Breeds of poultry are usually divided into three separate classes, depending on the place where the breed originated.  They are the American, Asiatic, and Mediterranean strains.  The leading American breed is the barred Plymouth Rock and for a beginner will probably be the best to start with.

Another very excellent American or general purpose breed is the White Wyandotte.  They are especially valuable as broilers, as they make rapid growth while young.  The Leghorns are the leading breed for eggs.  They are “non-sitters” and, being very active, do not become overfat.  Their small size, however, makes them poor table fowls and for this reason they are not adapted to general use.  The Asiatic type, which includes Brahmas, Langshans, and Cochins, are all clumsy, heavy birds, which make excellent table fowl but are poor layers and poor foragers.  Brahma roosters will frequently weigh fifteen pounds and can eat corn from the top of a barrel.

A beginner should never attempt to keep more than one kind of chickens.  To get a start, we must either buy a pen of birds or buy the eggs and raise our own stock.  The latter method will take a year more than the former, as the chicks we hatch this year will be our layers a year later.  Sometimes a pen of eight or ten fowls can be bought reasonably from some one who is selling out.  If we buy from a breeder who is in the business they will cost about five dollars a trio of two hens and a rooster.  The cheapest way is to buy eggs and hatch your own stock.  The usual price for hatching-eggs is one dollar for fifteen eggs.  We can safely count on hatching eight chicks from a setting, of which four may be pullets.  Therefore we must allow fifteen eggs for each four pullets we intend to keep the next year.  The surplus cockerels can be sold for enough to pay for the cost of the eggs.  If we have good luck we may hatch every egg in a setting and ten of them may be pullets.  On the other hand, we may have only two or three chicks, which may all prove to be cockerels; so the above calculation is a fair average.  If we start with eggs, we shall have to buy or rent some broody hens to put on the eggs.  A good plan is to arrange with some farmer in the neighbourhood to take charge of the eggs and to set his own hens on them.  I once made such an arrangement and agreed to give him all but one of the cockerels that hatched.  I was to take all the pullets.  The arrangement was mutually satisfactory and he kept and fed the chicks until they were able to leave the mother hen—­about eight weeks.  It is also possible to buy one-day-old chicks for about ten or fifteen cents apiece from a poultry dealer, but the safest way is to hatch your own stock.