How to raise chicks, including revision of facts about white diarrhoea

Front matter

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Foreword

|AISING the chicks has been named as the most difficult "poultry problem" and some poultrymen say that "everything else is easy." If one begins right, with well born chicks, chick rearing ought not to prove so very difficult. What is meant by beginning right?

For success the rearing of chicks should begin with the parent stock. You must have good healthy hatchable eggs in order to get good livable chicks. You can't get good healthy hatchable eggs unless you breed for health and manage for comfort. Select your breeding stock with great care to get the maximum of constitutional vigor; so manage and care for them that they will be comfortable, contented, and happy, and you will find them productive and possessing abundant vigor, vitality and health. These good and necessary qualities will prove an invaluable hereditary asset when the time comes for hatching eggs and rearing chicks.

In this book considerable space has been given to selection and mating of breeding stock, to care and management of breeders, to foods and the relation of fowls to food. I believe that a better understanding of these subjects will make it easier to solve the "problem" of how to raise chicks. It does not pay the farmer to sow poor seed. It will not pay the poultryman to produce poor seed eggs and weakling chicks by breeding, hatching and rearing from stock birds that are lacking in constitutional vigor. If you want strong sturdy chicks, full of health, vigor and vitality — the power to live — there is one safe and sure way to get them and that is to begin right with sound, well selected stock and breed for health.

Herein also will be found chapters on natural and artificial incubation and brooding, including the preparation of chick foods and care, feeding and management of chicks during growth, — all are presented with the object of helping the reader to success in chick rearing. My earlier booklet "Facts About White Diarrhoea" has been revised and largely rewritten and incorporated as a part of this book. The formula is given for a remedy which has been thoroughly tried for four years under a wide range of climates and conditions in the prevention and treatment of white diarrhoea and which has proved successful and satisfactory in the majority of cases reported.

It is hoped, friend Reader, that this book will help you to greater success in chick rearing, to more and better chicks and to greater comfort for the chicks themselves, — if it interests you and you profit by the advice herein given the book will be well worth while.

Prince T. Woods, M. D.

Dr. Woods' open-front, open-air poultry house as used by Wozelma Farms Producing Company in association with American Poultry Journal 's Experimental Plant, Silver Lake, Mass. This is a colony house for breeders, portable type, 10 ft. wide by 16 ft. deep and will accommodate a flock of fifty fowls. (Photo by John E. Zeller.)

Chapter I — SELECTING AND MATING BREEDING STOCK 11

Constitutional vigor necessary in breeding stock to secure "vitality in the chicks — Selection and care of the male bird — Selection of the females — Mating — Number of females to a male — The service — Fecundity vs. Sterility.

Chapter II— FOODS— VEGETABLE, ANIMAL AND MINERAL 21

What food is — Chief source of all food — How the plant grows — Food elements.

Chapter III— FOWLS AND FOOD 25

The living fowl and the life principle — The living cells — Chemistry of the fowl's body — Disposition of food varies with individuals — Variety of wholesome, palatable food is necessary — Balanced ration is desirable — Live food is needed — Digestion of food — Maintaining body temperatures — Exercise — Give the fowl a chance to balance its own ration.

Chapter IV— CARE AND MANAGEMENT OF BREEDERS 33

Housing — Foods and feeding — Hoppers and automatic feeders — Importance of comfort — Keep them healthy and happy — Well fed, healthy breeders managed for comfort yield hatchable eggs.

Chapter V— EGGS FOR HATCHING 49

Selection of eggs — Sex of eggs — Fertility — Gathering and keeping eggs — Time eggs may be kept — Period of incubation.

Chapter VI— INCUBATION— NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL 55

How to get good hatches with hens — How to get good hatches with incubators — How to test eggs during incubation — Simple home-made egg tester.

Chapter VII— BROODING CHICKS WITH HENS AND WITH BROODERS. 71 How to brood chicks with hens — Brood coops for ben and chicks — ■ Let chicks range but keep the hen confined — How to brood chicks in brooders — Small heated brooders — Fireless brooders — Comfort a better guide to the right temperature than a thermometer — Patience needed in teaching chicks.

Chapter VIII— CHICK FOODS AND FEEDING CHICKS 89

Home-made chick food, how prepared — Freshly prepared foods best — Commercial foods — Cooked food — Live food — Other necessaries.

Chapter IX— GROWING CHICKS 97

Weaning chicks — Colony coops and range — Changes in rations — Growing for stock birds and layers — Chicks for market.

Chapter X— FACTS ABOUT WHITE DIARRHOEA 107

What white diarrhoea is — Symptoms of the disease — Causes — Is there more than one form? — Has germ of specific disease been found? — Contagion — Prevention — Treatment — Formula for a simple remedy which has proved effective in many eases in many climates for four years.

CHAPTER 1. Selecting and Mating Breeding Stock

~~\0 BE SUCCESSFUL in breeding poultry, you must start right, get a lasting, solid foundation. Breed for health of future generations of fowls by beginning now to select your breeding stock for physical soundness, vitality, constitutional vigor — in a word — health. Keep them healthy by good housing, good food, good care and good management. Get common sense into your poultry keeping.

Breed for health if you wish to have and produce healthy chicks. Feed, house and manage for health if you would keep your stock healthy. Don't sow poor seed. You would not expect a good crop from poor seed corn. Remember that the hatching eggs are your poultry seed. You cannot get good seed eggs from stock that does not possess health — constitutional vigor. Without good seed eggs you cannot get good chicks.

The breeding stock is the foundation of your poultry business, the life of your undertaking and the source of the seed eggs from which you intend to produce chickens. You must have abundant constitutional vigor in the breeding stock to get vitality in the chicks. What is vitality? Vitality is the possession of vital force. The power to live and thrive.

Unless the breeding birds are sound and in the best possible condition for the reproduction of their kind, satisfactory results in hatchable eggs and sturdy chicks cannot be obtained. Condition has been said to be more than half the battle in winning prizes in the show room. Physical condition is the whole thing in the breeding pen and without this foundation to build on your strain will be without value. Eggs from healthy, sound, well-fed parent stock will hatch strong, sturdy chicks, full of vitality, often even under what are considered quite unfavorable conditions. Chicks from such stock are not subject to chicken ailments and do not become victims of "white diarrhoea." As one breeder said, "get the right sort of chicks and it will take a lot of abuse to kill 'em; they are born to live."

Eggs from breeding stock that is out of condition, either from abuse of inbreeding, unsanitary surroundings, improper food, sickness or other causes, will never produce chicks that are worth the trouble it takes to hatch and rear them. When chicks die in the shell, are slow to hatch, or die off in large numbers within ten days after hatching, don't lay the trouble all to faulty incubation; investigate the breeding stock. With good eggs, incubation may be, and often is, at fault; but in very many cases the eggs are not good and the breeding stock is all wrong. Oftentimes you will get an exceptional hatch only to find that the chicks die off like sick flies in the first ten days. Here again, investigate the breeding stock; errors of incubation may have been the cause, but it is quite possible that the exceptional hatch was simply an indication that nature was trying to provide against extinction, because of lack of constitutional vigor in the breeding stock. Abuse sometimes results in remarkable "provisional fecundity," though the efforts of nature may be futile.

To investigate the breeding stock, go over the birds carefully to learn their physical condition. Select and mate them up again as at the beginning of the season. Look carefully into the housing, care and feeding of the breeding stock. You will find in many cases that the cause lies with the stock or their management. When you find the cause you can prevent further trouble by avoiding or removing the cause. Breed for health if you wish to produce and have healthy chicks. Peed, house and manage for health if you would keep your stock healthy. Remember the three "C's" essential to health and success with your flock — cleanliness, comfort and contentment. Cleanliness of food, houses, yards and furnishings. Comfort and contentment for the flock because of good care, good food, good housing and good management.

The Male Bird. — In many particulars what is essential in a breeding male is equally necessary in the breeding female, for convenience we will consider these under this head and simply refer to them when treating of the section of female breeders.

From the breeding standpoint the male is half of the pen; i. e., you depend upon him to fertilize the eggs laid by all the hens with which he is mated. For this reason, whatever else you do, you cannot afford to be careless or indifferent in your selection of the cock or cockerel which is to head the pen. He should be as near perfection in constitutional vigor, physical soundness, health, as it is possible for you to judge. He must be carefully watched to see that he is capable of performing well the duty to which he is assigned. The eggs from his pen should be incubated and tested at home before any are sold for hatching. Failure to observe these rules is fatal to good results.

The male should be a good standard breeding specimen of the variety which he represents, but above all else he should be physically sound. Inferior or unhealthy male birds have no place whatever in the breeding pen. Never breed from a bird that has had or has apparently recovered from any serious illness. It is always difficult to determine whether a cure is complete or not, and whether there remains taint or chronic trouble.

In selecting a male bird to head the breeding pen, choose one that is well matured; i. e., full grown and well filled out in size and fully furnished as to plumage. He should be of good size for the variety, but not overlarge for the females. He should be broad-backed, deep, full-breasted, with stout, good-sized legs, thighs well set apart and no tendency to a "knock-kneed" appearance at the hock joints; good carriage and symmetry, well-formed comb and wattles, neither too large nor too small and of a bright, healthy red; keen, sharp, bright eyes, a bit full and somewhat egg-shaped as to curve of eye lens when viewed from the rear; a well-shaped, stout beak of medium length, the whole head being well proportioned to the body and carried in a manner that gives the bird an alert, active, aggressive, businesslike appearance. He should be in the best possible condition physically and capable of taking his place as head of the pen and holding it against all comers. His plumage should be bright and well kept, legs and feet clean and free from swellings and scale mites.

Do not breed from any male or female, no matter how good or how perfect it may be in standard points, that shows the following faults which indicate unsoundness: Crow-head and hawk bill, crooked breast bone, roach-back or other deformity, knock knees, small, thin shanks for the variety; badly rumpled plumage, lacking in luster and which seems to be inclined to turn the wrong way; shortness of breath on running or jumping or after service; pale face and comb or discolored face and comb; much rattling in throat; foul discharge from the vent; blue-green or grass-green stain from droppings on plumage below vent; vertigo (dizziness) ; violent and frequent shaking of head with a tendency to step backward or to one side; staggering or wabbling gait; jerking walk like "string halt"; paralysis of any kind; bunches of foreign growths on any part of body; emaciated, debilitated condition; leg weakness; foot, hock or wing ulcers, swellings or abscesses; deformities of any kind; or any other symptom of physical unsoundness or disease.

Examine the mouth and throat carefully and discard the bird if the mucous membrane is unhealthy. Simple canker may be cured, but if it is obstinate, and will not yield to simple remedies, better choose another bird that is not so affected. Note carefully the condition of the legs. If they feel hot and dry, look closely for other symptoms of disease. Hot, dry or withered feet and legs means that there is something wrong with the bird. It is a sure sign. Scaly leg is a parasitic disease and does not necessarily disqualify the bird for breeding. It is easily cured, and should be before the bird is placed in the breeding yard.

Don't breed a male lacking in constitutional vigor. Breeding from an unsound male is sure to result in trouble and disappointment later; either he will not fertilize the eggs at all or you will get weak germs and weak chicks. Weak germs are often the cause of chicks dying at all stages of development during incubation and for several days after hatching. There is also always the possibility and probability that chicks from such source, if they live, will inherit some tendency to disease which will result in losses, direct or indirect, by continuance of the inherited taint from an unsound body. It often takes years of careful breeding and management to uproot evil of that sort. Breed healthy males only and keep them healthy.

Care of the Male Bird. — Test the male by "flirting" him with other males in the presence of females. If he is aggressive and full of fight and does not develop any of the disqualifying faults named above he will probably make a good breeder. If he is cowardly and disposed to play the craven I would not advise using him to breed from. Cowardice in the cock usually indicates that he has been badly whipped at some time, or it may indicate that he is from stock that has been inbred too closely. Game fanciers who breed "pit" stock for fighting purposes will tell you that several generations of incestuous breeding will result in stags that are "quitters" and disposed to run after the first few blows are struck. A little "trying out," without allowing harm done, will often prove a better test of wind, lungs and heart action than any other method of trying the bird.

When you get a good, healthy male bird try to keep him in good condition. If he is attentive and gallant as he should be during the breeding season, he may easily get out of condition. Avoid this by removing him from the flock occasionally and feed a few tid-bits of fresh, sweet meat (cooked or uncooked), fresh, green food and a mixture of hard grains. You will run no risk by keeping him for a day or two away from the hens in a comfortable coop, where he is out of sight and sound of the females, and it may save him from wasting his energies in useless service. This is quite important, for an active, gallant and attentive male, when running with his flock, often does not eat a sufficient amount of food to keep him in good order. A little attention given to supplying him with occasional meals away from his harem will be well repaid in the results gained from a valuable breeding bird. Keeping the male bird with the hens will not insure strongly fertile eggs unless he is well cared for, and kept in good breeding condition. Too many breeders overlook this matter or fail to consider it of sufficient importance.

Do not pen the breeding male up with other males in a flock where there are no females, it leads to bad habits or injury far more harmful than continuous running with a flock of hens. I believe that a good many excellent breeding males have been ruined in this way. Young males develop better and make better breeders when brought up with females and always allowed to run with them. So kept they are less liable to become sterile and as a rule make better all around breeders. The reverse seems to be true of pullets, they usually develop better, make better growth and give better results as breeders and layers when not subjected, during their period of growth from eight weeks to maturity, to the over-attentiveness and nagging of a lot of husky young male birds. Raise your pullets in a poultry convent, if you can, but don't try the monastic method of mangement for cockerels.

If necessary to take the male bird away from the female do not keep him away from them for too long a time, a few days each month for a little change and vacation are enough, except during the moult when he will be better off for a pen and run by himself until well feathered.

The Female. — The female breeders should be selected with as great care as the male. Where the requisites for selection of the male will apply to both sexes they apply to the females. Health and a sound body should be the first consideration. Constitutional vigor is as necessary in the female as in the male. Size and shape is the next consideration and then standard requisites for a good breeder. To a large extent the size and shape of the female parent governs the size and shape of the progeny, though it does not hold true in all cases. Choose well-grown, fully-matured females for breeders. Do not use birds that have had serious sickness. Choose good layers rather than exceptional ones. Prolific layers are more liable to produce infertile eggs than ordinary good layers, chiefly because of the greater number of eggs they produce and inattention on the part of the male, as he is less attentive to females that have been long established in laying, as a rule.

The breeding female should have a broad, deep body for the variety, legs of good size and well set apart, tail well spread at base; alert, active and busy; with bright plumage; bright eyes, a bit full; comb and face bright and of good, healthy red color; and other essentials of a healthy bird mentioned in description of desirable qualities in male.

Unhealthy hens, or hens which have been sick, have no place in the breeding pen. The faults mentioned above as disqualifying males for breeding should also bar females from the breeding pen and, in addition to those faults already mentioned, no female should be bred that habitually lays misshapen or deformed eggs, or eggs containing blood clots. Hens broken down behind, or those having abdominal tumors, which cause abdomen to drag on the ground, should not be used in the breeding pen.

The use of trap nests is an invaluable aid in the selection of breeding females and in detecting sterile hens. Some hens seldom produce eggs that will hatch and from one cause or another are practically sterile. Such birds should not be permitted in the breeding pen. The men with the most experience in practical poultry work are not disposed to believe in any certain "egg type" that will indicate prolific layers. The good layers usually come in about all of the many types to be found in all varieties. The only sure means of determining which hens pay as breeders is to trap nest, keep an individual egg record and a hatching record.

Mating. — It is conceded that it is necessary to inbreed in order to secure the best results in fancy points. Some breeders go so far as to say that it is quite necessary to inbreed to secure utility values, like heavy laying and quick growing meat. I beg to doubt this last and will have to be shown. Introduction of new blood (crossing) usually stimulates egg production and promotes quick and good growth in the offspring of the cross. If it is true that inbreeding brings constant improvement in utility values, then why do so many practical men who grow for market show a preference for first crosses? Again, why is it that so many strains that have been subjected to incestuous breeding for generations do not show improvement in utility values, but are often found lacking in size, less vigorous, often sterile, and why should there be a tendency for their eggs to come smaller also? I have repeatedly found breeders who complain of such faults in closely inbred strains.

Where you must inbreed, be sure that the breeding birds are possessed of abundant constitutional vigor and let the relationship be as distant between the breeders as is consistent with obtaining the results you are working for. A noted pigeon fancier, who has bred a lot of good ones the past thirty years, told me that he had to inbreed very carefully and that he had always kept a record of all of his birds from the start and could know the relationship by reference to his records. He had found that too close inbreeding prpijuced undesirable results, loss of vigor, "idiocy" (and he showed me some pigeon "idiots" to prove his claim — they surely looked and acted the part), less resistance to disease, diseases of the nervous system and liability to "fits." He considered breeding brother to sister the most harmful form of incestuous breeding and stated that he had proved to his own satisfaction that it was not wise to breed closer relationships than uncles, aunts and second, third and fourth (or more distant) cousins. If this is true in pigeon breeding, why is it not true also in poultry breeding?

In mating up the pens avoid, so far as possible, using males and females possessing the same or similar faults (this is particularly necessary where inbreeding is practiced), as where the faults are similar on both male and female sides of pen there is more liability of a tendency to possess these faults in the progeny.

As a general rule, the best results in hatchable eggs and livable chicks will be obtained by mating fully matured, healthy cockerels with healthy yearling or two-year-old hens; or by mating a strong, vigorous, healthy yearling or two-year-old male and fully matured, well-grown, healthy pullets. Under such conditions there will be no cause for worry about the eggs producing weakling or imperfect chicks. Birds that are not full grown (fully matured) should not be bred. It is seldom advisable to breed birds that are more than thirty months old at the beginning of the breeding season.

Number of Females to a Male. — The number of females which may be successfully mated with a cock or cockerel depends largely upon conditions and upon the male bird. Commonly, ten females to a male is considered a sufficient number for a cock and fifteen for a cockerel. Some males will not properly care for half that number and some will serve well twice as many. Often a male, which in confinement would not give any too good results with a dozen hens, will easily serve twenty-five or thirty hens when on free range, with good results.

The number of hens a male should have also depends a good deal on how many of them are laying and how recently they began to lay. Test the eggs often by incubating them, for it is the only way to determine the result of the mating.

The Service. — The service is the "covering" of the females by the male, which should result in fertilization of the eggs. After the introduction of a male to the flock it is possible to obtain eggs in a few days that will hatch chicks of his get — though, if another male has preceded him, it may be two weeks (possibly longer) before all eggs can be safely credited as fertilized by the male last introduced.

How soon or how long after service impregnation of the egg takes place is not known. It is probable that it may occur as early as within 16 to 24 hours after service, but it is certain that a much longer time often does elapse between the act of service and actual impregnation of the ovum. The sperm of the male is capable of living a long time in the oviduct, under favorable conditions, remaining active and possessing full power to impregnate any ripe nonfertilized ovum with which it comes in contact. Where crosses have been made it has been found that the character of the fluids moistening the lining of the duct undoubtedly vary in chemical properties in different varieties, so that, for example, the sperm of a Game might not live as long, or find conditions so favorable, in the oviduct of a Rock or Orpington as it would in that of a Game female, with the result there might be less fertile eggs produced. In some cases the reverse of those conditions might exist.

It has been proved by many experiments that one service, under favorable conditions, will often suffice to fertilize the majority of eggs laid from the second day thereafter for a period of two weeks. Some observers claim that one service is sufficient for one month, providing the hen is just starting to lay her litter at the time of serving.

From this it follows that it is not necessary to waste the strength of a valuable male bird in promiscuous and useless service. Where a breeder possesses a particularly fine male from which he desires to obtain the greatest number of chicks possible, he could be made to care for a very considerable flock by mating him only with birds about to begin their lay; or by dividing the layers into several flocks and permitting the male to run a few days twice a month with each flock, giving him a brief interval of rest and good care between, he could be made to cover a very large number of females.

It is quite practicable to keep a particularly fine breeding cock "at stud," as is common with other domestic animals and to bring females to him for service at regular intervals, say, once a week, or even every two weeks, always endeavoring to have the hen well served when about to begin her lay.

Fecundity versus Sterility. — It is often stated that the prolific layer after producing a considerable number of eggs is prone to become sterile, or that a large number of her eggs come infertile. Without doubt this is a fact, yet the fault does not necessarily lie with the hen. Often it can be proved that it is not the fault of the hen by giving her a new mate, when, as a rule, her eggs will again come a good per cent fertile.

This is, in part, explained by the fact easily observed, but to date mentioned by very few writers on the subject (Mr. E. Cook, author of "Incubation," published in England, was one of the first to give this explanation), that the male when introduced into a flock of hens is soon surrounded by the layers or those about to begin laying and that he is usually particularly attentive to those near laying or lately become productive, while those hens which have been laying some time or which are unproductive are more or less neglected.

Failure to serve these prolific mates sufficiently often, and the fact that the male usually has his favorites in the flock, is in a large measure responsible for the proportion of infertile eggs produced. With prolific layers, there being more eggs produced, it is reasonable to expect that more eggs will escape impregnation, not because of lack of vigor (though that may enter into it in some cases), but often for the same reason that grass seldom grows on a well traveled road.

Where the service is frequent, eggs which escape fertilization in the first service may become fertilized by the second or any succeeding service. This explains why it is possible for a hen to lay eggs which produce chicks having the characteristics of more than one sire, although one of the parent males has been allowed to run with the flock but a short time. For example: If cock No. 1 has served a hen at the beginning of her lay and cock No. 2 be then introduced for service his seed will be likely to impregnate eggs which escaped the service of No. 1 (or the most active sperms of either may do the work), with the result that a part of the eggs in this hen's litter produce chicks that are the get of No. 1 and the balance the get of No. 2.

Some birds of both sexes are absolutely sterile — incapable of reproduction. This may result from many causes, but chiefly is due to disease or hereditary fault. When discovered such specimens should be killed and marketed.

Overshowing, in both sexes, is sometimes a cause of sterility. Any other form of abuse may produce a like result. Prolonged prolific laying combined with lack of care or insufficient food of variety sufficient for perfect egg-making, is another cause. Such sterility may be only temporary and when the bird is put in good condition, after a sufficient period of rest, good results may again be obtained. Where sterility is the result of hereditary taint or disease, no improvement can be expected.