It had been planned to carry the Colony Range in Timothy and Clover, but we lost the catch, and as the ground had been very heavily fertilized with the litter from the Laying Houses, a very rank and luxuriant growth of all kinds of Flora sprang up, and we found that what seemed to us a piece of very hard luck in losing the catch, was really a blessing in disguise, for this rank growth of Flora, even in its first year, was of sufficient height to give very considerable shelter to the large flocks on the Range, and with the Colony Houses just off the ground, the improvised shelters were practically abandoned by the birds, and so they have been removed.
Plenty of Shade
With the yearly scattering of the increased amount of litter as the Farm enlarged, the growth on the Range is becoming more and more luxuriant, and now the entire Range has a succession of changing Flora from month to month, and with some varieties, almost from week to week. There is a considerable growth of Timothy and Clover, and many other varieties of the grass family, which produce a varied diet of succulent food, and of course the constant change in Flora also supplies a varied diet of seeds which the birds harvest for themselves. Any oats and wheat which have been missed in the litter from the Laying Houses sprout here, and the birds also harvest this crop for themselves. The condition of the Range under this method of handling, as we view it, is absolutely ideal for the growing youngsters.
Fresh water is supplied daily to the Houses, and the grain ration consists of two-thirds wheat, and one-third cracked corn. The amount of grain fed to each Colony House depends upon the cleaning up of it by the tenants of this particular House. The mash box is filled daily with what is now known as the Corning Range Mash, which consists of wheat middlings, bran, ground oats, corn meal, and a sufficient amount of green bone, when mechanically mixed in a machine which has been designed by the Farm for this purpose, to give the mash a slight feeling of moisture, which is derived entirely from the juices of the bone.
There is not so great a proportion of animal food in this Range Mash as in the mash for the layers, and it should be noticed that there is in it no gluten or oil meal. The early hatches particularly are not forced along quite so rapidly, and are less liable to go into a Winter moult than if they get these ingredients, and should they moult it comes at a later date and does not extend over so long a period.
On such a range it is not necessary to have so great a proportion of animal food in the mash, because the floral growth harbors myriads of worms and insects, which supply a large part of the animal food needed.
Removed to Laying House Middle of September
It is now our plan to allow the early hatched pullets to remain on the Range until the first or second week in September, according to the weather and the way they are laying.
The time has now arrived for taking up the first fifteen hundred pullets.
