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 andEconomizes 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 KeptExercising 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 Farm16
[2].Interior Sterile Laying House No. 3, in 191022
[3].Entrance to Farm in 190924
[4].As You Approach the Farm, 191128
[5].Office Building30
[6].Breeding Cockerels, Fall of 190934
[7].Interior Laying House No. 2, in 191038
[8].Panoramic View of the Farm46
[9].Thirty Dozen Corning Sanitary Fresh Eggs Ready to Ship54
[10].The Strain that Makes the Corning Egg Farm Famous58
[11].Three Sterile Laying Houses Containing 4,500 Pullets64
[12].Interior Laying House No. 1, in 191068
[13].One of the Breeding Houses just after Mating, 191072
[14].Sprouted Oats Cellar78
[15].Two-Weeks-Old Chicks in Brooder House Runs84
[16].Yearling Hens in Breeder House before Mating90
[17].“Socrates,” the Great Bloodhound Which Heads the Corning Kennels92
[18].“Socrates II” and “Diogenes”94
[19].Buster, America’s Greatest Ratter94
[20].Corning Automatic Drinking Fountain96
[21].Part of the Old Incubator Cellar104
[22].Brooder House, Showing Chick Runs120
[23].Old Arrangement of Brooder House124
[24].Chicks Six Weeks Old128
[25].Colony Range Feed and Water Wagon with “Billy”136
[26].Feeding on the Colony Range140
[27].Baskets of Eggs150
[28].Breeding Cockerels, Fall of 1911156
[29].No. 3 Laying House Filled with 1,500 Pullets158
[30].The Workshop on the Corning Egg Farm162
[31].The Celebrated Corning Large-Flock Laying House No. 3170
[32].Laying House Prepared to Receive 1,500 Pullets from Range172
[33].One of the Breeding Houses in 1911174
[34].The Corning Colony House178
[35].Breeding House in 1907—The Original Corning House182
[36].Pullets in Laying House No. 2, Fall of 1911184
[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.