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Show EGGSandOHCKENS if - AW AV- Modern Poultry Farm in America. Prepared by National Goocrraphfc Society, Wiwhlnston. D. C. W'NU Service. POULTRY experts of the Department De-partment of Agriculture after careful experiments and studies have concluded that there is no truth in the old contention that the breeding of poultry strains for high egg production is impairing the quality of eggs. For untold centuries the hen has been a companion of man In the onward on-ward inarch of civilization. In America, where poultry husbandry hus-bandry has attained its greatest development, de-velopment, the lien has become one of our leading national assets, grow ing In the past fifty years from a neglected side line on the average farm to a position where she is considered con-sidered by the farmer as a very efficient ef-ficient contributor to his yearly Income. In-come. The hen might be termed a universal uni-versal favorite, in that a greater number of persons are Interested and actually concerned with poultry than with any other form of live stock. Last year there were more than 450,000,000 chickens in the United States. The yearly value of the products of the American hen has at times passed the billion-dollar mark. The great bulk of poultry and eggs produced in the United States comes from the Corn Belt states of the upper Mississippi valley. In fact, nearly one-half of our poultry population, or approximately 200,-000,000 200,-000,000 chickens, Is found in what are known as the North Central states. No Longer a Hobby. For many years a considerable "proportion' of our poultry population popula-tion was kept in back lots of city and suburban communities by persons per-sons primarily engaged in some remunerative re-munerative occupation. Poultry was raised largely for pleasure and as a hobby, and Incidentally to Insure a goodly supply of fresh eggs and meat for the family table. Surveys made a few years ago In eastern urban and suburban areas showed an average of one bird to every two people. Such (locks, averaging av-eraging from 10 to 25 fowls, were usually well cared for and consisted of birds of high quality. The postwar period has witnessed the gradual disappearance of many of these hack-lot poultrymen. This change in habits among a great mass of our population has fortunately been accompanied by the development of large commercial commer-cial poultry farms and specialized henneries, which have found popular popu-lar favor not only on the North American continent, but in many Old world countries. Commercial poultry farms are especially es-pecially successful near large centers cen-ters of population, where the demand de-mand is for a strictly' fresh, new-laid new-laid egg and fresh-killed poultry. Hundreds of such pntainP!c.M ! ... - vu.wM.ica art. being successfully operated In the Atlantic and Pacific coast states. The eastern sections produce espe cially for the New York trade, and the Pacific coast sections, after meeting the demands of the larger Pacific coast cities, ship their eggs to the Atlantic seaboard, where they find a ready market at attractive attrac-tive prices. Industry Is Systemized. Revolutionary changes have been going on in the poultry industry for ten years. Less and less attention Is being given to the purely "fancy" and to the breeding of exhibition ; fowls, and more and more stress Is being laid on their economic value m the production of human food. Tiie farm poultrymen are beginning begin-ning to apply sound principles" in the management of their flocks and are organizing co-operatively to move their graded eggs quickly to the large consuming centers The little White Leghorn hens of the Petaluma district, In central California, have become world fa mous because of the intensive con-,ditions con-,ditions under which thev are kept hundreds of thousands being massed ln one sma" valley; the entire community com-munity depends upon commercial jegg farming for a livelihood. It was not so many years ago that ;the American hen ruled supreme in the Pity of incubator and brooder, brood-er, faithfully sitting out the 21 ! dreary days on the nest, cautiously ''"ling her tender brood of flurry youngsters through the early stil ' of their development. The hen is too valuable today as :n egg machine to allow her to waste weeks aniI ni(J,lths ,n ing eggs and brooding chicks DP to Its greater elficiency, the modern Incubator has gradually replaced the hen. The rapid increase in poultry and the growing demand for baby chicks have called for the development of incubators of much greater capacity capac-ity than formerly. Credit for making possible our great commercial poultry industry should go In large measure to the modern mammoth incubator, equipped with automatic ventilation ventila-tion and temperature control, with labor-saving devices to eliminate hand-turning and hand-cooling, with eggs stacked deck upon deck or tier upon tier, efficiently heated with coal, kerosene or electricity. Parallel with the development of the mammoth Incubator, there has been evolved the colony brooder, heated by coal or kerosene, with a capacity of from 300 to 1,000 chicks under each stove. One operator can effectively manage from 12 to 15 such brooding units and can successfully suc-cessfully carry through the brooding brood-ing period from 10,000 to 15,000 chicks. The real romance of modern poultry poul-try husbandry has been the unprecedented unpre-cedented growth in the production and shipment of ready-made baby chicks. Hatched in mammoth incubators in-cubators on breeding farms or at commercial hatcheries, the chicks provide the most economical and convenient method of securing one's foundation stock, of enlarging one's flock, and of providing future generations gen-erations of layers. Shipping Baby Chicks. Formerly, hatching eggs were the medium whereby one poultryman purchased stock from another; but some 25 years ago, from the little village of Stockton, N. J., in the Delaware river valley, the first baby chicks were shipped. For a number of years one poultryman poul-tryman had been supplying chicks in small quantities to his neighbors. The success which they had with this method of acquiring poultry stock soon spread, and little by little lit-tle orders came for chicks from more distant points, until finally it became impossible to make deliveries deliv-eries in person over the increasing distances from which they were demanded. de-manded. So it came about that this demand was met by putting the chicks into cotton-lined wooden boxes with holes in the top for ventilation. ven-tilation. Twenty-five chicks were placed in a package and shipped by express to their destination. The experiment proved to be a success. From this small beginning the industry in-dustry gradually grew, until today there are in the United States several sev-eral thousand hatcheries, equipped to produce baby chicks for shipment, ship-ment, and having a capacity of approximately ap-proximately 200,000,000 eggs at one sitting. Culling the Nonproducers. ine poultry departments of our many state agricultural colleges have been responsible during the past quarter of a century for the development of many scientific facts and practices, the practical applications applica-tions of which have made possible commercial poultry keeping. The ability which the poultryman now possesses to cull his birds' on a basis of external character, to eliminate elim-inate the nonproducers from time to time as they appear in the flock Is an outstanding example. Weekly culling during the summer sum-mer and fall brings about a reduction reduc-tion of the feed costs without any decrease in egg yield. Culling Is done by observing the condition of certain secondary sex characters and body factors. The laving hen has a bright-red, full comb. When not laying, the comb becomes much smaller, appears shrunken and dry The heavy-laying hen has a loose Pliable, soft abdomen. In the non. laying hen the abdomen becomes small,, shrunken, and hard. The hen which is laying d has been laying heavily for some t, ' shows absence of yellow pigments in shanks, beak, ear lobe, and s n which I" "11U to'cn hich she obtains from her food has been used up in the production of egg yolks, as soon as she ceases to lay, this color begins to return-first return-first to the ear lobes, lhon thp ' "lk ,t1V".; so tha, there is he dehn.te relation existing be-tW1en be-tW1en " '"it of yellow pi,.mcl and products conditio,, It is by observing certain of these dy characters that. ,, .. 'n !" tell whelher biddv is si , Ply griming around the pen look!, . |
