The Corning Egg Farm book, by Corning himself

The first requisite is to breed from a mature animal, from a real yearling hen. The term “yearling hen” is a misnomer, for, when she is twelve months of age she has not as a rule developed into a true yearling hen. The female has five months of growth, ten months of laying, and then she moults, which process varies in duration from eight to ten weeks.

Eighteen Months Old

When she has completed the moult, her entire anatomy has undergone a change, and she is a mature animal, about eighteen months of age, a fit specimen to reproduce her kind, and her off-spring will be strong and vigorous youngsters.

The great mortality one reads of among chicks can be traced more to breeding from immature females than to any other cause.

The general method of selecting breeders for a great many years has been by the use of “trap nests.” Surely the use of a mechanical device is a poor method to determine what hens are proper for breeding purposes, and really the trap nest tells you nothing.

In every pen there are daily a number of eggs which are not laid in the nest at all. To what particular hen does the attendant credit eggs found in hollows scooped out in corners under the dropping boards? It is a peculiarity of “Biddy” that where she sees an egg she almost always decides it is a good and proper place for her to lay another. Thus, on some days, where trap nests are in use, it may be necessary to make a great number of guesses as to which hen did not lay in the traps, but on the floor.

Trap Nests a Failure

There is another reason why trap nests really tell you nothing. Take two females of a pen whose numbers are one and two. For the first few weeks No. 1 surpasses her sister No. 2 in the production of eggs. To this pen, clover has been the green food fed, and of this ingredient the farm has run short. The shipment has been expected daily but did not arrive, and, because of that failure, for four or five days no other green food was provided. Then cabbage was resorted to to take the place of the clover. The pen having been without green food for a number of days was fairly greedy for it, and good, crisp cabbage suits the palate of many hens exactly, and they are very apt to overdo the matter in eating it. A great layer must be a large eater, and so hen No. 1 gorged herself on the cabbage. Her digestive organs were upset, and for a number of weeks she ceased laying, while hen No. 2 continued to shell out a fair number of eggs. The owner of these birds, when it came time for the selection of the breeders, expressed his great disappointment over hen No. 1. She had started so well, and then had blown up entirely, and so she is passed up, and hen No. 2 is accepted as a breeder.

Now, if the anatomy of these two birds had been studied, it would have been found at once that hen No. 1 was much better qualified to take a place in the breeding pen than hen No. 2. The mere fact that the trap nest record of any female shows a phenomenal number of eggs laid in ten or twelve months does not necessarily prove that she is a proper animal to breed from. Post-mortem examinations show in many cases that they are freaks, and, while they have laid a great number of eggs, there was much to be desired in regard to the eggs, as to their size, shape, and color. As a matter of fact it would have been a great mistake to have bred from such an individual.

Type Reproduces Type

It must be remembered that type produces type, and the only proper way to select birds for the breeding pen which will produce progeny capable of great egg production is to thoroughly understand their anatomy. It is impossible to produce a great performer in any line unless the animal is of a build capable of the performance. No one would expect to breed a two-minute trotter from a Shetland Pony.

The hen which is capable of becoming an ideal layer must have a deep keel, a long body, and, as she faces out, she must have an appearance of broadness, and must be the shape of a wedge back to the point where the wings join the body.

The Large Flock System is carried on in the Breeding Pen on The Corning Egg Farm, and it has been most successful. It has been found that the small pen does not produce the high fertility continuously which the Large Flock System does. During the season of 1910, for long periods, the fertility ran as high as 96%, and as early as the first of March it was above 90%. In the season of 1911, eggs incubated in the early part of February, ran above 91%, and during the season there were times when the fertility reached 97%.

The Breeding Pens are mated up two weeks before eggs are to be used for incubation, and early hatched cockerels are used to head these Breeding Pens. It has been found that the mating of cockerels with yearling hens produces a very decided predominance of pullets, and the youngsters are strong and vigorous from the start.

The proportion of mating is one to twelve, and the records of The Corning Egg Farm show that by this method of mating the number of cockerels produced, through the years that the Farm has been in operation, has been as low as one-quarter, and as high as one-third.

The males to head the pens are selected with the same care that the hens are. They are all perfect birds, of large size, and conform as closely as possible to the standard requirements, without interfering with the paramount aim of producing a Great Layer.