Des Moines, Iowa, October 15, 1914.
A Pair of Beautiful Blue Bar Mammoth Homers, Straight American Bred.
CHAPTER I
PROFITS OF SQUAB RAISING—WILL IT PAY?
In first considering squab breeding the beginner always asks, "Will It Pay Me to Raise Squabs?" It is well to consider this phase of any business before making very much of an investment.
The squab business is comparatively new in this country although it has already reached such proportions that there can not be any doubt but it is the most profitable and pleasant business in which any one may engage. Under the methods outlined in this book there is no chance for a conscientious worker to fail.
This country is filled with plants large and small and I have yet to find a plant that is not paying a handsome profit unless there be something wrong with the stock or methods employed. I have visited the great squab plants of California where thousands upon thousands of birds are left to fly at will and nest in open boxes protected only from the sun, and here I find that the squabs are paying a fine return on the investment and thousands of tourists visit these large plants annually and pay an admission fee of fifty cents each so that the revenue from this source is considerable.
I have visited also the great squab district in South Jersey where the squabs are produced for the large cities of the East; the plants also in Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania, and I find that on the best equipped and best paying plants the methods employed are practically identical with those outlined in this book. The fact that experienced breeders in such widely separated sections of the country have adopted almost identical methods is certainly proof that we have the right idea and that the advice we give here to the beginner will be well worth while.