Arizona republican., 1898-04-05
SOME POULTRY EXPERIMENTS.

ter the Utah experiment station is do- ing much good and practical work; in i fact it is credited with the best work of any of the experiment stations in the inter mountain country. When it completes an experiment, the results are given to the press in an incred- ibly short time.
 The bulletin from the Utah station i is No. 51, and in it are reported re- suits of poultry experiments conducted at the station during the year ending November, 1897. A number of experi- ! ments are reported, and in some cases the results are very positive. They in cluded tests of old hens and bullets for egg production; of the value of ex- ercise; of the value of crossing pure breds; of the relative egg laying quail ities of Brown Leghorns, Barred Ply mouth Rocks, Light Brahmas and a Brahma Leghorn cross. The annual food cost per fowl of the different breeds, and the yearly production of eggs per hen were important features of the experiments. The relative value of old eggs and fresh eggs for matching was also tested. An incuba- tor test was conducted. A number of halftone cuts are reproduced, which include one of the poultry buildings, several photographs of fowls and of two baskets of eggs, one a very large basket representing the laying of the bullets, the other of old hens The latter is a striking lesson of the value of young blood"
 The bulletin, a copy of which may be obtained free on application to Di- rector Luther Foster, experiment sta is ,i1 follows:
 1. There is little profit in keeping hens three and four years old at the market prices of food and eggs in Utah. The profit in feeding young hens, or bullets, was six times greater than in feeding old hens three and four years. This conclusion does not apply to two-year-old hens and hens more than four years old.
 2. Leghorn bullets matched in April gave better results than those matched in late May. The profit was about one and half times greater from the April hatch than from the May hatch.
 3. The exercised pens, 4, 5, and 6 produced 26 eggs per fowl more than the pens without exercise-1, ?, and 8.
 f. The three exercised pens pro duced eggs at food cost of 5.5 cents per dozen; the pens without exercise at food cost of 6.5 cents per dozen.
 5. The three exercised pens aver aged net profit per fowl during the year of S4 cents, the non-exercised pens, 58 cents.
 6. Pen 1, which represented egg production under the most unfavorable conditions, except as to ration fed, cleared PA cents per fowl during the year on the cost of food. Pen 4, rep resenting egg production under the most favorable conditions, cleared, during the year, s1.25 per fowl; this would have been increased consider ably had the eggs laid before the ex- pertinent began been counted. In the one case there was a profit of per cent; in the other 203 per cent. '. Exercise had no apparent infiu- ence on the weight of the fowl. The lack of exercise did not add to the weight of the fowl.
 8. The non-exercised pens produced eggs weighing about 3 per cent more than the exercised pens.
 g. The eggs produced by the old Leghorn hens weighed about 51a per cent more than those produced by the LcSHOIH pulleIS
 10. The eggs produced by the Light Brahma bullets weighed 111a per cent more than those produced by the Leg horn bullets.
 H. The Barred Plymouth Rock pull lets eggs averaged about the same as i those of the Leghorn bullets. 12. In two or three pens exercise produced a larger consumption Of food.
 13. The exercised pens made bet ter use of the food than those without exercise. It required P per cent less food to produce dozen of eggs With exercise than without it. The results are strongly conclusive that exercise aids digestion and assimilation of food The chief value of exercise, therefore, seems to be in preventing waste o1 food.
 14. Exercise apparently reduced the percentage of fertility in the egg
 15. The percentage of fertility was highest with the early matched bullets and lowest with the old hens, though the results are not conclusive.
 16. The fertility of eggs averaging five days old was 300 per cent higher than of eggs averag ging twenty-five
 days old.
 IT. The results noted above were
 secured from what was considered 2