and will thrive under more
machine-like methods and without that touch of nature and of the
owner's kindly interest so necessary to the welfare of the fowls of
the gallinaceous order. The green duck business is about twenty
years old and has become an established business in every sense of
the word. The largest plants now produce about one hundred thousand
ducks per annum. The profits at present are not large even for the
most successful plants, because the demand is limited and the
production has reached such a point that cost of production and
selling price bear a definite relation as in all established
businesses. The green duck business is not an easy one for the
novice because the margin between cost (chiefly food cost) and
selling price is low, and unless the new man can reduce the cost of
production or raise his selling price in some way, he will have no
advantage over the old and successful firms.

Squab Business Overdone.

The business of producing pigeon squabs resembles the duck business
in the sense that it has been reduced to a successful system. The
production of squabs has grown until the demand is satisfied and the
price has fallen to just that figure that will continue to bring in
a sufficient number of squabs from the plants which are already
established, or which continue to be established by those who do not
stop to investigate the relation between the cost of production and
the prevailing prices.

Turkeys Not a Commercial Success.

In the case of turkeys, we find exactly opposite conditions. The
price of turkeys has risen with the price of chickens and eggs,
until one would think that there would be great money in the
business, and there is, for the motherly farm wife who has the knack
of bringing the little turks through the danger of delicate
babyhood. But just as the duck is more domesticated than the
chicken, so the turkey, which yet closely resembles its wild
ancestor, is less domestic and has as yet failed to surrender to the
ways of commercial reasoning, the chief factor of which is
artificial brooding.

The presence of a disease called blackhead has done vast injury to
the turkey industry in the northeastern section of the country. In
the South the industry has been booming. Especially in Tennessee and
Texas, I found great local pride in the turkey crop. I certainly
would advise any farm wife, in sections where blackhead does not
prevail, to try her hand at turkey raising. As to