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Show I !!!! lii tiff 1 1 ' if1 ,; xS MORTALITY IN BABY CHICKS Often Attributed to Parent Stock When Fault Is Really Not Inherent Inher-ent Test for Cause. The large mortality in baby chicks is very often attributed to the patent pat-ent stock when the fault is really not inherent. In an effort to ascertain the real cause for this condition make a test. v Remove carefully all traces of food from the brooders, leaving none whatever what-ever near thehm. Take some of the chicks that have the care of the mother moth-er hen aud place them in the brooder over night. Continue this for several nights in succession, being sure to T-oHii-n thom tn fliA rare of their mother each morning. Each morning note the condition of these little fellows, fel-lows, and if they are not Injured or are none the worse for their experience expe-rience in the brooder you will know that the temperature in the brooder is about right and the fault does not lie in that direction. With the brooder eliminated as a possible cause for the mortality, you most begin to look elsewhere. This narrows itself down to one of two causes improper feeding or lack of exercise. Now test for the food cause. Change your conditions of feeding radically and note the result. If the cause is not from the feeding, it must be from lack of exercise. Correct this by supplying them with a proper amount of this requisite. Simply finding your chicks dead in the brooder in the morning when they are all crowded . in a corner is not sufficient proof that they died from too low a temperature. Sick, weakly and Indisposed chicks will always hud- die together whether they are cold or not. They will not huddle together, however, how-ever, should the temperature be excessively ex-cessively high, in which event they will spread apart, and when found dead will usually be lying on their breasts. This condition, however, is seldom noted, as it takes a very high temperature to cause them to spread apart and to cause their death. |