Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 February 1918 — KITCHEN SCRAPS GOOD FOR FOWLS [ARTICLE]

KITCHEN SCRAPS GOOD FOR FOWLS

Waste Material Will Go Long Way With Poultry Flock. HELP REDUCE GRAIN NEEDED Good Plan to Produce Eggs Is by Feeding Garbage, Some Grain to Be Scratched For, Dry Mash, Grit and Clean Water. You can maintain a backyard flock on kitchen waste alone —not in these days of patriotic conservation —but you cap make waste material go a long way in the hen yard. With egg prices at high tide, it will not pay to skimp in feeding the layers, but using all the kitchen garbage and left-overs available will help reduce the amount of grain heeded. Scraps of meat, or left-over vegetables which cannot be utilized in any other way, make excellent chicken feed. There are also many other waste products, such as beet tops, turnip tops, carrot tops, potato peelings, onion peelings, watermelon rinds, the outside leaves of cabbage, waste lettuce leaves, bread and cake crumbs and so on, all of which are relished by the hens. In saving the scraps from the waste it is well to separate the portions adapted to “feed! ng and place them in a receptacle or pail by themselves. Decomposed waste material or moldy bread or 1 cake should never be saved to feed to the hens, as it is harmful to them. Slop material such as dishwater should not be thrown in with the other waste for the flock. It is also useless to feed such things as banana peel or the skins of oranges, as these have little or no food value. Any sour milk which is not utilized in the house should be fed separately, however, either by allowing the hens to drink it or by allowing it to clabber on the back of the stove and then feeding it in that condition. , Use the Meat Grinder. Table scraps and kitchen waste are best prepared for feeding by running them through an ordinary meat grind-

er. After the material has been put through the grinder it is usually a rather moist mass, and it is well to mix with it some cornmeal, bran or other ground grain until the whole esmhes a crumbly condition. The bestmethod is to feed the table scraps at noon dr night, or at both times, as may be desired. In a trough or on a board. AU should be fed that the hens will eat clean. With the table scraps ft is well to feed some grain. Perhaps this may best be given as a light feed in the

morning. Four or five handfuls of grain—about one-half pint—scattered in the litter will be sufficient for a flock of 20 to 25 hens. By handful is meant as much as can be grasped in the hand, not what can be scooped up in the open hand. By scattering It in the litter the hens will be compelled to scratch in order to find the grain, and In this way they get exercise which is decidedly beneficial to them. If the house Is too small to feed in, the grain can be scattered on the ground outside. A good grain mixture for this purpose is composed of equal parts by weight of feeding wheat, cracjced corn and oats. Another suitable grain mixture would be two parts by weight of cracked corn and one part oats. Have Dry Mash Accessible. In addition to the grain and the table scraps, it is well to feed a dry mash. This dry mash is composed of various ground grains and is placed in a mash hopper or box from which

the hens can help themselves. The advantage of feeding such a mash is that the hens always have access to feed and this tends to make up for any faulty or inexperienced feeding. Hens do not like dry mash so well that they are likely to overeat. A good dry mash may be made of equal parts by weight of cornmeal, wheat bran, bran middlings and beef scrap. Fish scrap when available may replace the beef scrap or cottonseed meal 'may be made to replace one-half of the beef scrap in the mash. The hens should have access at all times to a supply of grit or stones of a size small enough to be swallowed readily. Grit is used by the hens to help in grinding in their gizzards the hard grains which they eat. A supply of ordinary gravel will answer the purpose of grit very well, Crushed oyster or clam shells also should be given to the hens and be kept before them at all times. If this is withheld the hens are likely to lack sufficient shell-forming material in their feed, and soft-shelled or thin-shelled eggs may result. Grit or shell can be purchased in small quantities at any feed or supply store. A plentiful supply of clean, fresh water must always be available for the hens. They drink freely, especially when laying heavily, and should not be stinted in this necessity. Keep the water p’an, or dish, clean. If the water pan Is raised a foot above the floor the hens will not kick it full of straw and other litter when scratching for their feed.