Transcriber’s Notes
Texts printed in italics has been transcribed _between underscores_,
underlined text ~between tildes~. Small capitals have been replaced
with ALL CAPITALS.
More Transcriber’s Notes may be found at the end of this text.
[Illustration: CORNING STRAIN UTILITY COCKEREL
Four Months and Twenty Days Old]
THE CORNING
EGG FARM BOOK
BY CORNING HIMSELF
BEING THE COMPLETE AND AUTHENTIC
STORY OF THE CORNING EGG FARM
FROM ITS INCEPTION TO DATE
TOGETHER WITH FULL DESCRIPTION OF THE
METHOD AND SYSTEM THAT HAVE MADE
THIS THE MOST FAMOUS POULTRY
FARM IN THE WORLD
BOUND BROOK, NEW JERSEY
THE CORNING EGG FARM
PUBLISHERS
1912
COPYRIGHT, 1912, BY
GARDNER CORNING
CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTORY 13
CHAPTER I
THE BUILDING OF THE CORNING EGG FARM 21
Started with 60 Buff Rock Eggs 22
More Money in Eggs 25
Adopted White Leghorns 25
First Use of Roosting Closets 27
We Count only Livable Chicks 30
Percentage of Cockerels Low 31
The Great Flock System Succeeds 33
Foreigners Visit the Farm 34
Investigated for Germany 35
Selection of Cockerels 36
Pullets Lay in 129 Days 37
Keeping Down Labor Bill 39
Adopted Hot Water Incubators 40
Why Great Farms Fail 41
CHAPTER II
EGG FARMING THE MOST PROFITABLE BRANCH OF POULTRY KEEPING 43
Developing the Great Layer 43
Corning Method in Small Flocks 44
On Large Farms 46
CHAPTER III
WHAT IS A FRESH EGG? AN EGG SHOULD BE SANITARY AS WELL AS FRESH 48
Manure Drainage to Drink 48
Diseased Meat to Eat 49
As the Food, so the Egg 49
A Perfect Egg a Rarity 50
Unlimited Demand for Quality Eggs 50
CHAPTER IV
PREPARATION OF EGGS FOR MARKET 54
CHAPTER V
SELECTION OF THE BREED.--THE STRAIN IS OF UTMOST IMPORTANCE 58
S. C. White Leghorns Outclass All 59
Line Breeding--Not Inbreeding 61
How Corning Farm Produces Unrelated
Cockerels 62
CHAPTER VI
ADVANTAGES OF LARGE FLOCK SYSTEM--REDUCES COST OF HOUSING AND
ECONOMIZES IN TIME AND LABOR 64
Draughts the Stumbling Block 65
2,000 Birds to a House 66
CHAPTER VII
WHAT IS A WINTER LAYER?--THE PROPERLY HATCHED AND REARED PULLET 68
Must Feed Green Food 69
CHAPTER VIII
A GREAT LAYING STRAIN--THE SELECTION OF BREEDERS TO PRODUCE IT 71
Eighteen Months Old 71
Trap Nests a Failure 72
Type Reproduces Type 73
CHAPTER IX
BEST TIME TO HATCH 76
Experiment in Late Hatching 78
CHAPTER X
SUCCULENT GREEN FOOD--SATISFACTORY EGG PRODUCTION IMPOSSIBLE
WITHOUT IT 80
Sprouted Oats Best 82
How They are Grown on the Farm 82
Timothy and Clover Cut Green 84
CHAPTER XI
ANTHRACITE COAL ASHES--A SUBSTITUTE FOR MANY MORE EXPENSIVE
NECESSITIES 86
Better Than Charcoal 87
CHAPTER XII
EGGS FOR BREEDING SHOULD BE LAID BY A REAL YEARLING HEN 89
90,000 Orders for 40,000 Eggs 90
CHAPTER XIII
POLICING THE FARM WITH BLOODHOUNDS, ETC. 92
Shoot First--Investigate Afterward 92
Socrates, the Great Bloodhound 93
CHAPTER XIV
NECESSITY FOR PURE WATER--AN EGG IS CHEMICALLY 80% WATER 96
Automatic Fountains Essential 96
Hot Water in Cold Weather 97
Hens Drink More in Afternoon 97
CHAPTER XV
HARD COAL ASHES, OYSTER SHELL, AND GRIT 99
CHAPTER XVI
BEEF SCRAP AND GREEN BONE SUBSTITUTES FOR NATURE’S ANIMAL FOOD 101
Green Cut Bone Nearest Nature 101
CHAPTER XVII
A TIME FOR EVERYTHING--EVERYTHING ON TIME 103
Fixed Feeding Hours 103
Four Collections of Eggs Daily 105
Mash Fed in Afternoon 105
CHAPTER XVIII
INCUBATION ON THE CORNING EGG FARM 106
Hen Reigns Supreme 106
Livable Chicks--Not Numbers 107
Uniform Temperature Most Important 108
Ventilation and Moisture Next 108
Hot Water Machines Best 110
Corning Incubator Cellar Unequaled 111
Eggs Turned from Third to Eighteenth Day 112
103 Degrees Maintained 112
Cool But Never Cold 113
Cover Glass Doors 114
All Good Chicks Hatch in 20 Days 114
Set Incubators Toward Evening 115
Tested Only on Eighteenth Day 116
Moisture 117
Chicks Handled Only Once 117
Baby Chick Business Cruel 118
CHAPTER XIX
REARING CHICKS IN BROODER HOUSE--THE FOLLOWING TWO YEARS’ RESULTS
DEPEND UPON SUCCESS IN BROODING 121
Corn Not Proper Chick Food 122
Follow Nature’s Teaching 122
A Balanced Food 123
Never Build a Double House 126
Must Drain Chick Runs 127
Concrete Floors Mean Dampness 127
Corning Heated Brooder House 128
Corning Feeds Dry Food Only 129
Three Feeds Daily 129
Green Food Third Day 130
Animal Food Tenth Day 130
Avoid Moving Chicks Often 132
CHAPTER XX
HANDLING BIRDS ON RANGE--THE YOUNGSTERS MUST BE KEPT GROWING ALL
THE TIME 134
A Corning Wrinkle 135
Grain and Mash Once a Day 137
Plenty of Shade 139
Removed to Laying House Middle of September 140
CHAPTER XXI
FEEDING FOR EGGS--WHOLESOME NOURISHMENT--NOT DESTRUCTIVE
STIMULANTS 143
Easy Assimilation 143
Perfect Health or No Eggs 144
Abundant Animal Food 144
The Corning Mash the Secret 145
“Egg Foods” Kill Layers 146
Mustard Increases Egg Laying 147
Mustard Increases Fertility 148
4,000 Layers Fed Mustard 149
Mustard Maintains Health 150
Keep Appetite Keen 150
CHAPTER XXII
BREEDING HENS DURING MOULT--COMING BREEDERS MUST BE KEPT
EXERCISING THROUGH THIS PERIOD 153
Do Not Overfeed 154
CHAPTER XXIII
FEEDING THE BREEDING COCKERELS 156
CHAPTER XXIV
PREPARING SURPLUS COCKERELS FOR MARKET 157
Must Have Green Food 158
CHAPTER XXV
$6.41 PER HEN PER YEAR 159
$6.41 Not Extravagant Claim 160
Corning Farm Makes More Than $6.41 161
CHAPTER XXVI
THE BUILDINGS ON THE CORNING EGG FARM 163
No. 1, Brooder House, Incubator and Sprouted Oats Cellars 164
Building No. 2, Work Shop, etc. 167
Building No. 9, Horse Stable 169
Building No. 10, Wagon Shed 170
Building No. 12, Office Building 170
CHAPTER XXVII
CONSTRUCTION OF LAYING, BREEDING, AND BREEDING COCKEREL HOUSES 171
Nearly Six Feet from Ground 172
Double Floors 173
Canvas Windows 174
Double Doors 176
Draught-Proof Roosting Closets 177
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE COLONY HOUSES--THERE ARE FORTY-ONE ON THE FARM 180
Cotton Duck Windows 181
CHAPTER XXIX
MATERIALS REQUIRED FOR LAYING HOUSES 182
Bill of Material for the Construction of Colony House 183
CHAPTER XXX
THE ORIGINAL THIRTY HENS 184
CHAPTER XXXI
EGG RECORDS 186
How Corning Farm is Able to Get Great Egg Records 187
Highest Percentage of Fertility 188
CHAPTER XXXII
PREVENTION AND TREATMENT OF DISEASES 190
CHAPTER XXXIII
A WORD IN CLOSING 192
Nothing to Hide 193
Illustrations are Photographs 193
The Corning Success 193
Our Advice to Beginners 194
Single Comb White Leghorns Only 194
It’s “Strain” You Want 194
Utility, Not Show Birds 195
Corning Largest Specialty Farm in World 195
Points That Mean Success 196
BUILDINGS ON THE CORNING EGG FARM AND MANY HANDY DEVICES 198
ILLUSTRATIONS
Corning Strain Utility Cockerel _Frontispiece_
FACING
PAGE
1. Lay-Out of Farm 16
2. Interior Sterile Laying House No. 3, in 1910 22
3. Entrance to Farm in 1909 24
4. As You Approach the Farm, 1911 28
5. Office Building 30
6. Breeding Cockerels, Fall of 1909 34
7. Interior Laying House No. 2, in 1910 38
8. Panoramic View of the Farm 46
9. Thirty Dozen Corning Sanitary Fresh Eggs Ready to Ship 54
10. The Strain that Makes the Corning Egg Farm Famous 58
11. Three Sterile Laying Houses Containing 4,500 Pullets 64
12. Interior Laying House No. 1, in 1910 68
13. One of the Breeding Houses just after Mating, 1910 72
14. Sprouted Oats Cellar 78
15. Two-Weeks-Old Chicks in Brooder House Runs 84
16. Yearling Hens in Breeder House before Mating 90
17. “Socrates,” the Great Bloodhound Which Heads the Corning
Kennels 92
18. “Socrates II” and “Diogenes” 94
19. Buster, America’s Greatest Ratter 94
20. Corning Automatic Drinking Fountain 96
21. Part of the Old Incubator Cellar 104
22. Brooder House, Showing Chick Runs 120
23. Old Arrangement of Brooder House 124
24. Chicks Six Weeks Old 128
25. Colony Range Feed and Water Wagon with “Billy” 136
26. Feeding on the Colony Range 140
27. Baskets of Eggs 150
28. Breeding Cockerels, Fall of 1911 156
29. No. 3 Laying House Filled with 1,500 Pullets 158
30. The Workshop on the Corning Egg Farm 162
31. The Celebrated Corning Large-Flock Laying House No. 3 170
32. Laying House Prepared to Receive 1,500 Pullets from Range 172
33. One of the Breeding Houses in 1911 174
34. The Corning Colony House 178
35. Breeding House in 1907--The Original Corning House 182
36. Pullets in Laying House No. 2, Fall of 1911 184
37. Diagrams and Detailed Plans of Buildings, etc. 199
INTRODUCTORY
The Method, and the style of the buildings, evolved and worked out
on The Corning Egg Farm, when put into book form proved so helpful
to so vast a number of poultry keepers, that the sale of this first
literature, which for a time was added to as the months went by,
reached the enormous total of over 140,000 copies in eighteen months.
The writings were the simple, plain statements of facts, and enabled
others who followed them to reach a success which, until this System
was used, may have been dreamed of, but was never realized.
The literature from this Farm has gone out over the entire civilized
World, and the visitors, who arrive in ever increasing numbers from
month to month, come from every quarter of the Globe.
The Corning Egg Farm has been written of in periodicals of every
nature, and in almost every language the World over. For the last
twelve months the requests for further, and more explicit, detailed
information relative to breeding and feeding for eggs, the specialty
from which The Corning Egg Farm has never swerved, have become a
demand. So that, after mature deliberation, it was decided to write the
history of The Corning Egg Farm, from its inception to date, including
the work of the last two years, which has never before been fully
published.
“The Corning Egg Farm Book by Corning Himself” is to-day the only
publication giving facts in regard to the Farm and its unique Method
right up to date.
As the book is read it must be borne in mind that, in breeding to
produce a great layer, at first very marked increases in the number of
eggs during the first ten months of laying may be gained. The general
average number of eggs laid each year, from official reports, is less
than 100 per hen. On The Corning Egg Farm, when the average had reached
143.25 eggs, the next jump, in the following year, was more than had
been expected, and the record of 145.11 eggs for each hen for ten
months, though showing an increase apparently small, in reality was a
very great advance indeed.
From this time on, the gain, although representing a narrower margin of
increase, was in reality a much greater achievement. The trotting horse
may serve as an illustration. When Dexter trotted his famous mile he
clipped off a number of seconds from the previous record, and it seemed
as if it would be a matter of considerable time before his mark would
be lowered. But within a comparatively short time a number of trotters
turned off a mile in two-ten, and from this figure, within a short
period, a large company of famous horses had reached the two-five
mark, but every quarter of a second which reduced this mark meant
greater achievement in breeding than was represented by the reduction
of records from two-sixteen to two-five, and we have not yet seen the
horse which, in single harness, without a running mate, can turn the
mile track in two minutes flat.
The Corning Egg Farm realizes that from this on improvement will be
shown by fractional figures, but these fractions will represent a
greater progress than the figures which have gone before.
Two years ago the unequaled results of The Corning Egg Farm had seemed
unsurpassable, but to-day we are able to look back from higher ground
and see the road over which we have traveled to reach a point very
considerably beyond the unequaled position of two years ago.
It is our hope and aim, year by year, to improve the present position.
The man who believes he has learned all there is to learn is a failure.
The successful man is the one who is sure there is an opportunity to
advance considerably beyond the point he has already attained, and The
Corning Egg Farm believes this to be true, and has constantly worked
with that idea before it.
With an experience back of them of nearly six years the Builders of The
Corning Egg Farm know that this Book furnishes the necessary guide for
success in poultry culture. What has been, and what is being, done
at The Corning Egg Farm is not experimental work. Successful results
follow the Method and System employed as surely as day follows night.
It is no longer necessary for the novice to try out the various plans
proposed to him by the literary poultryman, whose methods are worked
out on a mahogany desk, with pen and ink, or more often, perhaps, by
dictation to a stenographer.
Years of careful thought and study, and the expenditure of much time
and many thousands of dollars in developing the Corning Method have
eliminated all necessity for experimental expenditure. The building
up of an Egg Farm is within the reach of any man who will follow the
Corning plan herein described faithfully and persistently.
The man or woman who determines to pursue some branch of the poultry
industry must first decide what particular branch.
Shall it be to raise poultry for market?
If so, what? Squab Broilers? Soft Roasters? Or Capons?
Perhaps all of these.
Some utility line is the best to start with.
Fresh, sanitary eggs are a necessity and command the highest price in
the market, daily, for spot cash, just as readily as stocks and bonds
command a daily cash value in any financial market. There can be no
better proof of the truth of this than the success of The Corning Egg
Farm.
[Illustration:
PULLET RANGE & COLONY HOUSES
EACH HOUSE 6′ × 10′ BUILT ON SKIDS MOVABLE]
In whatever line a beginner decides to start he needs to go straight
down that line without deviation, taking as his motto, “This one thing
I do.” In the fullness of time, having established a reputation for the
quality of his eggs and birds, the demand for his eggs for hatching
purposes and for his birds as foundation stock for other people, will
naturally come to him, and it is very profitable.
One certain fact should be settled in the understanding of every
beginner, to wit: it is not possible to invest from five hundred to
five thousand dollars in the Poultry Industry and double your money
in the first year, or even to earn 50% on the investment. Neither is
it possible with $300.00 to build a Laying House with a capacity for
five hundred birds, if the house is properly built for warmth and meets
sanitary conditions.
Housing for hens must be free from dampness. Concrete absorbs dampness,
therefore, avoid it.
Any person starting in the poultry industry for profit, and, intending
to follow it for a livelihood should begin in a small way, realizing
that, like any other business venture, it must be built up and grow
from year to year, and that, certainly for the first year, no money can
be drawn out for living expenses.
These statements are made clearly and emphatically because quite the
contrary has been given out as a fact. Such reckless representations,
because untrue, are misleading and injurious to both those engaged in
the poultry industry and also to those who contemplate entering it, and
should be branded as false, and the authors of such statements should
be prohibited from using the United States Mails.
We are not, and make no pretense of being, philanthropists. We have
written this Book primarily with the expectation that it will make
The Corning Egg Farm and the Corning Method of Poultry Culture even
more widely and impressively known to the World, and so benefit us by
increased demand for our stock, eggs, and all other goods we may have
for sale.
Secondly, we know that the Book will benefit others if they will follow
the Corning Method and System herein laid down, and so prove of mutual
advantage to readers and authors as well.
The Single Comb White Leghorn is par excellence _the_ Egg Machine,
provided always first class and the best strain of birds is procured,
and the Corning Strain, without doubt or question, is the very best
strain of Single Comb White Leghorns yet developed anywhere in the
World.
We know this new, large, complete and thoroughly up to date Book will
be the means of bringing us, and our unequaled Strain of Single Comb
White Leghorns, into favor with thousands of people who, as yet, do not
know us, just as the publishing of the small and older booklet put us
into touch with other thousands who are now doing a prosperous business
by the use of this same Corning Strain Single Comb White Leghorns, and
by following the Corning Method now more completely elaborated and
explained in “The Corning Egg Farm Book by Corning Himself.”
EDWARD AND GARDNER CORNING.
The Corning Egg Farm,
Bound Brook, New Jersey.
December, 1911.
The Corning Egg Farm Book
CHAPTER I
The Building of the Corning Egg Farm
Having determined, in 1905, to engage in some business connected with
the feathered tribe, we decided to try out the squab proposition versus
market poultry. After searching over a period of many months, in
various parts of the country, with the idea of finding a place where
the existing buildings might be utilized for our needs, we finally were
obliged to abandon this idea and purchased, early in the year 1906,
twelve and a half acres of land, now known as Sunny Slope Farm. This
property lies about two miles west of Bound Brook, New Jersey, which
town is reached by the Central Railroad of New Jersey, the Baltimore
& Ohio, the Philadelphia & Reading and the Lehigh Valley Railroads,
and the Farm is most accessible, as it is on the trolley line which
connects Bound Brook and Somerville.
In the early Spring of 1906 we began our buildings, erecting a house,
for raising squabs, which would accommodate five hundred pairs of
breeding birds, a hen house of the scratching shed variety, capable
of accommodating some two hundred and fifty hens, and a work-shop with
living apartments for the resident man.
We also sunk a well one hundred and seventeen feet deep, erecting over
it a sixty foot wind-mill tower, which carries an eighteen hundred
gallon tank. From this pipes were laid to convenient parts of the
property.
Three hundred pairs of Homer pigeons were placed in the house built for
that purpose, and we went diligently to work to prove that this was
the quick and easy way to wealth which the ingenious writers of squab
literature proved so conclusively on paper.
On the chicken side of the experiment we seemed to lean (possibly
because of the fact that squabs take one into the slaughter house
business) towards one or more of the market breeds, and, to meet the
needs of this part of the business, we understood that any of the
“Rock” family were best for the purpose.
Started with 60 Buff Rock Eggs
We purchased an incubator with the capacity of sixty eggs, being
fearful of attempting the operation of a larger machine, because, like
a great many novices, we had the feeling that an incubator was a very
dangerous thing, and that anyone without a vast amount of experience
should not attempt to handle it. We placed in this diminutive machine
sixty Buff Rock eggs, and obtained a very fair hatch. With daily
contact our fear of the machine decreased, and we exchanged it for one
with a capacity of one hundred and twenty-five eggs, and this, in turn,
was exchanged for one holding two hundred and fifty eggs.
[Illustration: INTERIOR STERILE LAYING HOUSE NO. 3 IN 1910]
We obtained fairly large flocks of youngsters that season, but, as we
had the usual hallucination that poultry culture was really a miracle,
and required neither work, capital, nor brains, that all you had to do
was to accept the profit and the chickens did it all themselves, we
did not get so very far. The growth of the birds was so slow they did
not reach a profitable weight until the broiler market had dropped the
price to its lowest level. The pullets which we carried through the
winter never produced an egg, for the simple reason that we had never
studied the question out as to how the hen produces an egg. In other
words, our lack of knowledge of the right methods was the reason for
charging up a considerable loss instead of profit so far as the first
season’s work with hens went.
We very early discovered there must have been a considerable amount of
fiction in the writings on the squab industry. One reads that a pair
of pigeons eats nothing like the amount of food which is required for
one hen, and that they never eat more than their exact wants require,
and that when they have young in the nest, this amount is very slightly
increased. We found, however, that they ate in season and out of
season. In fact one recalls, in this connection, and with considerable
amusement, the song, in the light opera “Wang,” of the elephant who ate
all day and the elephant who ate all night.
During our work with pigeons we tried out a number of different
varieties: Homers, Dragoons, Runt Dragoon crosses, Homer Runt crosses,
Maltese Hens, and the various crosses with Runt Dragoons; also
Carneaux. We were led to buy these fancy breeds through the stories of
extreme prices paid for large squabs, and we bred some heavy weights
only to find, from the commission man who made a specialty of these
birds, that it was impossible to pay the price which such birds were
really worth, as trade for this class was extremely limited.
Very early in our experience we realized that the poultry side of our
experiment was very much more to our liking and offered so much greater
and more profitable outlook for our energies that we rang down the
curtain on Squab raising--and turned our attention exclusively to the
Hen.
While our minds were still running in the line of poultry for market
purposes we tried out the Black Orpingtons, the idea being that, on
account of their size, they would make ideal roasting fowls. We found,
however, that they were a very much inbred variety, and it was almost
impossible to hatch the eggs. Out of one hundred eggs, for which we
paid twenty dollars, eight chicks hatched, and these were not of
sufficient vitality to live.
[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO THE FARM IN 1909]
More Money in Eggs
During all this time, however, we were studying the poultry question,
and had arrived at the conclusion that there was more money in eggs,
properly produced and marketed, than in any other branch. One of the
difficulties we met with in our investigations was the fact that so
many different writers had such a variety of ideas on the same subject,
and practically no two of them agreed on any given part of poultry
culture. What seemed to us even more confusing was that, in most cases,
the writer summed up his article by contradicting everything he had
said in the previous chapters. We were finally forced to the conclusion
that the raising of poultry had not yet been reduced to a science,
but was almost entirely made up of guesses. In our investigations,
however, we found in the writings of the late Prof. Gowell, of Maine,
an entirely different condition. He was the first man, so far as our
observations went, who worked on the principle that effect followed
cause, in poultry as in everything else. We studied his bulletins with
great interest, and decided we would endeavor to prove that the same
results gotten by him could be duplicated by others.
Adopted White Leghorns
We had also been studying the condition of the egg market, so far as
New York and vicinity was concerned, and had found that this market
paid a premium for a white shelled egg. This, then, was the determining
factor in the selection of the breed of fowls, and after gathering all
the information we could regarding birds which laid white eggs, we were
satisfied, taking everything into consideration, that for an Egg Farm,
the Single Comb White Leghorn, was the only fowl.
In the Spring of 1907 we collected a breeding pen, from different
sources, of thirty Single Comb White Leghorn yearling hens, and three
strong, vigorous cockerels. We purchased an incubator holding three
hundred and ninety eggs, and three out-door brooders, and built a
number of small Colony Houses to move the birds into as soon as they
were large enough to be transferred from the brooders. The hens chosen
for the initial breeding pen of the Farm were most carefully selected,
for even then we had in mind the result which we intended to reach,
as to the ultimate type of layer on the Farm. We placed the resulting
eggs from this breeding pen in the incubator, using a primitive turning
machine to keep them in proper condition until the requisite number was
acquired to fill the incubator. Our hatch was a very good one, and we
succeeded in raising a fair number of the youngsters hatched.
During the Summer we erected what is now known on the Farm as the No.
1 Laying House. This was built one hundred feet long, by twelve feet
wide, and on the same twenty foot section construction which has
proved to be so successful a plan for poultry houses. The one mistake
in this house was its width, and that has now been remedied by widening
it to the standard, sixteen feet in width, and sixty feet in length
have been added to it.
The youngsters on range grew rapidly. We marketed the cockerels at
between eight and ten weeks of age, and they weighed from one and a
quarter pounds to a pound and three quarters. These were sold “on the
hoof,” as we had decided for the future to do nothing in the slaughter
house line, and to this decision we have strictly adhered, shipping
alive also all culls and birds of any age showing imperfections, the
majority of our stock finding ready market for breeding purposes when
we are ready to dispose of it.
As a correct record of the mortality of our hatching, and the number of
cockerels marketed, had been kept, we found that we should have in the
Colony Houses about two hundred and twenty-five pullets to place in No.
1 House.
In catching up the birds we found that the number figured on was about
right. These two hundred and twenty-five birds went into the House,
October 31st. They were already laying on the Range.
First Use of Roosting Closets
It was a very interesting sight to us to watch these birds at work
in the first house which had ever been successfully built without
partitions, in other words, one large flock with the run of the entire
house. Others had tried it, and had failed. They had had draughts, and
had found the house, therefore, very undesirable. We conceived the idea
of roosting closets, with a partition extending some little distance
beyond the dropping boards, running from the ceiling to the floor, thus
breaking the house up so far as extended circulation of air went, and
at the same time giving the birds the benefit of the larger area.
It was also a matter of great interest to two novices to watch the egg
output in this first house. On the first day of November five eggs were
gathered; on the second, seven; the third saw a drop to four. Of course
these pullets had been giving us more eggs than this on the Range, but
a transfer from one place to another always means a set-back to a layer.
The middle of the month saw the hens producing above seventeen eggs a
day. December was started with an output of forty, and from that the
birds ran into larger numbers daily until the last of December, when,
with the mercury registering well down around zero, they were turning
out one hundred eggs a day. The increase in the egg output continued
steadily, and we found that March was the record month, but the highest
single day was in April, when the pen produced one hundred and seventy
eggs.
[Illustration: AS YOU APPROACH THE CORNING EGG FARM FROM THE PUBLIC
HIGHWAY, IN 1911
Showing 264-Foot Brooder House, Breeding Cockerel House and Office]
We were well satisfied with the result of the Winter’s work with these
pullets, and, although we did not have the knowledge that has since
come to us in feeding for eggs, the output was a most creditable one,
and we found a ready market at a good price.
Early in the Fall we had mapped out our plans for a very decided
increase in plant for the coming season. The excavation for the
Incubator Cellar, sixteen by fifty feet, had been made, and the Brooder
House above it was enclosed without difficulty before weather of any
great severity overtook us. We were blessed with a very late Fall, and
mild weather continued, with only occasional dips, well into December,
1907.
We installed in the Cellar ten incubators, with a capacity of three
hundred and ninety eggs each. The Brooder House, with its arrangement
for Hovers and Nursery pens, was all completed, and the month of March
found us placing eggs in the machines.
In the Fall of 1907 we had enlarged our Breeding House, so that we
were able to place in it some two hundred and fifty breeders. Out of
our original pen of thirty, we had lost two. From different sources we
bought yearling hens, and with our original twenty-eight, made up the
breeding pen.
Of course, as we had planned to endeavor to produce some three thousand
pullets for the Fall of 1908, we were obliged to very materially
supplement the product of our own breeders, with eggs from other
sources, and this we did, buying eggs from different breeders, in
widely separated territories.
As the hatching season advanced we added one more incubator to our
battery of ten, and we placed in these incubators a total of eleven
thousand eight hundred and four eggs, of which two thousand and
ninety-six showed dead germs and clear eggs on the fourteenth day test.
The resulting number of chicks placed in the Brooder House was five
thousand eight hundred and sixty-six for the entire season.
We found that the eggs purchased did not produce anything like the
number of chicks, that is, strong, livable chicks, that did the eggs
coming from our own breeding pen, which proved to us that the method of
feeding and caring for breeding stock, pursued by others, fell very far
short of the results gotten by our own methods.
We Count Only Livable Chicks
The lesson of incubation, which it is so difficult to make people
understand, is not so much a question of how many chicks may be hatched
from a given number of eggs as of how many strong, livable chicks are
brought out. We very early in our hatching experience decided to count
only those chicks, which were strong, and apparently capable of a
steady growth and a sturdy maturity. Thus, the count of the number of
chicks produced, does not really show the number which came out of the
shells.
[Illustration: OFFICE BUILDING]
We were extremely fortunate in handling the youngsters in the Brooder
House, and our mortality was very low, and when the youngsters were
placed in the Colony Houses, which had been built during the early
Spring months, and placed out on the Range in readiness for them, they
were a sturdy, vigorous crowd.
Percentage of Cockerels Low
The number of cockerels was very low, and these, as rapidly as they
developed, were taken away from the pullets and placed in a fattening
pen which had been provided, and as our stock was still an “unknown
quantity” in Poultrydom, we marketed the larger part of them at broiler
size.
The pullets came on finely, and the records show that a large number of
them came into eggs when they were a few days over four months of age.
Through the connivance of an employé we made a heavy loss in the way of
theft, and, when the final round-up of the pullets came, we found we
had one thousand nine hundred and fifty-three.
During the Summer, we had built the No. 2 Laying House, sixteen feet
wide by one hundred and sixty feet long, and in this house the first
fifteen hundred pullets were installed, the balance going into No. 1
Laying House.
A number of visitors had called at the Farm during the Summer of 1908,
and we had listened to the different stories of the ease with which
five thousand laying pullets were produced annually, but at the end of
this season we had much more respect for the number five thousand than
we ever had before, and realized very fully what it meant to produce
that number of females each year.
With the placing of these fifteen hundred pullets in this House of one
hundred and sixty feet in length by sixteen feet wide, without being
divided into separate pens, each hen having the entire run of the House
and no more (that is, she did not leave the house for a yard, but
stayed right in that space and did her work), we accomplished what,
from the standpoint of all authorities on the subject of Poultry, was
an impossible thing to do, and have the hen produce anything. And yet
each hen had only two and one third square feet of floor space, which
included the dropping boards.
The secret of being able to work the hen successfully in such a limited
space per bird is in the length of the house. In reality, every bird
has one hundred and sixty feet by sixteen feet in which to exercise and
roam.
The four hundred and fifty-three pullets which were placed in No. 1
Laying House were given the entire run of this house, of one hundred
feet by twelve feet, and yet the Egg Record for the ten months, in
which these birds never left either house, is rather in favor of the
house containing the fifteen hundred pullets. The average number of
eggs per pullet in these houses, from December 1st, 1908, to September
30th, 1909, was 143.25. Many people who had seen the No. 2 House filled
with the fifteen hundred pullets could hardly believe what they saw.
The Great Flock System Succeeds
The extreme health and great vigor of the birds was evident to anyone
who looked in through the wire doors. Articles were written in numerous
papers stating that the thing was impossible, and that, before many
months, absolute failure would result. But in spite of all the
prophecies the great flock system, in the Corning style House, proved
by its great success, that a decided forward step had been made in
economical management and housing of poultry.
We had gone ahead handling poultry in just the same way that any
business would be handled, plus the scientific study of the anatomy
of the hen, and what it was necessary to breed in order to accomplish
a great success as a producer of large, white, uniform eggs, with the
ability added to that formula, of turning them out in large quantities.
Callers at the Farm brought very forcibly home to us the fact, then
quite unappreciated by us, that the methods employed, and the results
obtained, were very remarkable from the standpoint of anything done
in Poultry Culture up to that time. It was pointed out that in almost
every other case it was not known by the poultryman just where he stood
at any time of the year, let alone being able to tell where he stood
every day of the year. The success of The Corning Egg Farm really has
that feature as its foundation stone.
Before the close of the ten months of laying of the 1953 pullets we had
received a number of overtures to put our methods and results into a
book, and, after a time, such a book was written. The tremendous sale
and success of that book is now a matter of history, and the great
number of people who were helped to better things in poultry, and the
still greater number of novices who were started on the road, were
enabled, through this book, to reach a success which, as many of them
testify, would have been impossible without it. In eighteen months over
one hundred and forty thousand copies of this first book were sold.
Hundreds of people came to the Farm to find out for themselves whether
or not the statements in the book were true, and these people found
everything, down to the smallest detail, just exactly as represented.
Foreigners Visit the Farm
The Visitors’ Register, which is kept at the Farm, shows callers
from almost every nook and corner of the Globe. In Scotland, a short
distance from Glasgow, there is now almost a perfect duplicate of Sunny
Slope Farm. The owner, who has twice crossed the ocean and come to the
Farm, states that if you were blindfolded and taken from Glasgow the
three miles out to his property it would be quite impossible for you to
tell whether you were in New Jersey or Scotland, so absolutely alike
are the buildings in every detail.
[Illustration: BREEDING COCKERELS, FALL OF 1909]
In England, a short distance from Tunbridge, the Corning Laying House
is again found. At this Farm both White and Black Leghorns are carried,
and the owners write that they are meeting with great success in
following the Corning Method.
Investigated for Germany
Germany sent a man who spent twelve months investigating the different
methods of poultry raising and housing, and he visited all the plants
of any note whatever from the Atlantic to the Pacific, including
Canada, down to the Gulf of Mexico. He did not make his mission known,
and it was only after his return to his native country that his
identity was disclosed. His report is of more than passing interest to
The Corning Egg Farm, as it states that the Method and System envolved
on The Corning Egg Farm surpasses anything that has as yet come under
his observation. The investigator is not only conversant with what he
saw in the line of poultry breeding during his twelve months’ sojourn
in America, but he is thoroughly posted in regard to everything in
Europe.
The pullets were hardly placed in the Nos. 1 and 2 Laying Houses, in
the Fall of 1908, before we began to plan for the Spring of 1909. We
had enlarged the Breeding House again, so that we now had housed some
four hundred and seventy-five yearling and two year old hens. These
were made up from our breeding pen of the year before, and as many of
our two hundred and twenty-five pullets as qualified. We bought a few
other yearling hens from different sources, and likewise the necessary
complement of cockerels.
Selection of Cockerels
We gave great care to the selection of the males heading the breeding
pen, every bird having perfect head points, being strong and vigorous,
and as large as we could find him, where we felt sure that no outside
blood had been introduced.
The Brooder House during the Fall, was materially added to, giving
us twenty Hover Pens, three feet wide, and twelve Nursery Pens, each
nearly five feet wide, this giving us a Brooder House 118 feet long by
16 feet wide.
We again this year (1909) supplemented our own breeding pen with
purchases of eggs from different sources.
Pullets Lay in 129 Days
Our hatches this Spring were very successful, and the chicks which went
up into the Brooder House were strong and vigorous. The mortality was
low, and when placed on Range they grew rapidly. The pullets came into
eggs, as they had in the two previous years, within a few days after
they passed the four months’ mile-stone.
We had added some six Colony Houses to our range equipment. The
building originally designed for pigeons we planned to change over into
a Breeding House, for, in the Fall of 1909, we would have a sufficient
number of yearling hens to carry quite a breeding establishment. This
house was about completed in the month of May, when it mysteriously
took fire, and was a complete loss. Fortunately the fire broke out at
about ten o’clock in the morning, and, by the timely assistance of
the boys of the Wilson Military Academy, under the able direction of
the Military Officers of that Academy, we were able to confine it to
this one building in spite of the fact that a high wind was blowing,
which carried the sparks directly on to the other buildings. The water
supply on the Farm proved more than adequate to the necessities of the
occasion, and the loss was entirely covered by insurance.
As we desired to recognize the services of the young men, and at
the suggestion of the Commanding Officer, medals were struck off
commemorative of the fire and of the bravery displayed by these young
men at this time, and were presented to them.
An addition to the Breeding House, extending over the site of the
burned building, was immediately erected, and the small building which
had been used as a fattening pen for cockerels was rebuilt, and became
the breeding pen for the production of unrelated cockerels.
Also during this season the No. 3 Laying House was built, this being an
exact duplicate of the No. 2 House.
Our selection of Breeders for 1910 was of course made from the birds
which had completed their first ten months of pullet laying, in the
houses Nos. 1 and 2. The mortality during these months had been about
7 per cent. With our method of selection only 950 of these birds
qualified to be used as yearling breeders, and these were placed in the
Breeding House which had been prepared for them. We had made a most
careful selection of cockerels, and these we had reared in two Colony
Houses, placed in a large yard, where we were planning to eventually
erect a Cockerel House for the housing of cockerels specially selected
for breeders.
The balance of the birds from Nos. 1 and 2, together with our breeders
of 1909, were sold, and we were able to face the hatching season of
1910 with a very decided step forward towards the realization of the
ideal yearling breeder, which The Corning Egg Farm is working nearer to
each season.
[Illustration: INTERIOR LAYING HOUSE NO. 2 IN 1910]
We placed in the Laying Houses Nos. 2 and 3 about 2750 pullets, and our
respect for the man who could successfully, yearly, produce and raise
to maturity five thousand pullets, increased materially.
Keeping Down Labor Bill
The question of keeping down the labor bill on the Farm has at all
times been a matter of careful study, and the machinery which is in use
is of large capacity, enabling us to turn out whatever may be required
in a very short space of time, and allowing the men to get at other
work. As an illustration; the Clover Cutter on the Farm has a capacity
of 3000 pounds an hour, cut in one-fourth-inch lengths, which enables
us, when we are cutting green food, to turn out the amount required for
the day, fill the tubs, and have it on the way to the Laying Houses, in
less than fifteen minutes.
The question of economy in time in handling the Incubator Cellar had
been a problem, which we finally solved by piping gas into the Cellar
and Brooder House, from the mains which are laid in the road passing
the Farm. Thus we did away with the danger of fire from sixteen
incubator lamps (for we now had in the cellar sixteen machines) and
the twenty Hover lamps, and the time and labor of cleaning and filling
them. We placed a governor on the gas main, so that it was impossible
to increase the pressure at any time of the day or night, and the gas
worked most satisfactorily in incubation and brooding.
The extensions on the Farm planned for 1910 were a Cockerel House, for
the housing of breeding cockerels, and the widening and lengthening of
No. 1 Laying House. These alterations were made in No. 1, so that it
was an exact counterpart of Nos. 2 and 3. We also planned, as soon as
the breeding season was over, and the 1910 breeding pen was shipped to
the various buyers who had purchased these birds for August delivery
(and the entire pen was sold early in 1910), to add another section to
the Breeder House, and to build a few more Colony Houses. Then we built
what we thought would be an adequate Office to handle the business of
the Farm, but which has since proved large enough for only one quarter
of the present requirements. We increased the size of the Egg Packing
Room, and installed a freezer with a capacity of over two thousand
pounds of green bone. This practically covers the enlargements on the
plant for 1910.
Adopted Hot Water Incubators
For three years we had been investigating quietly the so-called Mammoth
Incubators, or in other words, the Coal Heated, Hot Water Incubator,
and before the close of the hatching season of 1911 we had decided
to install two such machines in a cellar 146 feet long by 22 feet
wide--this cellar to be built so as to allow us to extend the present
Brooder House to the same length and width as the cellar.
This cellar has since been constructed, with a Brooder House over it,
so that we now have capacity for the incubation of 15,600 eggs at one
time.
The Hot Water System for heating the air supplying the Hovers has also
been installed, and the Brooder House now has a capacity of some 12,000
youngsters, before it is necessary to move any of them to the Range.
The Breeder House has again been enlarged, and, with the addition, a
year hence, of another Breeding House, which is planned to be 180 feet
long by 16 feet wide, and a larger house for the breeding of unrelated
cockerels, The Corning Egg Farm will have reached the limit planned for
since the inception of the Farm. We shall then have a capacity of 4500
sterile pullets, 3500 yearling hens for breeding purposes, and housing
for 1200 cockerels.
Why Great Farms Fail
One reads of Poultry Farms carrying anywhere from twenty to forty
thousand layers. Experience has taught us that the plant that gets
beyond the size where those financially interested can supervise and
know the condition of the Farm from one end to another daily, falls
down of its own weight, as it is impossible to find men, unless
financially interested, who will look after the endless details, which
spell success or ruin on a large poultry plant.
The planning and designing of all buildings on The Corning Egg Farm was
done by ourselves, and all the construction has been done under our
personal supervision. In the first two years we did not contract even
the labor, employing simply “handy men” who worked with us under our
instructions. Latterly, with the large amount of routine and office
work pressing upon us, we found it to be wise economy to contract the
labor, ourselves supplying the material and supervising the work.
The buildings, with the arrangement of all equipment, are built in
accordance with ideas thought and worked out by ourselves, on lines
which seemed to us common sense, and economical in time and money for
the handling of Poultry.
Until within the last two years we had never seen another poultry farm,
and those we have seen have only strengthened our conviction that no
serious error has been made in laying out The Corning Egg Farm Plant.