Republican news item. [volume] (Laport, Pa.) 1896-19??, 1899-03-23
Old Hens for Mothers.

While the chief use OF the hen is to
lay eggs and to furnish poultry for the
table, it must not be forgotten that
this is only part of the original de-
sign which must not be entirely SUI
perseded by inventions like the incu
bator. Thi. latter may do where
thousands of young fowls have to be
grown for broilers. Not enough hens
could be secured in brooding condi
ton to meet this demand, especially
as it is largest when the natural i'm
pulse of every hen is to lay more eggs
and not to become mother. Hence
the incubator is, and always will be,
necessity. But we hate to think of
the life of an incubator-h Matched
chicken that is to grow up and live for
years perhaps, and never hear the sound
of the hens familiar ''cluck." It will
practically grow up without any rela-
tions, the most desolate kind of an or
phan. There are thousands of farmers
who keep hens who do not care to
grow mere chickens than their own
hens can hatch We would advise all
such, in thinning off their hocks of
poultry, to save a few old hens to
hatch out the chickens needed for next
year. The old hens won't lay many
eggs. Probably their egg supply has
been mostly exhausted But they
will be all the more interminable sit
tiers because of this. Give tuem the
eggs of the most prolific egg producers
of the flock, for these will make the
best layers. Most people encourage
the brooding habit among their focks
by allowing hens that are nearly past
laying to steal a nest, lay ten or Il
dozen eggs and hatch them out. OF
course, he old hen is awfully proud OF
these chicks, which she knows are all
her own, as only her own eggs are i'll
the nest. But the chickens of these
old hens will take after their mother
in laying few eggs, and then quickly
becoming broody. 1t is by the con.
traly policy, breeding from eggs laid
by fowls that have little inclination to
set, that the best breeds of egg pro-
ducers were probably originally pro-
duced. The same policy continued
will largely increase egg production.
Poultry is kept for several distinct
purposes and has breeds adapted to
each, and as we have just shown, in
the same breed both the young and
the old fowl have their separate uses.
These should so far as possible be
kept distinct, and each individual fowl
be put to the wsrk it is best fitted for.
Possibl.' the OIL fowls kept for sitters
will nct lay Q ough eggs to pay their
keep. But ney Will save the time of
Young hens, which when they try to
sit can he very easily broken up, or
would probably break themselves up
and go to laying again. Generally
when pullet wants to sit she will
leave the nest some morning after the
eggs are spoiled, thus losing not only
her own time but the setting of eggs
also, as after the germ has once been
started it is easily killed by being eX-
posed to the cold. 1t is very easy to
break pullet from sitting. Keep her
somewhere few days where she can
receive no attentions from the male,
and where there is no chance for hel
to make nest. Feed her with whole
wheat and some milk curd, and keep
fresh, clean water always where she
can get at it. The sitting is really
fever, and the pullet that wants to sit
should have its bill dipped in water
several times each day, so as to oblige
it to drink. With this treatment and
food for three or four days, or even
less, more eggs will be brought for
ward to the period when they need to
be elected, and then you might try tc
tie the hen on the nest with her eggs,
but you could not even then make her
sit aud hatch them into chicks. Even
the hens two years old are not fit for
mothers if they are of egg producing
breeds. We have had such hens de.
sert their chicks when less than
month old, and begin to lay another
setting of eggs. Not warned by pre-
vious experience, they thought they
wanted to hatch these only. This ex-
pertinent in letting young hens hatch
nest of eggs had cost too much al
rcady. y.-4merican Cultiyator.