Saturday news. (Watertown, S.D.) 19??-19??, 1910-12-02

DEP ARTMENT.
G H. Wa.hburn, Editor.

81 When we Rad the Poultry Depart
ment in last weeks issue, we wondered
if our readers would think we had been
trying to make hodge podge. Surely,
if there is such 9 thing as pieing para
graphs, ours we're pied with q vengeance.5
When we wrote them we thot they had
some sequence and sense. When we
read them after being printed they had
neither. 559
However, as mistakes happen With
the best OF people, we suppose editors
come in for their share. We will for
give it this time if it doesn't happen
again" a;
This is fine weather for the hens. Let
them run out and enjoy 1t while they
can-they will have to be shut up be-
fore long for the winter; and every day
that they can get out in the sunshine
now is putting them in better condition
to endure the confinement.
Have you any vegetables to feed the
hens while they can't get green food?
If not, yor had better get some alfalfa
meal. Put some in tight vessel. pour
hot water on it, cover it and let it
steam. Then when it is cool enough
feed some Of it to your birds and watch
them eat.
We were fortunate in having wagon
load Of unmarketable cabbage soft and
hursted heads. The hens thoroughly
enjoy 9 meal Of this once day.
Little potatoes either raw or cooked
make welcome change. So do cooked
carrots or raw beets. But cabbage they
Efgksh as a steady diet. If you didn't
save any this year, atie a string around
your finger" SO as not to forget it next
year. Lots of it goes to waste every
year, both in town and in the country.
Do you keep grit and oyster shells
! where your chickens can get them
whenever they want them? II you
think they don't need them, try putting
some where they can get them. That
is the sure way to find out. They
won't eat them unless they need them.
Grit is an absolute necessity in winter
and they need more or less Of it in sum-
mer.
/ Oyster shells are necessary, too. Il
you expect your hens to lay, you must
furnish the food they need to make the
. egg, and oyster shells is used by them
in making the egg shells. Il
1 Meat Of some kind is also necessary
Milk will partly take the place of meat
but not wholly. Ground bone, if one car
get it fresh, is fine. Cracklings are
good occasionally.
Charcoal is worth many times what
it costs, to keep before your birds al
the time. If they have it they win eat
lit when they need it, and many times
ward off disease by it's use.
1 OF grains, there are wheat. barley an6
speltz, that can be fed daily; and oats
corn, buckwheat if one has it, and mil
let may be fed two or three times {
week. q. Barley is better il hot water il
turned on it at night, then covered ane
let stand till morning. Turn off the
4 water and feed as morning feed.
It doesn't pay to feed one kind Of feee
4 exclusively. Experiment on yoursel
4 and eat buckwheat cakes twenty tive
I. times a week. We think about thu
4 25th OF December yon could do full
justice to Christmas dinner of eigh
or ten courses.
We learned to our sorrow that ami
mails will starye to death on one kind o
4 food.
We can show you bunch of chick.
| ems hatched IN April and May that arr
no nearer maturity now than june ant
4 July chickens ought to be. The ownej
I fed them on speltz exclusively with tht
result that he stnnted their growtl
1 and many Of them died. They wot1lt
i have all died had he not changed thei
diet.
Il Make trays in which you can spreat
A onts about an inch deep. Keep then
3 damp and quite warm. When th,
a sprouts are an inch long, feed them yThi
Isl 2 great egg producing feed.