BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 105 



broodino;, and rearing of chickens under Arizona conditions is also 

 being obtained in this work. 



POULTRY EXTENSION. 



Activities in poultry husbandry extension during the last year 

 have been almost entirely confined to the poultry-club work. The 

 demand for literature on the production of infertile eggs, early 

 hatching, and culling has continued, and large numbers of our pam- 

 phlets dealing with these subjects have been distributed. Most of 

 the State agricultural colleges have now taken up these lines of 

 work. 



POULTRY CLUBS. 



f 

 Supervision of boys' and girls' poultry clubs, in cooperation with 



State agricultural colleges, was continued in seven States, where 

 there were 1,186 clubs with 29,480 members, of whom 12,786 made 

 reports from which the following totals have been compiled: Eggs 

 set. 731,709; chicks hatched, 510,478; value of products sold, $94,- 

 791.32: value of stock on hand $382,277.37; exhibits held, 712; mem- 

 bers exhibiting, 5,615; prizes received, $9,681.11. A feature of prog- 

 ress Avas the improvement in qualit}^ of fowls bred by club members. 

 In numerous instances the boys and girls won prizes in open com- 

 petition with older and established breeders. 



PIGEON AND SQUAB INVESTIGATIONS. 



Exi)erimental work with pigeons has consisted in the breeding of 

 squabs, keeping records of breeds for squab production, and breed- 

 ing and training homing pigeons. The loft of homing pigeons at 

 the Behville farm contains about 250 birds. Some of them were 

 entered in the southern pigeon races in the fall of 1919 and in the 

 westei-n races in the si)ring of 1920. They took several first places 

 in both and made the best average speed in the former series. 



i ANIMAL GENETICS. 



In the work in animal genetics the effects of inbreeding, and the 

 crossl)reeding of inlired lines, have continued to be major subjects 

 of investigation. The results for the calendar year 1919 confirm those 

 for previous years. The most important new results have been ob- 

 tained in cooperation with the Henry Phipps Institute, of Phila- 

 delphia, on the factors which affect the resistance of guinea pigs 

 to tuberculosis. A new method of analyzing causal relations has 

 been developed further. A study by .this method of the relative 

 importance of heredity, environment, and irregularities in develop- 

 ment in determining the coat pattern of guinea pigs has been pub- 

 lished. 



A Department Bulletin (No. 905) on the "Principles of Live- 

 stock Breeding " has been prepared. 



ANIMAL HUSBANDKY EXPERIMENT FARM. 



The work at the Animal Husbandry Division farm at Beltsville, 

 Md., has followed the plan of former years. The farm is the field 



24435— AGE 1020 S 



