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Show KEEP FOWLS CONFINED I MONEY-MAKING WAY FOR VIL- LAGERS AND SUBURBANITES. Birds Do Not Look as Well as When Given Free Range, bui They Keep on Shelling Out Eggs Least Work With Dry Feeding. (By OEOlHiK H. PKI.I.ARDJ As a cold blooded business proposition, proposi-tion, probably no plan is better than that of keeping the hens shut in all the time. They should be confined from the time they reach maturity un til marketed as poultry, and fed ae stout a ration as they will stand without with-out going wrong. Aside from sentiment and pleasure in their appe '.ranee this is the money-making money-making way for villagers or suburban ites, who have limited yard roorr and need to keep their premises free from the litter and soiling that are otherwise nearly inseparable froir. poultry keeping. The fowls do not look as well as when on range their plumage gets dull and they are less lively, but they will shell out the eggs and keep on shelling out, with less labor and less expense, than under any other system, unless it is the colony system with free range. Even then it is doubtful if the same number can be more easily cared for; or the ultimate profit be greater. In keeping the hens on this plan they should be separated into flocks of 25 to 35 and allowed from 4 to f feet square per bird. Dry feeding; entails the least wort and therefore brings the best profit as the egg yield is generally bettei than whero fed on the one-meal-at-a time and the quick lunch-systems. If the feed is properly proportioned and the supply is always amply, there will be no trouble id getting eggs, anc lots of them if the hens are in goor. health. We doubt if there is so much difference in the average egg-production of hens as is sometimes fancied. With good feeding, which means the right kind as well as quantities, mosl hens will mate good. Some will dc better than others, but so far it seems impracticable to select only the best in this case. Trap-nesting is the only positive way of deciding the question, and that is a way which is unpractical where large numbers are kept. Kept housed all the time, the hens are subject to the most arbitrary feeding feed-ing rules and1 experience is showing that they will produce as many, or more, eggs as when on range. It would require a corps of bellboys bell-boys and bookkeepers to release the hens and tabulate the returns. Occasionally a hen will get to feather feath-er pulling or egg eating. In such a case a run of a few days outside will usually cure the habit; if not, dark nests or the ax will. |