The Buildings on the Corning Egg Farm
The Buildings on the The Corning Egg Farm, at the close of the year
1911, were as follows:
No. 1--Brooder House, with Incubator and Sprouted Oats Cellars
underneath.
No. 2--Work Shop, Grain Bins, Egg Packing Room, Refrigerator Room,
and Quarters for the Resident Foreman, all under one roof.
No. 3--Breeding House.
No. 4--Laying House No. 1.
No. 5--Laying House No. 2.
No. 6--Laying House No. 3.
No. 7--Line Breeding House.
No. 8--Breeding Cockerel House.
No. 9--Horse Stable.
No. 10--Wagon Shed.
No. 11--41 Colony Houses Scattered over the Range.
No. 12--Office Building.
To give an idea of the magnitude of The Corning Egg Farm, there are
under roof 18,455 square feet of floor space.
No. 1. Brooder House, Incubator and Sprouted Oats Cellars
This building is 264 feet in length, and consists really of two
buildings. When this structure was first erected it was sixteen feet
wide and fifty feet in length. The Incubator Cellar is entirely of
concrete construction, with a Brooder House one story in height above
it. The floor joists were all beam filled, making the building rat
proof. The second year it became necessary to enlarge the Brooder
House, and an extension was built, sixty-eight feet in length, and set
up on cedar posts, with concrete filled in on top of the sills between
the floor joists, making this part of the building also rat-proof.
After using this Brooder House and Incubator Cellar for three seasons
a still further enlargement became an absolute necessity. Sixteen feet
has been, and still is, the standard width of Laying Houses on The
Corning Egg Farm. It has been found, however, with the Brooder House,
an additional width is desirable in order to give the chicks more roomy
runs when confined by bad weather to the House alone. Mainly for this
reason, the 1911 addition to the Brooder House has been made twenty-two
feet in width. This new building is 146 feet in length. It is joined on
to the old building in such a way that the alley-way merely widens at
the point of connection, thus making one continuous House.
The interior arrangement of a four foot alley-way, the entire length of
the building, along the north wall, greatly facilitates the feeding,
watering, and general care of the chicks, without disturbing them by
passing through the pens.
The raised hover floor starts at the south side of this alley-way, and
is raised about a foot so as to allow the passing underneath of the hot
water trunk line, with its perfect insulation. Attached to this hover
floor, by hinges, is an inclined runway, which is raised or lowered
by a cord running through pulley wheels and fastened by cleats to the
north wall.
The division wires between the pens are of inch mesh, four feet high,
brought down to a ten inch board which is securely fastened to the
floor.
The ventilation is acquired by the use of V-shaped window drops, placed
just under the plate, full detailed drawing of which is given in the
back of this Book. The bottom of the windows, on the south front of
the building, are three feet above the floors, and these windows are
forty-four inches in length and thirty-six inches in width. They are
hung at the top, and are opened and closed by the same sort of device
used in churches for the “Cathedral” window. The holes in the fastening
irons are about two inches apart, allowing the window to be firmly held
open to any degree desired.
There is a slide board at the back of the hover, which is easily
raised, materially assisting in the quick and perfect cleansing of the
hover floor. Hanging above this, and using the slide board as a sill,
is a gate which extends to the height of the wire division, and swings
out, giving the attendant ready access to the hover, drinking cups, etc.
The whole Brooder House is heated by hot water coils, extending along
the entire length of the north wall of the building. These are of two
inch pipe, and in the sixteen feet part of the building there are six,
while in the twenty-two foot extension there are eight pipes.
As stated, the Brooder House is built over the Incubator and Sprouted
Oats Cellars. The Sprouted Oats Cellar is entirely of concrete, and the
floor slopes to one point, where drains carry off the water, allowing
the frames to slowly drain themselves, and preventing the oats from
rotting from an over supply of moisture.
Access is given to the Incubator Cellar by a vestibule in which are
located broad stairways, enabling one to go from the Cellar to the
Brooder House without going outdoors.
The heater room occupies the first 30 feet of this Cellar, and is
divided from the incubator room proper by an eight inch concrete wall.
In this heater room is the large hot water boiler which heats the
Brooder House, above. There are also two automatic heaters, controlling
the trunk line pipes for the heating of the air passing up under the
hovers in the Brooder House. The incubator heaters also stand in this
room, the pipes passing through the division wall, connecting with the
incubators on the other side.
The floor is smooth surface concrete, there being a gentle slope in
the heater room all to one corner, where a drain carries off the water
used in flushing the floor. This same arrangement exists also in the
Incubator Cellar proper, allowing the hose to be used in flooding the
floor twice a day to give the proper amount of moisture for incubation.
The concrete blocks used in the construction of this Cellar are what
is known as rock faced, and the face is on the inside, pointed up in
black. The floor joists overhead are dressed lumber, and are painted
in the following manner: the priming coat is almost pure oil with
just enough lead to give it a whitish tinge; the next coat is dead
white, flat finish, and the third is white enamel of the best stock
obtainable. The incubators are finished in the same way, allowing the
whole Cellar to be literally scrubbed with a brush.
This Cellar has no duplicate, anywhere.
Building No. 2, Work Shop, etc.
The Work Shop proper is twenty by thirty feet, on a concrete
foundation, with a cement floor. The height from the floor to the
rafters is ten feet in the clear. In this room stands a ten horse power
Gasolene Engine, and a large Mixer, the second Mixer designed by The
Corning Egg Farm, which produces a mix in less time, and with less
power, than any other machine to-day on the market. With the necessary
meals and green cut bone, in seven minutes the juices from the bone are
so uniformly distributed throughout the entire mass that it is almost
impossible to believe that no water has been added. The weight of a
mix will average about five hundred pounds. In experiments with beef
scrap in The Corning Egg Farm Mash, in ten minutes’ time the meals
are completely coated with oils which come from good beef scrap when
properly mixed. This Mixer is now being made by Wilson Bros., Easton,
Pa., in different sizes, from hand to horse power, to meet the needs of
large and small plants.
The Bone Cutter is also made by Wilson Bros., and, in our opinion, is
the best Bone Cutter on the market, and we have tried all the different
designs. Wilson Bros. manufacture these cutters in all sizes, from hand
power up to the large one which they first built for The Corning Egg
Farm, and we have graduated in size, during the past years from a hand
power to the Large Cutter now in use.
There is also a large Clover Cutter, which will cut in various lengths
from a quarter of an inch to an inch and a half. The necessary pulleys
and hangers for this machine are placed in the rafters above.
Built into the rear and sides of this room are the various grain bins,
compactly arranged to reduce the labor of handling to a minimum.
In the Work Shop is also a bench, with vices, etc., and cupboards,
built into the walls, where complete kits of tools for carpentry,
plumbing, hot water fitting, etc., are kept, in order that the
mechanical work, so far as repairs and keeping up the efficiency of the
plant go, is done without calling in outside labor.
Back of the Shop, and connecting with it, is the Egg Packing Room,
with its necessary arrangement of shelves, tables, etc., for the work
carried on there.
To the rear of the Egg Packing Room, but having no connection with
it whatever, is the room in which the large Freezer stands, for the
preservation of green bone. The concrete floor in this room is sloped
to a drain so that it may be thoroughly cleansed every day after the
bone is taken out or put into the Freezer. The Freezer itself has a
capacity of 2500 lbs. of bone, but the room, under ordinary conditions
of weather, maintains such a temperature that there is no difficulty in
carrying bone in barrels, standing around the room, which increases our
storing capacity to more than double the quantity.
On the second floor of the Work Shop is a complete and modern apartment
in which the working foreman lives.
Building No. 9, Horse Stable
This is constructed on the general plan of all the buildings on the
Farm, with capacity for four horses, and with necessary room for hay,
etc., in the loft above.
A large shed is built at the rear of the stable, in which bins are
constructed for the carrying of grit and shell, and also for the
storage of packing crates for eggs.
Building No. 10, Wagon Shed
This is conveniently placed to the stable, and is twenty by forty
feet, with four sets of double doors, allowing the placing of vehicles
without interfering with those already inside.
Building No. 12, Office Building
Conveniently arranged in three rooms covering a floor space of nine
hundred and twenty-five square feet, hot water heated, and with
electric lights.
[Illustration: THE CELEBRATED CORNING LARGE FLOCK LAYING HOUSE NO. 3
CARRYING 1500 PULLETS]