The Butte inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1901-1912, 1901-06-28

Perhaps you don't know that hens
won't lay enough eggs here in Montana
to even perpetuate their kind" he went
on, "but it's fact. If it We're not for
the eggs imported from other states, ev-
cry year-high priced, blue blooded eggs
that cost you like champagne or dia-
monds-there would be enough chickens
in the state to feed a single darkey
preacher over Sunday. Something Is
wrong. Perhaps it Is the altitude; per-
haps the hens have formed union to
limit production and keep up prices. Or
perhaps a good many things that we
couldn't we'll guess. But hens don't lay.
For my own part. believe it is the re-
suit of a tradition among 'em that the
first hens in the state, in the old placer
mining days, used to scratch up so much
gold, which, being found in their crops.
led to their wholesale slaughter, and IN
self-protection the tribe solemnly pledg-
ed to swear off work rather than lose
their lives by over industry. At any
rate, my first flock Of hens. over in Alder
Gulch, lost their heads through over pro-
duction of gold. and I still have some
of the gold in bottle at home.
However,, I am drifting somewhat
from the subject 1t is curious fact
that not one-half of the eggs sold in
the state for table use are home prod
uct They come into Butte and the cities
by the carload, from Iowa, Missouri and
almost every other state in the west. on
can import the finest breeds, winners
of countless prizes in egg producing tests
in other states. and when they get to
Montana they might as we'll be China
1T, fo~
! lar and systematic laying goes. They
won't do it, that's all. If l had all the
money have spent in incubators, brood
ers, hens, patent foods, fences and grain
7 should have enough to endow a public
library I was determined to learn the
secret. But it is as elusive as will-'o-
! the-wisp.
"And 1 am not alone in the failure. You
may talk of the old-fashioned fisher
man. the boy who uses pin-hook, q
willow pole and an angle worm, and who
catches three times as many trout a.
. the angler with all the new tangled
apparatus; and it may be true that hi
will.
You may apply the same theory tt
hens and believe that the good old
ia shioned lady. with her old-fashionei
hen hatchery, and bright colored apron
to scare away the hawks and cats from
the brood of yellow little balls that arr
bound to follow in the wake of the ex
ultant hen mother that has been allow
ed to take natures course and raise
her young in the old way-you ma,
believe that she has better way thar
incubators and that she will have UNI
varying success. But she doesn't. It.!
in the air. and failure is as sure il
chicken raising in Montana as mining
is in the clouds. The state agriculture
college has racked its brains until the!
are tagged out, in an effort to solv'
the mystery, but it is still ahead o
them.
IF you want eggs, it will be we'll t,
buy them in the market. instead of try
ing to raise them in the back yard. I
will be money in your pocket if you will
take a handful Of gold pieces and throw
them down into the deepest abandoned
mine or shaft YOU can find, and thel
abandon the chicken raising thought
wish I had done that before trying TO
so long to accomplish the impossible"