522 



THE BOOK OF POULTRY. 



specimens of. You wish to breed cocks, say. 

 Put your pen together thus: heavily-marked 

 cockerel, beetle-green laced, good dark face and 

 orderly comb ; and to him two or three good 

 shaped, but lightly laced pullets. Be sure and 

 have shape in the hens, and perfect colour 

 and markings in the cock. In pullet-breeding 

 use a lightly laced cockerel, with pullets a trifle 

 too heavily laced for the show-pen. See that 

 every bird in both pens is laced to the wing-end. 

 Have no failures there, or on breast or tail 

 coverts, and use no rusty lacing in the pro- 

 duction of your stock. See that every feather 

 is clean from smut, splash, or other "ground" 

 defect. As a pullet-breeder, a cock with sickles 

 or any tendency thereto is much to be preferred, 

 by reason of his greater fertility. In pullet- 

 breeding you want a good amount of heavy 

 lacing down the thighs, tail coverts, and tail. 

 This is very important. For both cockerel and 

 pullet pens invariably select a small cock rather 

 than small hens. I say hens, for they are always 

 preferable in a Sebright pen to pullets, by reason 

 of the delicacy of the chicks. A pullet has not 

 come to maturity, and hence has not gained her 

 full strength ; though if she be very forward and 

 well grown and in good health generally, there 

 is no reason why such a one should not be tried 

 with the hens. 



In concluding the consideration of Sebrights, 

 I must yet once again urge the necessity 

 for in-breeding, and also keeping to one strain. 

 It plays havoc with all breeding to go mixing 

 strains promiscuously. If you want to do 

 well, then purchase a first-rate breeding pen 

 from some well-known and established breeding 

 strain. Get the birds as above described with 

 a specific object in view, and stick to that strain, 

 certainly until you have reached the limit of its 

 breeding powers, and never be driven, so long as 

 you can rear chicks fairly easily, to go in for new 

 blood. A time does come when a change must 

 be made, but it is a time of crisis with the 

 breeder, and he may undo more in a single 

 season, by an injudicious cross, than he may 

 be able to set right again possibly in the next 

 ten years. Go for new blood to as near your 

 own as you possibly can. Get a cock that has 

 come from the same strain as jour own, and 

 you will be able to go on again as success- 

 fully as before. 



No breed of Bantams has made more pro- 

 gress of late than the Pekins, named 

 Pekin from the city whence came the first 



Bantams. pair of Buffs in iS6o, small birds cer- 

 tainly, but wanting in many of the 

 show points of to-day. At the present time the 



subdivisions of the variety are legion. We have 

 now Buffs, Blacks, Whites, Cuckoos, Partridges, 

 and Mottles ; a grand array with many admirers, 

 a Club to themselves, and presenting no trifling 

 competition to breeders or exhibitors of other 

 varieties. So great is their excellence, that if 

 we except the very best specimens of Bufif 

 Cochins, the Pekins excel all other varieties of 

 their larger congeners. As a proof of their 

 immense popularity, at Liverpool show in 1899 

 there were exhibited in one class thirty-eight 

 specimens of Buff Pekins, whereas the Rose- 

 combs, with two classes, only mustered thirty- 

 nine entries ; and while the cup for the best 

 variety Bantam cock was taken by a Black 

 Rosecomb, a fine fellow too, that for the best 

 variety hen fell to a Black Pekin, which, like 

 the Rosecomb cockerel, was deemed as near 

 perfection as it was possible to attain. 



Pekins can be kept almost anywhere, if they 

 can be liberally supplied with fine sand, chaff, or 

 peat moss dust to keep the foot-feather un- 

 broken and in good order. Use this liberally 

 both in pen, and in the sleeping quarters : it is 

 the only way to preserve the foot-feather in decent 

 trim, and this feathering is so important in the 

 show-pen, that too much care cannot be exer- 

 cised. They are capital layers of tinted eggs, 

 and they come on to lay early in the year, 

 so that by the time the breeding-season is over, 

 there is generally a good supply of eggs, both 

 for incubating and for sale. The chicks are very 

 easily reared, and thrive under circumstances 

 trying to other varieties. As with all other 

 feathered-legged breeds, a little scheming is 

 necessary for the production of fertile eggs ; but 

 if the feathers on the feet of the cock be cut 

 short, and also those around the vent of the 

 hens,' no difificulty is found on this score. 

 It will therefore be seen that one ought not 

 to use exhibition birds as stock birds, and the 

 great breeders and exhibitors employ proper 

 stock-birds apart from their show specimens. It 

 is a wise precaution, and procures stamina and 

 health in the offspring. The Pekin hen is a 

 capital sitter and mother. Though she will lay 

 a decent number of eggs in ar season, yet she 

 will have an incubating turn after every dozen 

 eggs or so. This fact, added to the feathered 

 feet, constitute the only two real difficulties 

 in keeping Pekins. if the Pekin hen be 

 crossed with a Silky cock, they produce the 

 very best sitters for Bantams that can be 

 produced, which cannot be equalled either as 

 sitters and mothers for Bantam chicks. No 

 wonder Pekins are such favourites, when wasters 

 in pullets will readily fetch 4s. to 5s. each from 

 January to April as broody hens. 



