St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1909-06-05
CARE OF CHICKENS
BEST BREED NOT ALWAYS MOST
PROFITABLE.
Management and Care Essential Fea.
tures-GraduaI Decrease in Lay
ing of Hen After the
First Year.

The question as to which is the
| most profitable breed of fowls is very
| frequently asked me. There are un-
doubtedly differences in breeds, but
undue Importance should not be
| placed upon breed. The trap nest has
shown that there is more difference in
| individuals than in breeds. Breed is
not everything, says writer in At
| lanta, Constitution. You must keep
away from that idea in poultry keep
| ing. If one starts in the poultry bust
| ness with the best breed" as they
| believe, and has with it the notion
| that breed is everything, there will be
| inevitable failure. The breed may
| be all right, but the fowls must be
| encouraged to do their best by good
care and management. When eggs are
| steady at 80 cents a dozen and the
hens fail to respond, the owner is like
| ly to become unreasonable and take
up with another breed, and most like
| ly the fault was not in the breed. The
fault is usually one or two things;
| enther the hens are Of a poor or non
| productive strain of their breed, or
the management is poor.
It is point in management that /
| wish to write of here, one point of
many that may be taken into account
if poultry keeping is to be made a
success. 1t is question of the most
profitable age of the hen. Poultry
raisers who have kept in touch with
poultry Investigations during the past
few years are pretty well informed on
this point, but the Importance of the
subject is not yet generally appre-
ciated. To determine this fact, line
of experiments was conducted by sew
eral experiment stations with the OBJ
ject of determining the value of the
hen at different ages for egg produc-
ton. The same hens were kept year
after year under similar conditions,
and record was kept of production
and food consumed. These expert
ments proved that the hen is different
from the cow, which retains or i'm
proves her productivity with age The
first year was the most profitable, and
there was a gradual decrease in pro-
ductiveness each succeeding year. 1t
is safe to figure this decrease at Is
per cent. each year. With average
prices for food and for eggs, it is
not profitable to keep hens after they
have finished their second year of
laying. The first, or pullet year, is
very profitable, the second will give a
satisfactory profit, but during the
third year the egg yield will seldom
pay for the food consumed.
It is safe to say that poultry rails
ers of the south would be many thou
sands of dollars in pocket by vigor-
ously killing off the hens every two
years and replacing them with new
stock-with exceptions noted above.
When pullets and hens are allowed to
run together it will be necessary to
mark them, otherwise it will be diff
cult to separate the old stock from the
young when it is desired to market
them. The usual method of marking
is to punch hole in the web be-
tWeen the toes when the chicks are
Matched. This is easily and quickly
done with a punch, that may be pur-
chased from poultry supply houses for
Is cents. A number of different mark
ings may be made in this way. Cut
ing off one toe nail is another good
way of marking chicks.l Do this when
chicks are first Matched and before
the first feed.
The above suggestion is timely, as
the Matching season will be over by
latter part Of May, and it is useless
expense carrying over lot of old hens
another year. Dispose of them be-
fore they begin to moult, giving their
room and feed to the youngsters COM
ing on.