POULTRY-KEEPING AND DIVERSIFIED FARMING.

Otago Witness, Issue 2511, 30 April 1902, Page 49

POULTRY-KEEPING AND DIVERSIFIED FARMING.

' This subject is ably discussed iv .the , Aiigust crop report of the Massachusetts I Board of Agriculture by John H. Robinson, oi Massachusetts, who says: — It has been a serious and too common error of poultry fauciers in recent years that I they have "made 'themselves TJoultrymen, and nothing more. Glairy have gone farther in the wrong way. and have tried to .make themselves specialists in a single branch of poultry-keeping. With a few notable exct-p- ' I tions, those who havo limited their efforts to I narrow special lines have not made their operations with poultry financially successful, i Single, beparate brartcheis of poultry "culture have rarely been made profitable as all-year-round exclusive oeupations. While it . is true that -many special poultry-growers liave succeeded with poultry, while .neglecting the crop -producing possibilities of their {arms and buying practically all food for their fowls, the experience of . thjose who grow a:part or all of their food convinces me ■ that suoh -a combination i& desirable. Poui-.-readily enters into combination with almost every branch of agriculture, and •the attempt to keep it separate does violence to its development along natural lines. A lar^e stock of fowl§ makes in the course of a yep.r a great deal of very valuable manure, the greater part of which is lost to the noultfy-Jcoeper. unless applied to crop-producing laud on the .rsame farm. The night droppings, whir-'n can easily be collected and kept in condition to nell, constitute but a small part of ;the manure anade. i Th© -most of it falls either on the earth floor ! of the poultry house or is deposited on the ' j ground outside Non° of the manure ia . I saleable, but -every bit of it can be ufciiißed. I Moreover, if it is not utilised, it will sooner or later "poison the land wherever deposits of 1 it are very abundant, making it unfit ior I poultry, and often causing disease and loss to such an -extent that the poultry ceases to jie profitable. To secure the beat .possible development of the growing clucks they must be given , good, clean range from the weaning age • until maturity. They will do well <on light sandy or gravelly soil that is washed -clean . of their droppings by -every heavy rain, or . on a field so full of bouklens that it can ' neither be tilled nor mowed, but the loss of manure under eiich condition* is consider- ■ able They do as well or bettor on good ' grn&. land. The most difficult matter to regulate, wheu poultry-keeping is eonibkied with other farm lines of work, is the labour. The key to the -problem i 3 found in the right combinations of farm methods and poulbrykeepinfj. Three things -will be -found of prime importance fa "bringing about this result: the hens must be kept in larger flocks than h uanal with the intensive method ; • the;- must be givcti more yard room, and • tire system of feedrnc must be such that feeding take as little time as possible Much less time- is reauired to care for 200 hens in two flocks of 100 oach than to care for the same number in flocks of 12 to 30 each One of the most "uccespful poultry farmers I know keep? 60t) to 700 hens in flocks of about 100 oaoh. each lot occupying its own house, but a" running in the same field. — American A"- turist.