POULTRY.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 15, 12 October 1907, Page 2

POULTRY.

MOTHER HEN. A chicken in ail egg arranges himself on tiic eighteenth day of incubation in snch a way as to bo able, to peck a hole in the "upper" side of tho shell. The mother hen, in some mysteriouswwaty t - knows this. If the chick ill the shell be turned down after getting ready to pick (says the "Minneapolis Journal") ho may not make tlio extra exertion to right, himself, though a strong chick will do so. If lie cracks the underside of tlio shell, the moisture of tlio shell will run "to the holo and stop it. Aftor tlio chick' has once breathed the raw air, lie will stifle or bo drowned in his own-mois-tare if the holo bo stopped. Ho'will also drown in his own moicturo if lie does not pick the shell at all. . The motlioi' hen,-therefore, keeps the shells (from the eighteenth day onwards 1 * right side up, and can toll by the sounds in tho shells after the chickens begin to rap.' Tho mind of tho lion is mightily apparent .or elso it is ! a ]} instinct. And what in instinct but spontaneous mind ?■ ■ . When tho mother hen hears that rapping on tho inside of tho shells, a mighty mother instinct'-rouses-in her and slio iB icady to fight anything and

everything, including, the rooster, at tho drop of the hat.' Her'feathers get all crinkly with excitement and she is full of smothered clucks' and mother love. This is where the chickens have tho advantage over their incubator brethren. The incubator does not mot-bet them. If you ; were going to be a chicken, which would you choose for a mother, an incubator or a hen ? Tho incubator may bo safer aud surer and does not step on you. More chickens, good, bad and indifferent, grow to henhood and roosferhood under the incubator plan, but tho incubator does not cluck at you and sing "Hush, my babe," at eventide, and you carmot hurry under its wings when danger is nigh. Give us the hen overy time. it is a strango thing that the hen knows how. She has never taken a courso in "domestic economy" nor attended a mother's club. Sho never read a paper on "humanised milk' before tho Hens' Federation, but she has mastered tho science of chickens,