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  MAKING A
  POULTRY HOUSE




  _THE
  HOUSE & GARDEN
  ~MAKING~
  BOOKS_


It is the intention of the publishers to make this series of little
volumes, of which _Making a Poultry House_ is one, a complete library
of authoritative and well illustrated handbooks dealing with the
activities of the home-maker and amateur gardener. Text, pictures
and diagrams will, in each respective book, aim to make perfectly
clear the possibility of having, and the means of having, some of the
more important features of a modern country or suburban home. Among
the titles already issued or planned for early publication are the
following: _Making a Rose Garden_; _Making a Lawn_; _Making a Tennis
Court_; _Making a Fireplace_; _Making Paths and Driveways_; _Making
a Rock Garden_; _Making a Garden with Hotbed and Coldframe_; _Making
Built-in Bookcases, Shelves and Seats_; _Making a Garden to Bloom
This Year_; _Making a Water Garden_; _Making a Garden of Perennials_;
_Making the Grounds Attractive with Shrubbery_; _Making a Naturalized
Bulb Garden_; with others to be announced later.




[Illustration: It is not a difficult matter to care for a small flock,
but the old unsanitary methods of housing will have to be abandoned]




  MAKING A
  POULTRY HOUSE

  _By_ M. ROBERTS CONOVER

  [Illustration]

  NEW YORK
  McBRIDE, NAST & COMPANY
  1912




  COPYRIGHT, 1912, BY
  McBRIDE, NAST & CO.

  Published May, 1912




  CONTENTS


                                    PAGE

  INTRODUCTION                         1

  SPECIFIC SUGGESTIONS FOR HOUSES      7

  FLOORS AND FOUNDATIONS              23

  THE ROOF                            28

  WALLS, WINDOWS AND VENTILATION      33

  THE DOOR OF THE POULTRY HOUSE       40

  NESTS AND ROOSTS                    43

  THE RUN                             50

  SOME HINTS ON UPKEEP                52




  THE ILLUSTRATIONS


  UNSANITARY HOUSING MUST GIVE WAY
    TO MODERN METHODS          _Frontispiece_

                                       FACING
                                         PAGE

  A COLONY HOUSE RECOMMENDED BY
    THE OREGON EXPERIMENT STATION          12

  TWO PORTABLE COLONY HOUSES
    ADAPTABLE FOR THE HOME FLOCK           16

  BROOD HOUSES FOR THE YOUNG BIRDS         20

  FLOORS OF EARTH AND OF WOOD              26

  THE SINGLE-PITCH ROOF IN A SERIES
    OF CONNECTED HOUSES                    30

  A COMBINED POULTRY HOUSE AND
    PIGEON LOFT                            38

  ALFALFA UNDER NETTING IN THE RUN         46

  A SIMPLE FORM OF TRAP NEST               46




Making a Poultry House




INTRODUCTION


To close one's eyes and dream of a home in the country with its lawns,
its gardens, its flowers, its songs of birds and drone of bees, proves
the sentimental in man, but he is not practical who cannot call into
fancy's realm the cackle of the hen.

Having conceded her a legitimate place in the scheme of the country
home, good housing is of the utmost importance, and it is in regard to
this that one easily blunders. Few would idealize a rickety hovel as a
home for the flock, but many of us, while we would not put our highly
prized birds into an airtight box, so over-house them that they weaken
instead of profiting by our care.

That the poultry house is yet in an evolutionary stage, all must admit,
but no one can deny that great strides have been made since the once
neglected barnyard fowl has come to be known as a very understandable
and responsive creature, to be dealt with on common-sense grounds.

Only that poultry house is a good shelter which in winter conserves
as much warmth as possible, and yet permits an abundance of fresh
air; that admits sunlight, and yet in summer is cool. Such a building
must offer no hospitality to other than poultry life, and it must
be constructed in line with the economic value of its residents. In
short, the structure must be so contrived as to guard against drafts,
