every
week during the summer and fill all your hoppers, one
with beef scraps, one with wheat screenings. Also
your grit, oyster shells and charcoal. These must be
before them winter and summer. Never let them get
empty, and when freezing weather comes in the fall,
you must change your plans at once if you want the
egg yield to hold up. Remember this is where the
profit comes in. Under no circumstances let your
hens fall off on eggs, so start on your winter rations
as I have outlined in a previous chapter, just as scon
as severe weather of November comes on.

During the summer, your windows are to be left
open day and night; also your door, providing your
plant in enclosed with a wire netting fence such as I
described in opening chapter of this book.

You must remember one thing. If you let your
fowls get knocked out in any way, through careless-
ness, it will take three to four weeks to get them back
again. And you in, the meantime have lost a month’s
laying of eggs. So great care and judgment must be
used. Sickness will scarcely be known under these
conditions. Your hens should always be in the pink
of condition, and your eggs from January to Septem-
ber should run 90 per cent fertile and give wonderful
hatches. I think you will agree with me that this is
caring for fowls the nearest to nature’s way of any
system known at the present time.

26 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

CHAPTER X.

Processed oats and how to produce it.

I will now tell you of one of the most wonderful
feeds known at the present time. Positively one of
the greatest egg producers ever discovered and some-
thing that will make eggs hatch any time of the year.
Oats is to a hen what oats is toa horse. What would
a horse be worth without oats? But very little! The
main objection to oats for fowls is their very tough
hull, which is very hard to digest, and for this reason
alone many people will not feed them to their hens.
I have experimented very extensively with oats and
have fed them for weeks boiled, with no results in
eggs. They make a very good fattening feed when
boiled, but of no value for eggs—simply put the hens
out of laying condition. But when processed, hens
eat them in preference to anything else. In fact, they
will eat them when they will touch nothing else, while
on the other hand, they are the last things eaten by
the hens in their natural dry state. I will now tell
you how to process them.

Take a pail of good quality clipped oats, cover
them with water and let them soak twenty-four hours.
Then turn them in a box that will hold fully five pails
full. First bore two half-inch holes in each end of
box in the bottom so it will not hold water. After
putting your oats in this box, cover them up with an
old blanket or old bags. In the winter time, or when it
gets cold and freezing, these boxes of oats should be
put in a cellar—the warmer a place, the better—and
they should be thoroughly wet every night and morn-
ing with a sprinkling pot of warm water. If you want
to use them quick, it will take from a week to ten days
to get them in prime condition for feeding, depending
on how warm a place you have them in, and whether
you use warm or cold water in sprinkling them with.
Now, as I said, sprinkle them with warm water in
winter time and stir them up every night and morn-

POULTRY RAISING 27

ing; begin at one end of the box and turn them over
and thoroughly wet them and it will not be long before
you begin to see them sprout.

As soon as they show some roots, if they are at all
thick in the box, they will begin to heat, and as soon
as they germinate heat, they will grow very rapidly
and will be ready to feed. When properly processed,
one bushel will make four to five bushels of the most
delicious feed you ever fed. Give your hens daily of
this, about 2 p. m., all they can eat. Do not be afraid
of over feeding them on it, and no matter what your
hens have been fed or when, they will always take a
good feeding of these oats. Now, when they begin to
get hot, you must spread them out thinner, for if they
get too hot they will kill the life of the oats. After
they get right for feeding, you can keep them for many
davs, if you desire, by spreading them out thin and
wetting night and morning with cold water.

These are also grand for young chicks in their
earlier stages, just as they begin to show the roots
nicely. There is nothing known at the present time
that will produce so many eggs and such fertile eggs
as these processed oats—and at the low price of eight
to ten cents a bushel.

This alone is worth hundreds of dollars to any-
one with a big plant. You can grow these out of
doors, during the warm weather, for yarded plants,
and for young chickens. Put your boxes in the shade
of a big tree or on the north side of a building, and
for free range plants you grow them in the ground as
I have described in my former chapter.

BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

28

Pair Silver Laced Wyandottes

POULTRY RAISING 29

CHAPTER XI.

Caring for a free range plant without labor.

In this chapter, I will tell you how to care for
a free range plant with practically no labor, only
gathering your eggs and caring for them.

First, make a feed hopper, as I have described,
to hold a bag of feed. You should have three of these,
fill one with wheat screenings, one with oats, one
with cracked corn. Also your small hopper with beef
scraps and your three-department hopper with grit,
oyster shells and charcoal. And if your plant is built
on a stream of water and inclosed with a wire netting
fence, as I have described, all the work you have to
do is to gather your eggs every night and send your
man around once a week and fill all your hoppers. He
should also put carbolic acid and kerosene, half and
half, well mixed, on the roosts once a month during
the winter and twice a month during the summer.
In September he should clean the houses out thor-
oughly and coat them over with new sand. Your hens
will go to the creek to drink, and in winter, if ground
is covered with snow, let them eat snow and they
will lay more eggs. The hole which lets them out of
the house should never be closed, day or night, winter
or summer. In the winter time your windows would
have to be kept closed and your hens will pay you a
fine profit under this system with practically no labor.
You will not get a big egg yield during the winter,
but you can depend on a profit of one dollar or more
from each hen on this no-labor-system. You will be
surprised at the results. And for a business man in
the city who owns a small place in the country, and
wishes to make some money at home while he is away,
there is nothing I know of that can pay him so large
a profit on his money invested as a poultry plant run
on these lines. Of course, in this case you would
have to buy your breeders each season and the best
way to do this is to sell off half of your stock during

30 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

the early fall and replace them with pullets of which
you can always buy at one dollar each during Septem-
ber and October. You can buy better birds for vour
money during these two months than at any other
time of the year. One reason I specially advise single
comb white Leghorns in preference to any other
breed, is because you can always buy all you want for
one dollar each, good laying stock.

I advise changing your breeding stock at end of
second year’s laying, as two vears is all a hen can be
relied on to pay a good profit and she should never
be kept after this unless she is an extra good one
which vou would want to use as a breeder.

= GepyRienteo sys.
FIUADLE POULTRY J2URMAL: +

aXe

Typical

Barred Rocks

POULTRY RAISING 3r

CHAPTER XII.

Caring for a yarded plant.

I am now going to tell you how to handle a yard- .
ed plant for the greatest possible profit, to those who
are so unfortunate as to own one, for such plants sel-
dom pay unless it is used for breeding fancy stock.
I have experimented for many months on yarded
plants and I find that hens even over crowded in
small runs will produce more than double the eggs
fed on the hopper system than they will fed the other
way. Just keep good quality wheat screenings and
beef scraps before them at all times and give a liberal
feeding of processed oats in the morning—all they will
eat—and at I p. m. another feeding of processed oats—
all they will eat. Remember you cannot over-feed
them on the processed oats, as they are light and
quickly digested. At night give a light feeding of
cracked corn in litter in winter and you will be sur-
prised at the results. Your fowls will always be in
the pink of condition and practically no sickness
among them. Roup, colds and cholera will scarcely
be known, even on the same plants that have always
been full of it, when the hens had their daily mashes,
all they could eat of it.

I will also give you another valuable secret for a
yarded plant. If your hens have long, narrow yards,
say 10x60 or more feet long, I will tell you how to
keep green feed in their yards all summer. Spade up
half the yard, sow it to oats early in the spring and
put in cross boards eight inches high, cover it over
with one inch mesh wire netting, stretching it tight
and stapling it firmly to the boards. As soon as your
oats get a good start your hens will eat them through
the wire netting and your oats will grow just as fast
as your hens can eat them off. In this way they will
be supplied with green feed all summer long. I am
satisfied a yarded plant can be made to pay, run on
this new line and cut your mashes entirely out. If

32 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

possible, feed green cut bone once a day. About 11
‘a, m.,I find the best time for this. If you are in a
position to get plenty of green cut bone, feed a yarded
plant as follows: Keep a hopper of wheat screenings,
also one of beef scraps, always before them, as well
as grit, oyster shells and charcoal. Give a feeding of
processed oats in the morning and 11 a. m. a light
feeding of green cut bone; at night a light feeding of
cracked corn in litter to induce exercise, and your
fowls will keep in the pink of condition, lay well all
winter long, and colds and roup will hardly be known,
if they are properly housed. They should be watered
with warm water in very cold weather, as they are
always dry in the morning and should not be allowed
to fill themselves on ice water. After they drink all
they want of water in the morning, during the rest of
the day they will drink but little at a time and cold
water will not then hurt'them.

POULTRY RAISING 33

CHAPTER XIII.

Feeding a yarded plant for the greatest possible profit.

I will now tell you how to feed a yarded plant for
the greatest possible profit and still have healthy birds
and produce eggs that will run fully 90 per cent fertile
in January. You also use a light mash under this
system. This method will produce more winter eggs
than any method I know of at the present time. Keep
a hopper of wheat screenings, one of beef scraps, al-
ways before them. Also your grit, oyster shells and
charcoal—never let them get out of any one of these
ingredients. As soon as it is light, give each flock a
few handfuls of oats in the litter to keep them busy;
say a pint to twenty hens.

About 8.30 a. m. give a hot mash, composed of
wheat bran, ground oats, corn meal, Alfalfa clover
meal, equal parts by measure; put in some salt, mix
thoroughly, then mix with hot water so it will be
nice and crumbly, but not wet. Give a light feeding
of this mash, not over one-half the quantity you usually
feed, say one quart to twenty-five hens will be plenty.

About 11 a. m. give a light feeding of green cut
bone, just what they will eat up nicely.

About 2 p. m. feed all the processed oats they will
eat.

Just before they go to roost, give a light feeding of
cracked corn, thrown in their litter—they will not take
much as a rule.

In the morning, before you give your mash, give
your hens good, clean warm water. This is very im-
portant, for the more your hens drink, the more eggs
they will lay.

Always dump all your drinking fountains at
night so your hens will be sure to be good and dry in
the morning, and start off with warm water and warm
feed.

If you keep your windows well opened during the
day, so your hens do not get too warm, you will have

34 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

no trouble in getting an abundance of eggs all winter
long. For if you knock your hens out by over-heating
them or leaving your windows open, just one night,
carelessly, it will take three weeks to get them back
on eggs again. You must use judgment in this re-
spect. A yarded plant fed this way will keep per-
fectly healthy and lay an abundance of eggs the year
around, but can never compare with a free range plant,
fed on the system I described for producing the great-
est amount of eggs.

One more advantage in feeding a plant this
way, you can get eggs from Leghorns that will
run go per cent fertile right in January under this
system, and hatch fully as good as eggs usually hatch
in April. Wyandotte and Rock eggs will run from
80 to 85 per cent fertile, and for anyone who wants to
raise early broilers, you can easily see the great value
of this method of feeding.

In case you cannot conveniently give your hens
warm water to drink in the morning, leave water be-
fore them all the time or water first thing in the
morning before hens come off the roost.

If your houses have dropping boards, you should
clean the droppings off at least twice a week the year
around. In the houses I have described for your free
range plant, your droppings go right on the ground
and it is not at all necessary to clean them out oftener
than twice a year; so you can see the amount of labor
saved.

For nests in these colony houses that I have told
you how to build, I advise making three sets of five
nests each for each house, which can easily be made.
A common hemlock board, twelve inches wide, will
answer every purpose. Saw a piece, four feet six
inches long, three of these will make your top, bottom
and back. Use four partitions, one foot long and for
your front, a four inch strip is all you want, and you
have a set of five nests quickly and easily made. You
can either nail these to siding or put a couple of holes
in them and hang them on hooks, about one foot from

POULTRY RAISING 35

the ground, just so a hen can look in them, and then
she will jump in them from the ground.

Three sets of these nests should go in every house
for a flock of sixty layers.

Pen of White Wyandottes

36 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

CHAPTER XIV.

How to build an ideal incubator house.

I have told you in my former chapters how to
produce your eggs in the greatest possible number and
how to produce eggs that will give you the largest
hatches. Now you will want to know how to hatch
them. First, I will tell you how to build what I con-
sider the most perfect incubator house. Select a side
hill if you have one near by, for a perfect incubator
house should be part under ground and part on top.
You can determine size of house by the number of
machines you want to use and the number of chicks
you wish to hatch. But it is always safer to build
much larger than your present needs, then you will
not have to rebuild or enlarge when your business
grows.

To build this house, put up a wall of stone, five
feet high on all four sides, putting in windows at the
top of your wall a four pane window, 8x1o glass, will
answer the purpose nicely. Hinge at bottom so it will
open inside.

Put windows on each side and at south end. Put
none on north side. A window every ten feet is about
right. Now put a window in each end for ventilation.
Put these windows near peak, a six light window;
8x1o glass, and in summer these can be left open for
ventilation, This makes an ideal incubator house.

Throw up dirt to top of wall on all sides, except
South end, and put in a double door wide enough to
carry out any incubator set up.

‘The air in such a house always smells free from
lamp smoke and if you fail to get good hatches in
such a house you will know it is not the fault of the
house.

POULTRY RAISING 37

CHAPTER XV.

How to run an incubator.

I want to say a few words here in regard to run-
ning an incubator, especially to the beginner. First,
after setting up your machine and starting your lamp,
you must let up on your regulator. Keep unscrewing
it until temperature goes up to 10214 degrees. Re-
member the temperature cannot raise when your disk
over lamp is raised. But when you get temperature
to 102% and your disk raised % of an inch, or so it
just clears, then your machine is ready for the eggs.

Better run your machine twenty-four hours after
you get your temperature right before putting in the
eggs. As soon as you put your eggs in, your tempera-
ture will disappear; give your machine twenty-four
hours to get back to 102% degrees. Run your venti-
lation according to directions sent with the machine
you use.

Change trays from side to side in the morning,
and from end to end at night, in a two tray machine
and turn eggs at end of third day and fourth day.
After this turn twice a day until sixteenth day. Turn
last time at end of sixteenth day but continue to
change your tray from side to side and end to end
until you see the first pip. Handle your eggs. very
carefully at end of sixteenth day on; and do not jar
them in changing your trays. Now, remember,
animal heat begins to take place after seventh day
and your temperature will begin to work up and you
must give your regulating nut part of a turn every
time the temperature crawls up to 103 so as to keep it
down as near 10214 as possible, if you are operating
your machine in a room which registers above 50 de-
grees. If not over 40 to 45 degrees, then run your
machine at 103 to 103%, and do not air your eggs.

In a room of 50 to 7o degrees begin airing your
eggs on fifth day and air each night, depending on
temperature of room.

38 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

A good airing for an hour or two on seventeenth
day will much improve your hatch in warm weather.

Give plenty of air during hot weather.

Good, fresh eggs hatch much better than those
kept two or three weeks.

If you are hatching white eggs test them on fifth
day, and take out all clear eggs and dead germs.

If you are incubating brown shelled eggs, leave
them in seven days when you can test them nicely,
taking out all clear eggs and dead germs.

They should be tested again at end of fifteenth
day. Remove all dead eggs and if vou have not a
good fair size air cell, you must give more ventilation,
for you cannot get a good hatch without a good size
air cell.

After you see your first pip, do not open your
machine again under any circumstances until your
hatch is practically through; say the morning of the
twenty-first day for Leghorns, and end of twenty-first
day for all large breeds.

Leave chicks in incubator fully twenty-four hours
after all are ont.

Just a word about buying an incubator. I have
tried nearly all the leading makes of incubators on the
market, especially those made in the East, and also
some of the Western machines. Among two of the
best I have ever used, one is the “Cornell” made by
the Cornell Incubator Co., Ithaca, N. Y. The other is
the “Successful,” made by Successful Incubator Co.,
Des Moines, Iowa. Either of these machines give
grand hatches of strong rugged chicks which will live
if given a good chance.

Now comes the most difficult part of all the busi-
ness—raising the chicks. Here is where they all fall,
except under my system.

POULTRY RAISING : 39

CHAPTER XVI.

Chicks raised nature’s way.

First of all, you must get the best brooder made
if you expect to be successful. Under no circum-
stances use a long piped house, for they are complete
failures in nearly every case. I have tried nearly all
the brooders on the market and have found none to
equal the “Peep ’O Day,” now made by the Cornell
Incubator Co., Ithaca, N. Y. And for this system on
a large scale, taking everything into consideration,
there is no brooder so well adapted for the business as
the Cornell colony house brooder, known as the “Peep
°O Day” outdoor brooder and colony house combined,
built on runners. This can be bought for $16, and is
the best and cheapest thing I know of, all things con-
sidered. They can be used out of doors in perfect
safety from the 2oth of March on, and if you want
good, rapid growing chicks, I would not advise hatch-
ing any before March’ 2oth, as they will come on and
mature nearly as quick as chickens hatched a month
earlier as a rule.

The next problem is to raise fully ninety per cent
to maturity of the chicks you hatch. To do this on a
large scale, to raise from three to six thousand, you
must keep someone among your chicks all the time if
you do not want them all carried away by hawks and
crows and various other animals, as there is nothing
we raise that have so many enemies.

I will here name you some of their worst enemies
when they are small: Hawks, crows, rats, weasels,
cats, skunks, woodchucks in rare cases, raccoons,
foxes.

Select for raising your chicks a nice, large orchard
if you have one, if not, you must put up some artificial
shade. Put your colony house brooders in rows
across the lot, about ten feet apart, and try to hatch
in one week enough chicks for a row of brooders.
About sixty feet in front of this row put up a one and

40 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

one-half foot fence of one inch mesh wire netting;
then another row of brooders, about eight feet from
this fence; then another fence same as the other.

It makes no difference how many brooders on a
line, twenty could be handled all right if they were all
filled with chicks at near the same time.

If the field was near level, they would equalize
themselves all right in the brooders.

You can safely put seventy-five chicks in each
brooder and should have no trouble in raising seventy
of them to maturity if you follow my instructions to
the letter.

Tor feed and care, I first grind fine all egg shells
they hatch from, and feed these for first three days,
putting chick feed before them the second day. You
must see that they are never out of feed again as long
as you own them. Here is one of the secrets of suc-
cess, for if your chicks, always have free access to
feed—they will never over eat and die of indigestion.
As soon as you put them out, give them fine grit and
fine charcoal, also water that is lukewarm, and your
egg shells, and, as I said next day put chick feed be-
fore them.

On the third day also put beef scraps before them
and see that they are never without it. Begin feeding
them processed oats, same as you do your hens—they
will quickly take to it and eat off all the roots and
sprouts, leaving nothing but the hulls. Feed them all
the processed oats they will take from then on, say
four or five times a day. Do not be afraid, for they
cannot over-eat of it, and remember this costs only
eight or ten cents a bushel. You can thus see how
cheap you can raise your chicks.

Remember from the third day on your chicks
must have always before them water, chick feed, grit,
charcoal and beef scrap; also feed several times a day
all the processed oats they can eat. I generally set a
panful in the pen first thing in the morning and again
at noon, dumping out the hulls every time. And
again at about 4 p. m. I see that they have just all

POULTRY RAISING 41

they can eat, and I wish you could see them grow. It
is a pleasure to raise chickens this way where sickness
is scarcely known.

After three weeks, change from chick food to a
good quality of wheat screenings which must also be
kept before them from then on as long as you own
them; or better still, I have a screening feed which I
sell for $25 per ton, free on board, Buffalo, which is the
finest feed for hopper feeding I have ever yet seen. It
gives great results, for I am using it entirely for my
layers in place of wheat screenings. It is giving
grand results, and I know of nothing that can in any-
way compare with it for growing young chicks, and
nothing so cheap as this screening feed and processed’
oats.

After three days old, your chicks should always
have before them grit, charcoal, beef scraps, chick
food until you change for wheat screenings or screen-
ing feed, and water to drink—and good, clean, fresh
water is very important—in fact thousands of chick-
ens are lost every year through dirty water and filthy
drinking dishes, as disease starts in the drinking foun-
tains in many cases.

If your fountains are not kept clean, and if vou are
not particular and wash out your fountains every time
you fill them, slime collects on the inside, and I con-
sider this rank poison to the chickens.

The best fountain vou can get is the two piece
earthen fountain, which keeps the water cool and
clean. I would not use any other kind under any cir-
cumstances. If you can yard your little chicks on a
stream of water, so much the better, and much ‘labor
is saved.

When your little chicks are first put out, they
should be looked after several times a day, and you
must see that they do not get chilled.

Keep your brooder at 95 degrees first five days,
then it should be lowered to:go degrees. After two
weeks to 85 degrees, and after three weeks to 80 de-
grees and gradually harden them off, depending on the

42 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

season of the year and the weather. Here is where
common sense and judgment counts. Give your
chicks heat just as long as they want it, if you wish to
attain the most rapid growth, and this is what counts
if you wish rugged birds of extra good size, for such
birds, as a rule, are never sick.

After your chicks are four weeks old, give a light
feeding every night of cracked corn until they are
matured. If they are Leghorns, this can be kept up
as long as you own them, with grand results.

I am now going to give you the secret of success in
raising your chicks and putting them over the danger
period, especially Leghorns, which is from twenty
to forty days old. This is raising them nature’s way.

In front of my colony house brooders, say six
feet, I plow a good big strip the entire length of all
my brooders. I do this the day chicks begin to hatch,
and I sow this lightly with oats. By the time the
chicks come out of their brooders, the oats are nicely
sprouted. I let the chicks out of the colony brooders
the third day, about ten a. m., if weather is nice. The
next day I let them out, J run the harrow over the
ground and sow more oats. Every day after this, I
harrow this ground. And I sow more oats every
other day. The result the chicks keep at work from
morning until night, and never get time to become
sick.

You ought to see them grow under this system.
I consider this the only perfect way to raise chicks,
and the only successful way. Pullets raised this way
should lay at four to five months of age.

As soon as they weigh two pounds each, or near
this weight, the cockerels should be marketed—except
what you use for breeders — and these should be
separated from the pullets, in order to mature them
fine.

The pullets will also mature into a much finer
size if separated from the cockerels.

If the eggs which your chickens are hatched from
are produced under my system vou should have no

POULTRY RAISING 43

trouble in raising fully ninety-five out of every hun-
dred you hatch providing the eggs are from yearling
hens, or fully matured pullets.

Bear in mind, the most critical time of your
chicks’s life is between twenty and forty days old.
This is the period they must not be neglected, as they
begin to grow rapidly at this age.

You must sow more liberal of your oats at this
time, and do not neglect your harrowing, for it takes
but a short time each day.

You must also give your chicks all the processed
oats they will take at this time.

In order to economize and save labor as soon as
the chicks are large enough to leave the brooder, you
can move your pullets to your laying houses, that is,
the pullets which you want to keep for your own
breeding stock to take the place of your yearlings.

When you want to replace a flock of old hens
with pullets, just put a lean to on back end of your
laying house, say 6x6 ft. square would answer every
purpose. You can put this up with a single pitch
roof and a wire netting front, and put some low roosts
in here and shut in sixty of your finest, largest pullets
for three days, when you can let them run with the
hens.

Feed chicks in their own department in an open
trough, keeping it full of wheat screenings; also beef
scraps before them all the time, also grit and charcoal.
They will grow fine here and mature very rapidly.

When you sell your old hens, just shut chicks
out of their department and they will go right in the
main house and never have to be changed. When
they start to laying, they will keep right at it and you
will gain a full month’s eggs under this system.

This lean-too is also very handy for shutting up
sitting hens and various other purposes.

For earlier hatches, if you find you want to hatch
very early and also to have some houses to carry over
some surplus birds in case you go in the fancy stock,
you can build one row of houses same style as your
laying houses only one-fifth smaller, Use sixteen

44 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

feet plank, and make your house eight feet wide and
sixteen feet long, outside measure, in each case. Make
your house four feet high at eaves, same as your lay-
ing houses. For the roof, saw a sixteen feet board in
three pieces, and saw rafters five feet one inch long.
Build it the same as laying houses, with wire netting
partition, and you have an ideal house for the busi-
ness. Put in windows the same size as you use for
your laying houses, one in each side in center of each
department, also a slide under each window for letting
them out.

Put in each side a No. 5 regular “Peep ’O Day”
brooder, for inside use only, and your outfit is com-
plete.

Now handle these chicks just the same as I have
outlined for the others, except you use these houses
in February and March, when you cannot plough the
ground, so you will start these chicks same as I have
told you, except on the third day you begin feeding
processed oats to your chicks, and give them all they
will eat of them from then on, and see that they are
never out of chick feed. It will be a pleasure to see
them grow, and sick chickens will be rare under this
system of feeding—and your cost in raising them will
be very light, as you will find their main feed is pro-
cessed oats at 8 to 10 cents a bushel.

When your chicks are large enough to think of
roosting, and need heat no more, vou should market
the cockerels for squab broilers, if possible, at eight
to ten weeks old, and remove your pullets to your lay-
ing houses. Your brooders are then ready for another
batch of later chicks which can be allowed to grow
up in these houses.

You will find these houses very handy for winter-
ing surplus cockerels and pullets, and it is always
nice to have some surplus birds on hand.

I think I have made things very plain and if
you will follow my instructions vou will have no
trouble in raising your chicks, providing your eggs
are produced under my method of feeding, from
healthy stock.

POULTRY RAISING 45

CHAPTER XVII.

Raising broilers — bowel trouble, its cause and cure.

This chapter is written expressly for broiler men
and those who keep their hens mainly on mashes.

As I have been through the same experience in
my day, and have seen whole broods die off like
poisoned flies with bowel trouble, and have tried
everything I had ever heard of, but with no results
until last season, when I took all feed away for three
days and gave only charcoal to eat, and boiled milk
to drink, with a good quantity of black pepper put in,
and this stopped the diarrhoea completely. But many
would die anyway, so I experimented even further, for
you can depend upon it, if some in each batch have it
on the start of the season it will get worse every hatch.
So, for first three days I gave only charcoal to eat, and
boiled milk to drink, with plenty of black pepper in it.
The result was I had scarcely a case of it after this.
But these chickens I found were very difficult to raise
anyway, so I had to look still further for my trouble,
and I found all the trouble lied in the feeding of the
breeders. You will find in nearly every case the foun-
dation of all your trouble lies in your breeding stock.

If you want healthy rugged birds, free from
disease, never feed them a mash.

The cheapest way of all to feed and have healthy
rugged birds, free from disease at all times, is to feed
as I have told you, except in place of your light mash
at 9 a. m., give your hens a good feeding of processed
oats, nature’s own feed. If you will produce your
eggs in this way, from yearling hens mated, with fully
developed cockerels, not less than ten months old, you
can raise practically every chick you hatch, even in a
long piped brooder house providing you can run your
temperature anywhere from 80 to 95 degrees. This,
you know, is a big variation ; but strong, healthy chicks
can stand a lot and not get sick. Once they get sick,

45 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

they will bunch up, and this is the last of them, for
they can die about as fast as you can hatch them.

You will find most of the big breeders, who are in
the fancy stock raising, all use hens for hatching and.
raising them, and get all their neighbors to hatch and
raise for them, for they cannot hatch them and raise
them with incubators and brooders, just because their
breeders are fed on mashes, so as to get a big egg yield
to supply their large trade in eggs for hatching.
Nearly all the eggs sent out for hatching by the single
sittings, at a big price, always are hatched by the old
hen and raised-by them on free range, which will
pull them through if anything will.

Under my system of feeding, eggs laid here in
January are running co per cent fertile, and have
hatched as high as 9334 per cent of fertile eggs. These
chicks in the same brooder house as where they all
died last year, are nearly all living this year, and these
chicks are hatched from the same breeding stock as
last year. So, you see, it all lays in the feed.

A party was here to see me, one day, who pur-
chased 60 eggs from this plant last year. Chicks hatch-
ed 10 very weakly. This year, in January, I sold
them 75 eggs, first test O8 eggs, hatched 61 chicks, all
hving and growing like weeds, one week old.

Last year chicks weak and sickly, almost impossi-
ble to raise, which shows vou without a question that
it all lies in the feed.

You can see at a glance why every one who has
tried the broiler business as a business, has failed at
it. I defy anyone to find a profitable broiler plant,
but I am satisfied it can be made to pay under my
system of feeding, and in no other way yet known at
the present time. y

I want to say to you broiler men, with your long
piped houses, give them one more trial with eggs pro-
duced under my system of feeding and your troubles
are over,

From January until June you can hatch broilers
at a splendid profit under this system, for you can
grow your later hatches up and make roasters of them

POULTRY RAISING 47

at a grand profit; for under this system of feeding
your birds will grow very rapidly and develop fully
one-third quicker than fed the old way, stuffed with
mashes. When fed the old way, you will lose a large
number with colds and roup, and have but few well
chickens to sell.

Just a word here in growing your birds for roas-
ters. Either good wheat screenings or screening feed
which I feed must be kept before them all the time;
also a first class beef scrap and grit, charcoal, and
good fresh water. And they should have one good
feeding of processed oats about 9 a. m.—all they will
eat. At night give all the cracked corn they will take,
and you will grow roasters that will be a credit to you,
and sickness among them will not be known, and your
profit will surprise you.

White Wyandotte Cock

But you will find it to your advantage to market
them as broilers as long as they bring 25 cents a

pound and more.

A pan of corn meal, set where they can eat all
they want whenever they want it, will also fatten
them nicely. Do not wet it, but let them eat it dry.

48 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

Under these conditions only, can broilers be made
to pay a profit and you can raise them well into the
Summer on this free range system of cultivating the
ground. But just as soon as you fail to raise 80 per
cent of your hatch better stop and sell your eggs.

TY) NewYork 19082
}] Boston __

Light Brahma Bantam

POULTRY RAISING 49

CHAPTER XVIII.

Diseases—their cause and cure.

I am going to write you a few words here on
diseases of chickens, of which there are many, in fact
so many that I will only mention a few which are apt
to give you trouble.

First, I will take the cause, which is improper
feeding in nearly every case. All colds, roup, cholera,
bowel trouble come from improper feeding. This
also causes lice, which live on the hen, or rather the
poison thrown off her system.

Heavy feeding of rich mashes will quick knock
out your birds and various diseases will soon step in.

Our old fashioned farmers never knew what colds
and roup were but of late years many farmers have
been feeding mash to increase their egg yield, and the
result—colds, roup, cholera.

If you will feed my way, and cut your mashes out
you will not be troubled with disease. Roup and
cholera will not be known. If you see a hen sick,
just give her a tablespoon full of castor oil, and in 24
hours more, if she is not all right, give her another
spoonful. If she is no better at the end of next 24
hours, better cut her head off, and burn her up, for
she will only mope around and finally die.

I find roup and colds in fowls grown, or nearly:
grown, can be cured in nearly every case without
medicine by feeding them my way, and partly grown
to one-third grown birds will improve very rapidly
on this hopper feeding, and by the aid of a good roup
cure you can save nearly every bird and get them
well and strong. But never give them a mash.

You may occasionally have a hen go light but very
rare on this method of feeding. I find corn is the
cause of most birds going light. I have proved this
to my entire satisfaction. Corn or cracked corn will
not do at all kept in hoppers before your hens as

50 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

they will grow poor and go light on it unless on
plenty of range, but it can be kept before them without
injury where two or three other kinds of grain are
kept before them at all times. If you follow my sys-
tem in every detail you will have no medicine to buy,
as sickness will scarcely be known.

Pair White Wyandottes

POULTRY RAISING 51

CHAPTER XIX.

When and how to start in the poultry business.

Now comes the important part to the one who is
going to start. in the business when to start, and how.
Now in either case you should start in the Fall if you
wish to start on a large scale. For your buildings
should be put up in the Fall, even if you start by buy-
ing your eggs and raising your own breeders. This
is by far the cheapest way to start if you have not
much capital. Get your incubator house ready in the
Fall, providing you have not a house cellar which will
answer for your first year.

You can get your brooders all right in the
Spring if you only raise breeders, but cannot start
so early as where you have a brooder house. But the
Cornell Colony House Brooder can be used out of
doors very early in the Spring anytime after March
1st, asarule. Pullets hatched middle of March should
lay in August under my system of feeding, and keep
right at it from then on. I can sell you all the eggs
you want from either single comb white Leghorns or
White Wyandottes, produced under my system of
feeding, at $6.00 per 100, in any quantity, on short
notice; eggs that will run go per cent fertile right in
January. Now to the one who is well fixed, financial-
ly, I advise him to start in the Fall. I advise putting
up your laying houses during July and August, and
‘buy your pullets as early as possible during the Fall.
October and November are usually the two months
when you can buy cheaper than at any other time of
the year.

You should have no trouble to buy all the’ pullets
and yearling hens you want of single comb white
Leghorns during these two months at $1.00 each.
This is a very satisfactory way to start, but not so
cheap as buying the eggs and raising your own stock.

You must buy eggs of a party who feeds little or no

52 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

mash, if you wish to get good hatches of chicks that
will live if given half a chance, for when an entirely
inexperienced man tries to raise them they must be
from hardy stock.

You do not have to wait many months for profit
to come in when you buy your eggs to start with, as
you can market your cockerels for broilers. In three
months from the time you set your machines, you can
count on quite an income, so all things considered, ex-
perience you get with the rest.

I advise starting in the Spring, by buying your
eggs and raising your own chicks. These chicks can
be raised very cheaply under my new system of giving
them all the processed oats they will take four or
five times a day, in connection with a good chick food
before them all the time, as well as grit, charcoal and
beef scrap.

You should clean your brooder out at least once
a week, which I find answers every purpose. Also
keep your brooder part, where chicks are fed, covered
with cut clover, as they eat much of this, and it is
very beneficial to them.

Dark Brahma Bantams

POULTRY RAISING 53

CHAPTER XX.

A Leghorn plant for profit.

I want to say just a few words here as to what a
Combination Leghorn Plant can be made to do, and
to tell you how to run such a plant for the greatest
possible profit.

First of all, your great aim must be the produc-
tion of eggs, and for at least six months in the year
you must feed this plant to produce not only eggs that
will hatch but to produce eggs that will hatch
chickens, that will live, cared for any old way. If you
will feed vour plant this way, and advertise eggs for
hatching, produced by the new Briggs System, for
producing fertile eggs that will hatch strong, healthy
chicks, that will live if given half a chance, and offer
to replace all clear eggs free if returned, express pre-
paid, I am very positive a man with three thousand
layers could clear from eight to ten thousand dollars
a year, providing he feeds them on my system and
gives them free range.

You should sell your eggs during the hatching
season for $6.00 per 100; or $50 per 1,000. Possibly
you could make more money by selling them for $5.00
per 100, in any quantity, and make no reduction, for
quantity for $5.00 per 100 is the popular price for good
hatching eggs in this country. There is a grand pro-
fit in it when you produce them in such large num-
bers at so small a cost.

Now for your breeders; their care and feed.

You must not feed a bit of mash. I will lay you
down here the ideal way to feed for fertile eggs at a
small cost either a yarded or free range plant for Leg-
horns only.

Beginning in December, the first thing in the morn-
ing, as soon as it is light, give your hens a light feed-
ing of oats in your litter; about 1% quarts for 60 or
65 is plenty. Give warm water to drink, as early as

54 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

convenient, about 9 a.m. Give each flock all the pro-
cessed oats they will take. At I p. m., when you give
your flocks more water, or put in warm water with
what they have, give on this trip a light feeding of
green cut bone—a quart to a flock of sixty, if they
will take that much, if not, cut them down to a pint.

About 3 p. m. give another feeding of processed
oats, all they will eat. Remember, these only cost
eight to ten cents a bushel.

Before dark give not over one quart of cracked
corn to a flock and gather vour eggs. If it is very
cold weather, you will also have to gather your eggs
on your 1 o'clock trip.

These birds must have always before them grit,
oyster shells and charcoal. Also a hopper of beef
scraps and one of wheat screenings or screening feed.

Just a word about mating up your breeders to
produce chickens which should practically everyone
live.

To do this, take all your yearling hens and mate
them with cockerels, not less than ten months old.
Put these birds on my free range system and feed as
I have here directed, vou can then raise practically
every chick you hatch.

Pullets also hatched in February and March,
mated to good vigorous vearling cocks, will also pro-
duce chickens that are very hardy when a year old,
and you should have no trouble in raising 90 to 95
per cent of these chicks.

Under no circumstances use anything but a single
comb white Leghorn for the greatest profit, because
they lay the largest egg of the Leghorn famliy and
are by far the most popular of the Leghorn family.

To dispose of your breeders at the best advantage
during July, August and September, vou should make
a great clearance sale at $1.00 each. You will have
no trouble to dispose of all your surplus stock at this
price, and you will find this far preferable to putting
them in the market.

Care for vour plant during the Summer as I laid
down for Summer care and feeding.

POULTRY RAISING 55

Just a word here in mating your male birds, for
where you follow up my system, I advise four cocks
or. cockerels for every sixty layers. These birds
should be so mated that there is no fighting among
them, and no “boss” as a rule.

After vour breeding season is over, say July, you
should remove nearly all your male birds and make
one flock of them, except a few flocks which it would
be well to keep mated the season through, so you can
always fill a stray order for hatching eggs. g

Your cockerels should also be separated from the
pullets and placed in one large flock, or several flocks
of a 100 or less in a flock. In this way, these male
birds run together very peaceably and rarely ever
fight; and you rarely see a “boss” among them.

To mate them up, just take out of a bunch as
many as you want for a flock of females, all at once,
and let them go. You will then have no fighting and
very seldom even a “boss.” This is the only way to
mate up your birds, for the best possible results.

Never keep a brassy male bird. Have nothing
but pure white birds on your place and you will find
your profits can be greatly increased by gradually
breeding into fancy birds.

Show a few at your fall fairs, or local shows. Get
a standard and study them up. By careful selection,
you can soon have a plant of very fine birds.

Do not try to show at the big shows, such as Madi-
son Square Garden or Boston, for it takes years of
study or a large sum of money to win at such shows
as these.

Just a word about your houses and I am through.
If the houses I have given you the plans of in this
book are not warm enough for your location, you can
build them six feet at the eaves instead of four, by
using a twelve foot board sawed in half in the centre.
Put a floor in this house at eaves and fill the top with
straw. Do not put on a tight floor, a floor of poles
would work all right. You could also line the sides
in the same way, and you would have a very warm

56 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

house, where you could get eggs in any kind of a
Winter.

I want to say right here the Leghorn plants of
this country are the only plants up to the present
time that have made money in a market way. Eggs
for market, at market prices, have made many of them
rich.

All that have tried the larger breeds such as
Wyandottes, Rocks, ete., have failed, at it in a market
way, so they have all had to go in the fancy or give
it up entirely.

White Wyandotte Female

POULTRY RAISING 57

CHAPTER XNXI.

A White Wyandotte plant for profit.

I have decided to add here a chapter on White
Wyandottes, as I have bred them all my life, that is
for the past eighteen years, and exhibited them all that
time. I have seen them head all the large breeds in
popularity, but the demand for them increases yearly.
I know of no breed of the large fowl where it is such
hard work to get good, fertile eggs that will hatch
strong chicks, that are bound to live any old way, as
it is from the White Wyandotte that have been bred
for exhibition purposes in yarded plants.

In breeding exhibition stock, every trace of
creaminess or brassiness had to be bred out of them,
and their stability has gone with it to a large extent.

Inbreeding has also done much to injure the
vitality of this breed.

My aim here is to tell you how to feed and care
for these birds, so you can get them hardy and full
of vigor once more, without breeding out their fine
qualities—and this can be done by feeding alone.

I have experimented very carefully along this line
and I find all large breeds should be fed quite different
than the small breeds.

First of all, they should never see corn in any
form, that is the breeding stock. If any corn it must
be in very limited quantities.

I find they will stand the hopper feeding and give
grand results. In fact, this is the only natural way
of feeding any fowl, and the only safe way of feeding.

First of all, give them your hopper of beef scrap
and wheat screenings; also grit, oyster shells and
charcoal. The first thing in the morning, give a light
feeding of oats in litter to induce all the exercise you
can.

At 9 a. m. give all the processed oats they will
take.

58 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

At I p. m. a light feeding of green cut bone, a
pint to a quart for 60 layers.

At 3 p. m. all the processed oats they will take.

At 4 p. m., or later, according to the time of the
year, another feeding of oats. This should be fed
to all large breeds in place of cracked corn.

Always use clipped oats, and feed in the litter,
and you will not only get an abundance of eggs, but
eggs that will hatch, strong healthy chicks that will
live. Such eggs will run from 80 to go per cent fertile,
right in the winter months.

I am not guessing at this, for I am doing it right
in February.

Do not be afraid of the processed oats, but give
all they will possibly take, for they are very light and
it is impossible to overfeed on them. There is noth-
ing I have ever tried that will make hens lay equal to
them, and nothing so cheap. It costs only about half
to feed a plant this way.

You can always sell any amount of eggs for hatch-
ing at $5.00 per 100.

I am positive you could sell all a 3,000 laying plant
could produce for hatching by a liberal amount of ad-
vertising on the same lines I told you how to adver-
tise Leghorn eggs.

You could sell a large quantity of breeders, for
good prices, if you will start with fairly good stock
and exhibit at the small shows on the start.

One thing you have to contend with on a Wyan-
dotte plant, you do not on a Leghorn plant, and that
is setters. This means quite some work; but you will
not have near the amount of setters on a plant fed
this way.

‘To properly break up a setter, they should not
be allowed to remain on the nest the first night, and as
a rule three days will break up any setter. Or, if you
want to break her up in twenty-four hours, just put
her with a bunch of surplus cockerels where a roost
is handy and your hen will not think of setting.

There is no breed at the present time so hand-
some as the White Wyandotte, when bred up for show

POULTRY RAISING 59

purposes, and no fowl that makes so fine a broiler and
roaster when they are grown up healthy and rugged,
that is, nature’s way, and this can be done on the feed-
ing I have outlined on my free range system. You
can get eggs right in January that will run from éo
to go per cent fertile and give you grand hatches of
strong, rugged chicks tlat can be easily raised right
in the winter—and you will have no trouble to dis-
pose of hundreds of laying pullets during September,
October and November at $2.00 each. There is a
grand profit raising pullets at this price, when you
can raise ¢O per cent and more of all the chicks you
hatch, and raise them lirgely on a feed that costs you
only 8 to 10 cents a bushel. So you can easily see
what a profit you can make by running a large plant
my way.

White Wyandotte Cockerel

Your small feed bills would surprise ad after
feeding the old way.

I am positive ten thousand dollars a year can
easily be made off a plant of three thousand layers,

60 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

and even more when you work into high-class show
birds and get three to five dollars a setting for many
of your eggs, and fifteen dollars a hundred.
Sell high-class birds from ten dollars each up to a
hundred. It can be done by pluck and perseverence.
A White Wyandotte plant of three thousand layers
could turn in a greater profit than the same number
of any other breed, fed and run my way, which is
nature’s way, providing it was handled by a White
Wyandotte fancier who thoroughly knew the value of
his birds.

Light Brahma Bantam

POULTRY RAISING 61

CHAPTER XXII.

A combination plant for profit—Fruit, Poultry, Bees.

I feel that I must write a few words here on a
combined plant for those who want to go on either a
small or large scale, and do not want their eggs all in
one basket; or to those who like a variety in life—for
variety is the spice of life.

There is no combination of business, that I know
of, so profitable, and at the same time will give so
much pleasure in various ways, as this. First of all,
every poultry plant should be covered with fruit.
This is the very first thing you should do. To pro-
vide your poultry with shade and a peach tree gives
the quickest shade of them all. Then the plum and
the apple, and you are bound to get immense crops
of fruit, where you cultivate your ground, and use
your poultry manure around your trees. And when
you are feeding your poultry, how nice it is to have
all the peaches you want to eat, or plums, or pears,
grapes, and, in fact, you should plant liberally of all
kinds of fruit, and you will find life worth the living.

Now you want bees to fertilize your blossoms, so
you will get large crops of fruit, and bees are very
profitable and afford a great amount of pleasure.
They are very profitable, in fact, they often turn in a
greater amount of profit, time and capital taken into
consideration, than anything I know of. I have
cleared as high as $25.00 from a single hive in a season
with but little labor. You have to give them no at-
tention to speak of, from October Ist to May Ist, and
for only two months, May and June do they need any
great amount of attention.

I advise every one who keeps poultry to make
of it a combined plant, Poultry, Fruit and Bees.

You must remember that fruit trees you must
have on your poultry plant for shade, if you expect
your poultry to do its best, and there is but little

62 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

labor to care for a big lot of fruit in this way—and
there will be years when your profit from fruit alone
will not only give you a good living, but will give
you a good fat bank account as well. Just think of
eating peaches, for instance, from the first of July
until November. This can be done, if vou will plant
several kinds from the earliest to the latest. You
can also have all kinds of apples, plums, cherries, and
other fruit in the same way, grown at no expense, on
your poultry farm, and anyone should enjoy life under
such circumstances.

POULTRY RAISING 63

CHAPTER XXIII.

Breeding for layers.

There is no question but what it pays to use a
good trap-nest and breed up your stock for layers. A
few of your best flocks could be used for this purpose.
Pullets would give you the best test for this, for after
a month or two you would know which ones were
laying the best, and at the end of the first year you
could take all with a big egg record and keep them
over, especially for your own breeders. In this way
you could soon build yourself up a wonderful strain of
layers that if cared for and fed on my system of free
range, you would soon have flocks averaging you 200
to 250 eggs a year. It is not possible in any other
way, in my opinion, and this is the only sure way of
breeding high class show birds.. Those that win the
blue in the hottest competition, and it would not take
so much extra time as you would think, for you could
release your hens on every round you make. By
breeding from the yearling hens that gave you the big
egg yield as pullets, you would not have to trap-nest
your hens the second year. In this way, you could
easily develop a wonderful strain of layers which
would more than répay you for time spent. In fact a
big plant could well afford to hire an extra man for
this purpose alone—that is, on a three thousand lay-
ing plant, it would pay to hire a good man to do noth-
ing but take care of your eggs and trap your hens.
In this way, I am positive you could soon have noth-
ing but 200 egg hens.

I know of no better trap-nest than the one ad-
vertised in this book. In fact every advertisement in
this book I solicited only from parties whom I per-
sonally know and have had dealings with, so you can
depend on full value for your money in every case and
I highly recommend every advertiser in this book,

64 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

CHAPTER XNIV.

The best feed and where to get it.

I want to say a few words here in regard to
quality of feed and where to buy. First, beef scraps.
This is one of the most important of my feeds, and
I have used all the leading makes, but have never
found any to give me the results that Spratt’s Patent
has given me. I consider this far ahead of any made
at the present day.

There is no chick food I have ever seen as good as
Rackham’s Chick Grain, only it is higher in price than
the other makes; but in quality it is way ahead, in
fact all their feeds are of the highest quality. You
will find their advertisement in this book.

I have also made arrangements with D. Lincoln
Orr, Orr’s Mills, N. Y., to make a special chick feed
for me which will contain less than Io per cent of
cracked corn. Price $2.50 per hundred. Have also
made arrangements with him to supply wheat screen-
ing by the car load, or ton.

I am also selling a screening feed for $25.00 per
ton free on board Buffalo. I use this entirely here on
the plant and it is giving grand results. I use it in
place of wheat screenings for hopper feeding. You
may find it very difficult to buy good wheat screenings
in your home market. If so, write D. Lincoln Orr,
Orr’s Mills, Orange Co., N. Y. :

To show you what can be done, I built a large
plant for a party on this free range system and first of
August I put 300 hens on this system of feeding.
These hens had been confined in small yards all the
season and were put in an old barn for a week. Before
putting them in these colony houses, They had been
laying 30 to 40 eggs a day. When I put them out,
they were laying 18 to 20 eggs daily. I put them on
free range, and put before them good wheat screen-
ings and Spratt’s Patent beef scrap, and on the eighth

POULTRY RAISING 65

day they showed a gain. On the eighteenth day,
when I left.the plant, I gathered 128 eggs and they
were gaining very rapidly. These hens were going
_through a heavy moult at the time. I write this to
show you what can be done nature’s way. These
hens had free access to a stream of water. These
hens were going through a heavy moult when they
made this wonderful record. So you see, it is possible
to keep your hens laying the year around.

66 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

A FEW THINGS TO
REMEMBER

All oats will not grow satisfactory, and if you get.
some that will not nearly all grow, try another lot of
another dealer, for when they grow satisfactory you
will have a complete mass of roots and sprouts which
should be an inch long for best results.

Have several large lots of oats going for a large
plant, and do not get out of them, for this is your
main feed for producing eggs and for growing chicks.
There is nothing like it. Give them all they will take
four times a day, sure. Keep it right by them, as they
live and grow on this as they will on nothing else, and
it forms fully 80 per cent of their rations after they
are a week old.

If you fail to make the success you expect under
this system, write me, enclosing stamp, and I will
straighten you out. For you cannot go wrong if you
follow my instructions to the letter.

If your little chicks have board floors, you should
clean their pens out every four days, sure, and put the
leavings in runs of your old hens, they will clean up
all seeds and oats not eaten by chicks. Cover your
floor lightly with clover, there is nothing as good.

Your Leghorn pullets should lay at five months
of age, sure, if you have fed and cared for them as
laid down in this book. If they do not, you have
failed to carry out some important part, or your stock
is not the laying kind.

POULTRY RAISING 67

A poor memery is a poor thing for a poultry man
and will put you out of business. By all means put
your memory in your business. Nothing can be neg-
lected or forgotten, if you wish certain success.

Trap and poison all rats during the Fall and
early Winter, for you cannot raise the two on the
same plant. “Common Sense Rat Exterminator” is
the best rat poison I have ever used, and if you cannot
get it of your dealer, write H. H. Cannon, Irvington-
on-Hudson, N. Y., who carries it in stock.

Hopper feed, only wheat feed, such as screenings,
or screening feed, I have mentioned. Do not hopper
feed corn of any kind, or whole wheat, and then won-
der why you are not getting results.

Remember, you cannot get a hen laying in a day
or two. It takes from two to five weeks, depending
on the condition of the hen and the time of the year.
So, for big results, do not neglect your hen and let
her stop laying.

Do not neglect your houses and let them get full
of mites and lice. Go over your roosts at least once a
month during Summer, with kerosene and carbolic
acid, half and half—or a good lice exterminator. Also
clean droppings from board floors once a week sure,
at all times of the year, for lice multiply very rapidly
in droppings in the Summer time on board floors. On
the ground, it is different.

68 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

DUCK CULTURE

Believing this book may fall in the hands of many
who raise a few ducks, and possibly in the hands of
some. who may raise thousands annually, and as I have
raised from five to ten thousand yearly for many years
very successfully, until I now am able to raise every
duck hatched that has strength enough to eat and
drink.

I will take up the care of the breeding stock, as
the foundation of success all lies with the breeders.
First, you must select your breeders and in every
case they must be young ducks.

Never keep an old duck over the second year,
for they will not lay before February, as a rule, while
young ducks start in December, if properly fed and
housed. I prefer breeders hatched in April to any
other month, as they get fully matured early in the
Fall and are hatched from our strongest eggs.

All breeders should be hatched from April 15 to
May 15, and such ducks should begin to lay in Decem-
ber.

Your breeding ducks can be kept very light dur-
ing September and October. Do not let them get to
poor, for if you do, you may lose some.

Tf you are on a farm you can give them range and
but little feed. A mash of wheat bran and gluten
meal, equal parts, makes a very cheap feed to Sum-
mer them on.

About November first, you must begin to feed
them up and house them, if you wish to get early eggs.
This is where the profit comes in. Give a mash,
morning and night, from November first on, as fol-
lows. One part bran, one part middlings, one

POULTRY RAISING 69

part corn meal, one part clover, five per cent beef
scraps, two per cent grit and oyster shells. Give
all they will eat of this, night and morning, and keep
water by them if they have not a pond. Also give
them water in their houses at night. A butter tub,
sawed down, makes a handy thing.

About December first, increase your beef scrap
gradually, from 5 per cent to Io per cent, and lift your
ducks occasionally by the neck and see how thin they
are. Do not let them get too fat if they begin to lay
in December and in January. If they do not gain
much, and are thin in flesh, gradually increase your
corn meal and add some whole corn and whole wheat.
The more they gain on eggs, the heavier feed they
must have to keep them in good flesh, for a good
Pekin duck should lay from 75 to 100 eggs without
stopping, you should also raise their beef scraps from
10 per cent to 15 per cent and give more oyster shells
and grit. It requires great judgment in feeding a
flock of Pekins for the most eggs and to have them
run good and fertile. I have seen flocks. of breeders
knocked out the whole season by getting them too
fat before they got to laying good. Your breeders
for best results should be mated up one drake to five
ducks and your eggs should run fully co per cent
fertile from March 2oth on, and if they do not as a
rule you will find your breeders are to fat.

If you keep ducks for the greatest possible profit,
you will find none to equal the Pekins as layers, and
for quick growers which stand close confinement they
head the list of market ducks to day.

In hatching duck eggs I find a temperature of
10214 plenty high for good results, and you will get
much better hatches in warm weather by airing your
eggs both morning and night.

When they hatch put them in your brooder and
give warm water to drink. \Watch them closely for
two days and teach them to go where the heat is and
after that you have no further trouble. Give warm
water to drink for first two weeks sure, for cold

70 BRIGGS’ SYSTEM OF

water will give them cramps which quickly kills them
and if they do not die it will so stunt them that they
never get over it.

I have at last found a perfect feed for young
ducks first hatched, and that is Spratt’s Patent chick
feed. I pour hot water on it which increases the bulk
about one-half; when cool feed and you will find every
duck that can be raised, or better every duck that has
strength to eat, will live on this feed and they grow
very rapidly on it. In fact they could be put to
market on it but it would not pay as the feed is to
high priced; but it pays well to start them on it, for
they eat but little the first two weeks. I would not be
without it in raising ducks.

«After they are two weeks old you can gradually
change them on a mash made as follows: One part
wheat bran, one part middlings, two parts corn meal,
ten per cent beef scraps, a little grit and you will find
they grow very rapidly on this. Twenty per cent
of green feed can be added with grand results. After
the seventh week double up your corn meal and in-
crease your beef scrap to 15 per cent and if you have
the large kind of Pekins they should be ready for
market on this feed at nine weeks of age and fully
80 per cent of your flock should average five pounds
each, dressed weight; and many will go over this
weight.

Spratt’s chick feed will cost you $6.00 per hun-
dred, and even at this price it is the cheapest thing I
know of for starting voung ducks, for every one lives
on it that is fit to leave the incubator. It is the
natural duck feed, although not generally known.

In dressing ducks for market, hang them in pairs
on a line and stick in roef of mouth with a sharp
knife and at the same time hit them a solid blow on
top of the head and pull out their main tail feathers
and wing feathers, except flight feathers or plainer
feathers on last or outside joint of wing. Soon as
dead take them down, wash out mouth, and take them
by the head, two at a time, and dip them in a kettle of
boiling water until feathers come easy. You will

POULTRY RAISING 7

quick learn this with a little practice. Have a pail of
cold water ready to wet your fingers and take the
feathers from the breast first and then turn it over
and remove the rest, taking all large feathers off.
They are then laid on a shelf for a finisher, which
generally gets three cents each, they clean them up,
then they go in tubs of cold water and later in a
barrel of ice water, from which they are packed in
barrels and heavily iced and shipped to market.

As soon as your breeders are done laying about
July first, they should be sent to market alive. You
will never get more profit out of them as a rule.

You can also make a fine profit selling duck eggs
for hatching at $8.00 per hundred. A duck plant can
make a fine profit if handled right, as sickness and lice
are not known in the duck business. Duck eggs do
not hatch near as well as hens eggs in incubators as a
rule, but you have no loss after they are hatched.

HALLOCK’S
WHITE WYANDOTTES

Won five out of six First
at the Madison Square Garden,
New York Show, 1905.

WRITE FOR FREE CIRCULAR

ROSS C,. HH. HALLOCK
No. 6301 Clifton Avenue, St. Louis, Mo.

MA’TINGS

I have mated up seven choice breeding pens, all
headed by first-class pure white male birds closely re-
lated to my New York winners, from which I will
sell eggs for hatching at $3.00 per 13; $5.00 for 26;
$8.00 for 50 and $15.00 per 100. I am looking for
good results from all of these pens.

Then, I have four better pens which I have mated
up to the best of my ability, and will sell eggs from
these four select pens at $5.00 per 13; $8.00 per 26;
$11.00 per 50 and $20.00 per 100. I have only one
special mating of four birds from which I will sell no
eggs at any price.

PULSIFER’S

STAY WHITE WYANDOTTES
HEAVY LAYERS AND
PRIZE WINNERS COMBINED

Seven ribbons on eight entries at Boston’s latest
show with Special for the Whitest female in show is
to be proud of. Our last year’s winning cockerel at
Madison Square, New York, proved a wonder as a
breeder. \Ve are breeding him again this year. If
you would take the trouble to trace the majority of
show winners to their ancestors you would find that
they came direct, or originally, from our stock. We
have the reputation of having the most typical and
whitest Wyandottes to be found.

A few females, a male, or a few eggs from us
would be a gold mine investment for you.

Eggs from our best; one sit $5.00 straight; two
sits $8.00; three sits $10.00; five sits $15.00 or $20.00
in one hundred lots.

STOCK FOR SALE AT ALL TIMES AT PRICES
TO: SUIT QUALITY DESIRED,
ORDER TO-DAY.

F. P. PULSIFER & CO.

BOX N, NATICK, MASS.

HAMM’S
Barred Rocks

Are the true Blue Ribbon Winners at
New York, 1904.
First, second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth prizes
at Grand Central Palace, New York, 1905. Two
firsts, two seconds, also third, fourth and fifth prizes

my Barred Rocks have won at Madison Square Gar-

den, 1902, 1903, 1904, 1905 and 1906.

ELEGANT SHOW AND BREEDING BIRDS
ALWAYS FOR SALE THAT CAN WIN

IN ANY COMPANY.

Frank D. Ham

Livingston, Col. Co., N. Y.

Eggs, $5.00 for 15. Best only!

That hatch winners!

A Necessity to the up-to-date Breeder and a
Short Cut to Success

The Practical Trap Nest

SIMPLEST CHEAPEST LATEST BEST

SHOWS THE HEN WHICH LAYS THE ECC, AND THE ECC
THE HEN LAID

USES OF THE

Practical Nest Trap

POINTS OUT YOUR BEST LAYERS
POINTS OUT THE WORST LAYERS
POINTS OUT THE EGG EATER

Gives you an increased egg yield with
a reduced feed bill.

Makes the hens gentle.

Gives all the benefits of single matings,
without the expense of separate houses.

Gives definite data upon which to im-
prove your flock and enables you to do
more in this direction in one year than
in many years without it.

Single Nest goc. Two Set $1.70. Three Set $2.40.
Four Set or more 75c. per Nest.

M. J. WHITTY & CO.

WISEACRES, CROTON-ON-HUDSON, N. Y.

SPRATT’S PATENT

POULTRY FOOD NO. 3

is a perfectly balanced ration and is invaluable for birds kept
in confinement or preparing stock for exhibition purposes.
As an egg producer it has no equal and it will materially in-
crease the percentage of fertility in the eggs. It is an ex-
cellent food for birds after they return from a long journey
and for poultry during the moulting season at which time
there is a great strain on the system and they require a
highly nutritious and concentrated food.

Spratt’s Patent Poultry Food No. 3 should be fed as a
morning mash with mixed grain at night.

Spratt’s Patent Chick Meal No. 5

is prepared strictly according to modern scientific methods,
and is the result of careful and exhaustive experiments. It
has been demonstrated and is admitted by all experts that
to rear birds successfully and bring them to the highest
state of perfection, they must have, while very young, a
cooked food, and their corn diet must be carefully limited.
This food should be composed of cereals, meat, vegetables,
bone and shell in judicious combination. Such is Spratt’s
Patent Chick Meal No. 5.

Spratt’s Patent Chick Grain

is the best dry Chick Food that can be compounded, and it
is the cheapest, because none but the best can be the
cheapest. :

Chicgrain is a perfectly-balanced, semi-cooked, partly
malted grain, insect and vegetable ration; easily digested and
highly nutritious. It is a compound of grains, meat, milk,
etc., and the original formula has been used and improved
upon for over twenty years.

Chicgrain can be used as the staple food from the very
day the chick is hatched, by breeders who believe only in a
Dry Food. It prevents and checks the. percentage of mor-
tality. Bowel trouble is almost unknown where it is used,
and it gives the chicks a start in life that makes them grow
like weeds.

We also manufacture specially prepared foods for Dogs,
Puppies, Cats, Rabbits, Poultry, Pigeons, Game, Birds, Fish.

Send for Catalogue “Poultry Culture.”

If interested in dogs, write for copy of “Dog Culture”
which contains practical chapters on the feeding, kenneling
and general management of dogs also chapters on cats.

450 Market St., Newark, N. J.

Dpratt Pion oe

1324 Valencia St.,
(AM.) LTD. San Francisco, Cal.

BARRED anp WHITE
PLYMOUTH ROCKS

ROSE COMB
BROWN LEGHORNS

BRED IN LINE WITH THE WINNING STRAINS
OF TO-DAY. MATED TO PRODUCE
WINNERS.

oh

STOCK FOR SALE.

Eggs for Hatching $2.00, 15; $5.00, 45.
Incubator Eggs from fowls having free range,

$5.00, 100.

H. W. BUNK,

GERMANTOWN, = NEW YORK

HAWKINS

BREEDS AMERICA’S BEST

PLYMOUTH ROCKS,

BARRED, WHITE AND BUFF.

WYANDOTTES

SILVER, WHITE AND BUFF.
Winners at New York, Boston, World’s Fair, and

America’s greatest shows for 20 years.

2000 Choice Birds for Sale.

ok
HGGS

From prize matings, I sitting $5.00; 2 sittings,
$8.00; 3 sittings $10.00; 5 sittings $15.00; $20.00 per
100.

Catalogue of AMERICA’S BEST free.

A. @. HAWKINS,

Lock Box 3, Lancaster, Mass.

There’s ——
Money in Poultry

_ , Not everybody makes it, but not everybody uses good
judgment in outfitting for the business. ‘Donit expect to
make money out of poultry if you cannot hatch dependably,
at all seasons, in all climates, under all conditions, upwards
of 90 per cent of your fertile eggs. Not all incubators will
Oe Show your good judgment by selecting one that
will.

Raising all the chicks you hatch is just as important.
Just any sort of a box for a brooder will not do. See to it
that you get the best possible substitute for tthe hen to
mother your chicks.

You will start out right in the poultry business and go
a long ways toward assuring your success if you outfit with

SUCCESSFUL
INGUBATORS AND BROODERS

They are machines that have been proven. Many thous-
ands have been in use for many years. They can be relied
upon for uniform good results. Every user testifies ‘to their
perfect self-regulation, their dependableness and their uni-
form good results under all conditions.

Successful Incubators and Brooders for years have
been, and now are, sold with the positive guarantee
that, under like conditions, they will hatch as many
and as strong, vigorous chicks from a given number of
eggs, and will brood as many to maturity, as any other
incubator and brooder in the world.

This guarantee protects you. Start right with proper
machines. Incubator and Poultry Catalogue FREE. Book-
let, “Proper Care and Feéding Small Chicks, Ducks and

Turkeys,” toc. 50c poultry paper one year, loc.

Des Moines Incubator Co.
DEPT. 7. DES MOINES, IOWA.

We have a full line of poultry supplies, poultry and eggs.

SUCCEED
| WITH A SUCCESSFUL INCUBATOR

Roberts Poultry Farm

BREED NOTHING BUT
FIRST-CLASS

WHITE WYANDOTTE
“Exhibition and Utility.

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We have a large flock of birds fed under free
system laid down in this book.

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PRICE OF EGGS:
13 for $3.00; 26 for $5.00; $5 per 100; $40 per $1,000

fom)

ALLEN C. ROBERTS,
Paitker Ford, Pa.