Rocky Mountain husbandman. [volume] (Diamond City, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1880-07-22
gle Auuhg Nard
WHEN TO SELL CHICKENS FOR PROFIT.

" IAN ~ 0GAA ChACA6N6 Fun EAUEKT.
A correspondent writing to the Rurat
World gives the following on the profits of
poultry raising in the States, from which
some estimate rs to the business in Montana
CAN be deduced:
We often hear the complaint that it does
not pay to raise chickens tor market, and
likely it is the case with many, but the fault
is with those who raise them and not with
the chickens. There is = big profit to the
farmer in raising few hundred chickens
every year and selling them at $l.25 to 50
per dozen if they are sold at the right time.
Some may ask, when is the best time to
sell at profit? Our advice is to sell just as
soon as they are large enough to sell. A
chicken ten weeks old. or when it is Of good
frying size. if il has the range of the farm.
has not consumed five cents worth of food,
at The price corn usually sells at here III the
west.
Three bushels of meal will keep eight
hens and one hundred young chicks the
first mouth; four bushels of meal will keep
them the second mouth, and five bushels
will keep them the third month, or until the
chickens are Of good large frying size, and
are in good condition for the table, ana will
sell at almost any railroad town for 81 so
per dozen at amy time during the summer or
tall. and during spring and early summer,
before there are many spring chickens in
the market, good ones, such as these, often
sell for much higher price.
You see, these eight hens and one humid
red chickens have, during the three months,
consumed twelve bushels of meal Ii corn
is worth rs cents per bushel, meal ought to
be wortl 30 cents. So you see So go has
produced one hundred chickens OF frying
size worth three or four times the cost of
the meal the mother hens began 10 lay
when the chicks were three or four weeks
old, laid some TWO dozen eggs each, went to
sitting again and are off with another humid
red chicks, and This early lot, especially the
cockerels, should be sold Immediately, or
before they eat 50 much that there will be
no profit i'll raising them. Besides, ii they
are marketed at this age, your place is not
overstocked with chickens, and you have
room TO raise others at Il profit. There are
few farmers but what could raise and sell
one hundred chickens per month in this
way and make a far greater profit on them
than is made on many other things raised
on the farm.
Chickens generally sell for as much at
three months old, during the spring and
summer, as they do during the next winter
AT six 10 eight months old; as during the
latter season the large city markets are gell-
orally uverstockeu with spare-ribs, back
bones and the like from the pork packing
establishments. The pullets may be sold
with The cockerels, or the earliest and most
thrifty kept to lay while the old hens are
in the tall, at which time eggs are
always high.
These early pullets, if of any good variety,
will continue TO lay well during the winter
if properly housed and fed, ana too many
are not crowded together.
Ii farmers would make practice of SELL
ing their chickens as soon as they become
va a. hi2i HCeauiC Saw thSJ COuiu SCH OiE
huadred or more every month, from May
until winter, and at the same time realize
good profits. Bv this means they could
raise four Or five times us many chickens
each year as they do, and at the same time
never have their farm overstocked with
fowls. ltis not necessary that chickens