The daily morning journal and courier., 1904-04-02
HENS MUST LAY NOW.
MAINE SCIENTISTS HATE PRO-
 DUCED

Winter-Laying Fowl Experiment. shows That Eggs Can he Produced
 During the Months of Frost-wyan-
 dotte Can Lay Two Hundred aud
 Nineteen Eggs Year.
 From the old-time haphaxzard meth ods of the farmers wife or children to acquire pocket money by raising chick ems for the market or bullets for the production of eggs, the poultry busi- ness within a comparatively brief per iod has developed into one of the most profitable of farming industries. And it has passed the fad phase, which a few years ago urged fanciers to breed for such curious characteristics as bulk, feathers, comb ear-lobs and wavy cas- cades of top knots adornment.
 Experiment has determined that with proper care good layers can be coaxed to produce eggs during the months of frost, when prices are high, and breeding has been developed to such nicety that good all-the-year- round egg providers can be propagated quite as successfully SIS dogs or horses are bred for points or speed. Time was when hens were not expected to produce during the season of snow, but 1 the best of breeds known to the indus l try to-day would just as steadily re- 1 fuse to lay where they neglected as were the farm hens of twenty years I ago.
 l But things have changed. Investga- tors have inquired into the why's and wherefores of the hen with very satis- | flying results. They have discovered I that the well bred hen is quite compe- tent and gladly willing to repay with profit for generous and intelligent 1 treatment both summer and winter. Those who know how to conduct the business of poultry farming are mak- l ing money, and as the demand for eggs and broilers will never be less the out look in that line of farm endeavor is most encouraging.
 l Breeding for fancy fowl alone is an interesting fad, but there is little or no l profit in it. The city man with q com- | fortable income who goes to his coun- l try home for the summer can well af- l ford to strive for peculiar character istics in chickens for his friends to gaze in wonder at, but such birds plucked do not appeal stronger to the market man than yellow skinned one of a l less expensive breed. Of late years a great deal of attention has been devot- ed to the wheedling of hens by intel l ligent housing and good feeding into l laying when snow is on the ground and the mercury low. Such hens mean pro- l fit especially when the price, per dozen of eggs inflates to the, half dollar mark. l The success has been achieved by a great many breeders by exceedingly simple methods; but breeding for pro- \ fit layers, as speed in horses is bred for l by selection and survival of the fittest l is something new. It is too just a bit 1 startling, but it seems to be quite as logical as breeding for desired charac-- teristics in other animals.
 For several years Professor Gilbert M. Gowell, head of the stock breeding and poultry department of the Maine agricultural experiment station, an ad- junct of the state university in Orono T lIctO dCfQlEu q Cett 1Sscii VI dttCilCltol to this phase of the poultry industry The professor believes that there is pro- fit in the poultry business, but not as | it is conducted in connection with other work on the farm. It is a large field ! but in order to be successful in it one must make it a speciality, must know the science and art of incubation breeding and egg producing. These are the results of study and experiment
 In November, 1898, Professor Gowel began tests for the purpose of procur ing data relative to the egg production of hens and also by selection and care full mating to improve the quality ant increase the number of eggs produced It was decided to study individuals a: well as hocks, and to do this with ex- aetness the everyday performance o each individual bird should be known Fifty-two traps were devised. There were so arranged that when hen en tered to lay she could not get out unti released by an attendant, and as eacl bird was tagged a record could thus b. easily kept of what she did Thirteei pens were provided for the test. The. were 10x16 feet in size. Four trap nest. twenty bullets and two cockerels wer, placed in each pen on the first day O November, and daily egg records were kept with each individual bird for year. With some of the largest yield
 CTS the records were continued int, succeeding years.
 At the end of the first twelve months the birds that had yielded 200 or nor
 eggs of good shape size and colo
 were selected for foundation stock, up
 on which, with the additions made t, them in succeeding years of birds O
 similar quality, the breeding operation
 were to be based. Professor Gowel
 went ahead on the theory that the law
 of inheritance and transmission are a
 true with birds as with horses ant
 dogs, sheep and COWS, and he could SC
 no obstacle in the way of breeding fo
 egg production He was confident tha
 by breeding only from those birds tha
 were themselves good producers h
 cold get a strain of first-rate layers
 At the outset he made known that h
 was not trying to produce stock tha
 would yield an average for each Dir
 of 200 eggs per year. but to get strai that would average better than usua
 If by furnishing the male bird
 which were are raising to poultryme
 and farmers,' he said, 'the averag
 egg yield of the hens of the state sha
 be increased to the extent of one dog
 en per bird, the value and importanc