216 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



production in general, whether of meat, milk, or other desirable 

 qualities. 



The experiment in breeding hybrid poultry from Barred Plymoutji 

 Rocks and Cornish Indian Games is progressing well. By the appli- 

 cation of the Mendelian principles it has been possible to combine in 

 one strain the good meat quality of the Cornish Indian Game with 

 the good laying quality or the Barred Plymouth Rock. The new 

 type thus created seems to be a very desirable one from the utility 

 standpoint. Tlic study of egg production of these h3'brids has 

 resulted in bringing to light important evidence regarding a type of 

 inheritance — sex limited — hitherto but little understood. 



In connection with the work in breeding for egg production a 

 detailed study of factors influencing the fertility and hatching qual- 

 ity of eggs has been made, which shows that this quality is a definitely 

 inherited character which may be improved by selective breeding. 



In general the plans for the future contemplate a continuance and 

 further development of the work already under way. 



INDEPENDENT INVESTIGATIONS. 



During the year the poultry investigations at the Bureau Experi- 

 ment Station have been continued. The comparison of the dry and 

 moist mash and the hopper systems of feeding, begun in the fall of 

 190G, were brought to a close in the fall of 1909. This work has been 

 carried through the three years, and three successive generations of 

 fowls have been used. The results have been so variable that no 

 definite relation between egg yield and method of feeding has been 

 established. 



During the year a feeding test was begun with cotton-seed meal to 

 see whether it had any harmful effect on laying hens. Five pens of 

 fowls were used in this test. In addition to a grain ration, which 

 each pen received, there was fed to one pen a mash containing about 

 80 per cent of cotton-seed meal, and to another a mash containing 

 about 18 per cent; and there were fed to the other pens, as checks, 

 mash containing from 12 per cent to 40 per cent of linseed meal. 

 The mash containing 30 per cent cotton-seed meal was as rich a 

 cotton-seed mixture as the hens would eat readily. This experiment 

 has been running six months and no harmful effects Avhich can be 

 attributed to the cotton-seed meal in the ration have been noted. 



A short experiment to determine the palatability of soy beans and 

 cowpeas as a feed for laying hens was carried on. Three pens were 

 used, each receiving in addition to their mash a grain feed composed 

 in the check pen of equal parts of wheat and whole corn, and in the 

 other pens cowpeas and soy beans in place of the wheat. After a 

 few days both the cowpeas and the soy beans were eaten readily and 

 apparently relished. The hens seemed to do quite as well on the 

 cowpeas or the soy beans as on the ration containing wheat. 



During the winter dried beet pulp was tried to some extent as a 

 green feed. This material furnished a green feed which seemed to 

 be quite palatable, cheap, and generally satisfactory. 



The work at Bethesda has been greatly handicapped by the reap- 

 pearance in the flock of coccidiosis or white diarrhea, the disease 

 which caused so much trouble last year. This has rendered it impos- 

 sible to rear satisfactory young stock, those escaping death being 



