90 THE BREEDING OF ANIMALS 



Darwin 1 reports that " It has been found in France 

 that with fowls allowed considerable freedom, only twenty 

 per cent of the eggs failed; when allowed less freedom, 

 forty per cent failed ; and in close confinement, sixty out 

 of the hundred were not hatched." 



88. The fertility of domesticated animals. From 

 what has already been said regarding confinement and 

 its deleterious effect on fertility, it might be concluded 

 that domestication is unfavorable to high fertility in 

 animals. This is far from the truth. Domestication 

 furnishes or ought to furnish the most favorable conditions 

 for high* fertility in animals. A regular and abundant 

 supply of nutritious food, shelter from a rigorous climate, 

 and the opportunity for selection by man all contribute 

 to the development of a relatively high degree of fer- 

 tility in animals. All races of domestic animals are more 

 fertile than their wild prototypes. Darwin has pointed 

 out that the tame rabbit gives birth to four to eleven in 

 a litter and breeds six or seven times a year, while the 

 wild rabbit only produces five or six young at one time 

 and breeds four times yearly. The domestic fowl may 

 produce as many as 200 or more eggs in one year, while 

 the female of the wild progenitor of the domestic hen lays 

 only six to ten eggs in a year. The same remarkable 

 difference exists between the domestic and wild duck. 

 The Indian Runner duck under domestication will pro- 

 duce 250 eggs a year, and the wild duck only five to ten 

 eggs in one year. At the Government Experiment 

 Station of New South Wales in Australia, six Indian 

 Runner ducks laid 1601 eggs in one year, an average of 

 267 eggs each. 



1 Darwin, "Animals and Plants under Domestication," 

 vol. II. 



