Sept. i8, 1916 



Dwarf Eggs 



1013 



egg belonged. Table XXVI gives for every size of clutch the frequency 

 distribution of clutch position of dwarf eggs. 



Table XXVI. — Clutch-position frequency of the dwarf eggs for every size of clutch 



This table (XXVI) shows that 50 dwarf eggs occurred as i-egg 

 clutches — that is, no egg was produced on either the preceding or the 

 following day. Forty-six occurred • in 2 -egg clutches, the other egg 

 being in each case a normal egg. Of these, twenty-six were the first, 

 and twenty the second, of the two eggs. Similarly through the table 

 we may compare the number of dwarf eggs produced in the successive 

 positions in a clutch of any given size. The clutches in which dwarf 

 eggs occurred varied in size from one to fifteen eggs. A study of this 

 table shows no apparent uniform tendency for a dwarf egg to occur in 

 any particular position in a clutch. 



In order to summarize the data for the various-sized clutches, it is 

 necessary to standardize the clutch. A clutch may be conceived as a 

 line of definite length. This line may be divided into as many segments 

 as there are eggs in the clutch. Each segment may be assigned a value 

 equal to the fraction which the distance from the origin to the midpoint 

 of the segment is of the whole length of the line. An egg, then, has a 

 definite clutch-position value expressed as a fraction of the clutch. 

 These values are comparable for all sizes of clutches. For example, 

 the value assigned to the middle egg of any clutch which contains an odd 

 number of eggs is 0.500. A table was calculated which gives the value 

 for each clutch position in each size of clutch. By means of this table 

 the clutch position for each dwarf egg can be determined in terms which 

 are comparable for all cases of dwarf-egg production whatever the size 

 of the clutch. 



