The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-03-04
DANES HAVE PLAN TO BEAT MIDDLE MANS EXPLORATION
Thrifty Europeans Scheme to Buy at Bottom of Market and Sell Commodities
 at Top Prices
By FRANK G. CARPENTER

the Pilgrims were climbing out of the Mayflower onto Plymouth Rock, and the people of Denmark were practically slaves, I write of an egg.
 It is a big egg, a fresh egg, and moreover an egg of pure gold. It is not however. the golden egg thrown into fiction by that Danish creator of fairies, Hans Christian Andersen. That egg was laid by goose. This is laid by hen. l do not know whether she is a black Langshan. a Minorea, a Leghorn, or white Wyandottee, but she is one of the eighteen million hens, each of which keeps dropping into the pockets of the Danes from two hundred to two hundred and fifty eggs every year. I have already described how these farmers, by cooperation, have elim- mated the middle man in their buy ing. In this letter l would write something of their thousands of CO., operative associations which elim- mate the middleman in their selling. giving them the highest cash prices for all they produce,
 The Helpful Hen.
 We shall first visit the Helpful Hen in her home. She laid last year for export more than six hundred million eggs in addition to those consumed here in Denmark. and she has increased her annual product more than one-third since 1914. There are now something like sixty thousand chicken farmers belonging to the Egg Export Association, who raise their chickens according to rule and ship the product in common. They are combined into more than five hundred local societies, to which Ia cept those used on their tables, and to which each pays fine of one dol lar and thirtyeight cents every time he slips in bad one. The constitu- tion of each society provides that the members collect the eggs daily from the nests and deliver them weekly, more than seven days old. Each so- ciety is numbered, and the number must be stamped on each egg so that every bad egg can be traced back to the farm and almost to the nest in which it was laid. The result is that the eggs sold are uniformly good, and command the highest price on the market.
 Along about two generations ago one could buy two eggs for cent here all the year through. A little later steamers began to run. direct from Copenhagen to England, and these cheap Danish eggs found favor there. Shortly after our Civil War. one million eggs were exported. and they brought eight thousand dollars Within twenty years the number had multiplied one hundred times, and last year the exports ircluded more than 62l million eggs which netted seven or eight cents apiece. Today Dansh eggs are used all over Eng land. and millions go to other coun- tries as we'll
 Danish Chicken Farm.
 During my automobile travels over Denmark, l have visited the chicken farms. Their owners combine this business with the raising of grain and root crops which are always fed to the cattle and pigs. The chickens are kept in yards, surrounded by high fences or wire closely woven Each pen Is about 50 feet square It Is carpeted with grass, and in it's center is a little red henhouse made of boards, about six feet in height, six feet wide and eight feet long. This contains roosts and nests. It has number upon 1t. and by this number the chickens within are re- corded in the stock books of the farm. Each pen contains a rooster and perhaps one dozen hens. and every ten has a little metal anklet about her right leg upon which is stamped her number so that the farmer can tell exactly to what ex- tent she Is earning her living. The chickens are fed on grain and chop ped feed. They have also cook ed po- tatoes and tankage, and just the right proportion of crushed bone to supply the lime for egg shells The business is carefully studied and the best breeds are chosen. One of the farmers I visited tells me his best layers are the white Leghorns. all though he keeps also Plymouth Rocks. white Wyandottes. black Langshans. and Mnorcas.
 Egg Export socie1y.
 Here at Hillerod I have visited the packing establishment of one of the egg export societies. It is long low, one-story building filled with cases of eggs, each egg in it's little pasteboard compartment like those used for shipping eggs in the United States. These cases come In from the farms. As soon as they arrive, the eggs are taken out by young women and laid on network of woven wire fitted into the top of barrel over two incandescent light globes of one hundred candle power. The room is dark, except for these globes. and the powerful light shines through the eggs, showing the least age or defect. Every egg which has not a translucent red color is taken out, those which are not perfect are set aside by themselves. If they are bad they are destroyed, and the farmer Is fined s1.38 per egg. Some nf hn nrfn e.. pickling. which means that they are packed away in vats of lime water. which serves the same purpose as cold storage. enabling them to be sold as picllled eggs during the win ter. After candling, the good eggs are sorted according to size and packed in excelsior. First comes a layer of excelsior and then a layer of eggs. followed by another of excelsior and another of eggs until they fill the box, which is about two feet wide, ono foot high and perhaps five feet in length. The eggs are
 sold by the pound or by the score, and not by the dozen as with us. They are sometimes packed in small cases of 16 pounds each. They are
 then ready for shipment to England.
 The manager of the society tells
 me he can easily decide the approxi-
 mate age of an egg by it's appearance over the electric light. He showed
 me how, in perfectly fresh egg. the yolS lies in the center, and how each egg contains little pocket of air
 which he says Is placed there by the Lord to give breath to She baby
 chicken before it expands Us lungs
 in the open. After the egkj attains an age of week or SO th1 yolk Is
 apt to leave the center nd drop
 down to the side of the sNell' and
 there are other indication which
 show the number of days since the egg left the hen.
 Tn n Cooperative Creamery.