Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1897-12-17
QUEER INVENTIONS.
Patents on Devices for Preventing
Hens From Setting.


One of the unsolved problems of the
ages has been to discover an argument
for dissuading the setting" hen from
following the natural bent of her ma
ternal instincts, aud inducing her to
resume her egg.laying routine.
The average poultry raiser thinks
he is defrauded unless he can secure
one egg per diem for seven or eight
months from each hen. When, there
fore, hen stops laying in the early
summer, and vehemently asserts her
intention to remain in the nest all day
without adequate rental to the owner,
the trouble begins.
1t is a battle royal between human
intellect and ingenuity and animal in
stinct, the hen usually coming off
with the honors, unless she sacrifices
her life to the often too drastic meas
urer adopted by the owner.
OF the many expedients employed
by the human being in this contest,
two have been patented to their inven-
tors by the United States Government,
and may not be used by the exasper-
ated public without proper license
from the patentees.
The first patent was granted to a
citizen of Lacrosse, Wis, in 1887, and
so has seven years yet to run. The
inventor proposes to place in the nest
flat coil of stout wire, having at in
tervals sharp points. He states under
oath that besides driving the hen off
the nest, it will, operating in the man.
ner described in the patent, Gin
stantly divert the hen from any desire
or disposition to set" Not only will
it do this but, theoretically, it will
so effectually Danish all recollection of
previous intent upon the part of the
party of the second part that she will
forthwith resume her ordinary de-
meanor and begin laying eggs again.
1t reads like fairy tale, but the origi-
nator of the idea doubtless never had
experience with hens so fertile in re-
source and indomitable in will power
as those with which the writer had
personal acquaintance in his youth.
The second patent has just been
granted to man residing in Roxton,
Texas, and has given rise to great
deal of amusement upon the part of
the Patent Office officials. The man
who made the drawing, in order to
play a joke upon the office, showed
the device--a pair of blinders-fas-
tened to the head Of q lordly chanti-
cleer, and in this form it was pub
lished. The examiner who had charge
of the case has been bantered so much
that he now asserts that the fowl is
really hen, but of French breed
having no distinction between the
sexes.
The patent says: "When q hen is
provided with one of these improved
hoods she can neither see to the right
nor left, nor upwardly,. and thus is
prevented from flying to any elevated
position. All nests in the modern
construction of henneries are con-
structed at an elevation from the
ground, and as fowl will never fly in
a direction in which it cannot first
look, the hen will thus be prevented
from flying up into the nest"
As the hen can see directly before
her, however, it does not appear how
she is to be prevented from focalizing
her efforts to Matching a brood of
chickens from such bits of broken
crockery as she can scratch into a cor
ner of the aforesaid hennery."