Mutations among Birds 



The Golden Pheasant (Chrysolophus pictus) 

 produces, in domestication, the dark-throated 

 form (C. obscurus), in which the cock has the 

 throat sooty-black instead of buff, and the 

 scapulars or shoulder feathers black instead of 

 red. Moreover, the two middle-tail-feathers are 

 barred with black and brown like the lateral 

 ones, while in the ordinary form they are spotted 

 with brown on a black ground. The hens have 

 a chocolate-brown ground-colour instead of 

 yellow-ochre as in the normal type. The 

 chicks are likewise darker. 



The common duck, in domestication, when 

 coloured like the wild mallard, sometimes pro- 

 duces a form in which the chocolate breast and 

 white collar of the drake are absent, the pencilled 

 grey of the abdomen reaching up to the green 

 neck. In this mutation the duck has the head 

 uniformly speckled black and brown, and lacks 

 the light eye-brow and cheek-stripes found in 

 the normal duck. Both sexes have the bar on 

 the wing dull black instead of metallic blue. 



The ducklings which ultimately bear this 

 plumage are sooty-black throughout, not black 

 and yellow like normal ones. 



The phenomenon of mutation is not confined 

 to animals in a state of domestication. The 

 common Little Owl of Europe (Athene noctud] 

 has produced the mutation A. chiaradia in the 

 wild state. In this the irides are dark, instead of 

 G 97 



