Unreliable Incubators 19 



qualities. In other words, the whole energy of 

 the fowl is devoted to the one particular pur- 

 pose of producing eggs. So far has this been 

 carried that breeders are now seeking to breed 

 fowls having stronger constitutions, that this 

 specialization may be carried to a still greater 

 extreme. 



The tendency toward egg production has be- 

 come so great that the hen has comparatively little 

 desire to rear young and otherwise exercise her ma- 

 ternal instincts. Almost without exception, those 

 breeds of fowls that are noted especially for egg 

 production cannot be depended upon for natural 

 incubation if any considerable number of fowls are 

 to be reared. Breeders are therefore compelled to 

 resort to artificial incubation, or to keep largely if 

 not wholly, for incubation, some fowls of another 

 breed, whose maternal instincts make them good 

 mothers. Occasionally individuals of the egg 

 breeds become "broody" and under favorable con- 

 ditions prove to be persistent sitters, but too fre- 

 quently the desire to incubate is but a fickle one and 

 indulged in at the expense of the owner who sup- 

 plies the "sitting of eggs." As the hens become 

 older the tendency to incubate becomes stronger. 

 While these fowls are extremely poor sitters, yet 

 so long as they continue to incubate, though it 

 be somewhat rarely, the term "non-sitters" cannot 

 strictly be applied to them, 



