POULTRY NOTES.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 389, 22 October 1903, Page 5

POULTRY NOTES.

EGG-LAYING HINTS.

(From " Commercial Poultry,")

There are two ways to perfect a laying strain.

One is to use trap nests and breed only from hens that show large egg production. This is no doubt the quickest way, but it is only practical where but few hens are tested and the owner has time to take care of the nest. That the trap nest has a great future before it no one doubts, but its usefulness is confined to comparatively small flocks or to pens containing a few birds. The other way to accomplish the desired end is to adopt the methods pursued by dairymen. This is to feed their cows heavily, and thus promote a greater production of milk. . Their female progeny become better milkers, and gradually the characteristic becomes inherent, and with each generation becomes more pronounced, until a race of heavy milkers is produced. The same course has been followed by the egg farmers of America. They feed their pullets from the day they are hatched, with a view to inducing early maturity and greater egg production than would have been pos« sible with ordinary care. Each succeeding year the year-old hens are sold and the pullets brought into service, and each year early maturity and productiveness become more and more characteristic of the flock, until a strain is produced that is very prolific. In order to build up a laying strain in this way a plentiful supply of feed of the proper kind must be provided. Health must be promoted by scrupulous cleanliness. Comfortable houses must be built and maintained. In the end the flock cared for in this way become know as an egg-lay-ing strain, and specimens sell for a high price. A strain of of this kind is not made in a year, but it does not take so long as to make it a discouragingly tedious operation. Each year improvement will be noticed, and each year the breeder who is working along this line will betterunderstand what it is necessary for him to do in order to reach the high mark he is aiming at. The making of an egg-laying strain is no secret. Its only drawback is that it is harder to select the best layers and at the same time keep the highest scoring birds than it would be to work with a single purpose in view. Sometimes a good layer wil not score high, and often a high-scoring bird is not the best layer in the flock. This makes it slower work than it would be to seek only one point of excellence, but he who perseveres to the end will be amply rewarded.

The hens of the United States during last year laid 16,000,000,000 eggs valued at £30,000,000. W It has (said Mr D Hyde, Government Poultry Expert,, at a meeting which he addressed in Marlborough, recently) been over and over again demonstrated by experiment that, upon the farm or small country estate, a hundred pounds of nice eatable poultry can be reared at much less cost than so many pounds of mutton, beef, or pork, while- it will - always bring twice the price, or more, per cwt than either of the other kinds of meat will command in the market.