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Show I - I" l - . WHEATLESS RATION FAVORED FOR HENS ; I - - - - - - (From the United States Department of Agriculture.) With wheat so high, poultrymen will be Interested to learn that on the United States department of agriculture agricul-ture experiment farm excellent egg-laying egg-laying results were secured with a wheatless ration. Thirty Leghorn pullets pul-lets to which this ration has been fed for one and a half years produced an average of 147.3 eggs per hen for the pullet year. This compares favorably favor-ably with egg yields secured on other rations containing wheat and therefore there-fore more expensive. This pen, moreover, more-over, during the first 16 weeks of its second year has averaged 28.15 eggs per hen, 17.5 eggs per hen being produced pro-duced in March. The same wheatless ration has been fed since last November to a pen of Ruff Orpington pullets, which have laid 53 eggs per hen in 20 weeks and hold the highest egg record of any of the large feeding pens of pullets at the farm this year. Two other pens, however, are less than one egg per hen behind this pen. The ration used was as follows: Scratch Mlxure. I Dry Mash. 2 pounds cracked cord 8 pounds corn meal 1 pound oats 1 pound beef scrap The scratch mixture was fed sparingly, sparing-ly, so that the hens ate about equal parts of this mixture and of the dry mash. The total grain consumption of feed for the year was 52 pounds, of which 20 pounds was scratch mixture. mix-ture. Throughout the year it took 4.G pounds of feed to produce a dozen eggs. This scratch mixture, with wheat $2.57, cracked corn ?1.35, and oats 70 cents per bushel, is -40 cents per hundred hun-dred pounds cheaper than the regular mixture of equal parts cracked corn, wheat and oats. Another mash which is slightly cheaper than this one is made of 4 per cent eac'.t brail and middlings, mid-dlings, 26 per cent beef scrap, and 06 per cent cornmeal. If the wheat is omitted from the ration, ra-tion, it is very essential to feed a considerable con-siderable proportion of beef scrap in the mash, but with present prices beei scrap is one of the cheapest poultry feeds, considering its high protein content, con-tent, and its adaptability as an effective effec-tive weight-making combination feed. These experiments, the specialists say, prove that wheat is not essential in an egg-laying ration and that excellent excel-lent results can be secured by using corn and oats as a scratch mixture, provided that this is fed with a good mash feed containing 25 per ceut beef scrap. i A P CwrwS- ' SINGLE-COMB WHITE LEGHORN COCKEREL. |