1 8 OUR DOMESTIC BIRDS 



first eggs are removed or destroyed, the bird lays more, usually 

 changing the location of its nest. In domestication the eggs of 

 most kinds of birds are removed from the nests daily as laid, 

 and the birds lay many more eggs before they stop to incubate 

 than they do in the wild state. 



It is, and has been for ages, the common opinion that the 

 wild birds and poultry, when first domesticated, were capable of 

 laying only a small number of eggs each season, and that laying 

 capacity has been enormously increased in domestication ; but 

 the oldest reports that we have of the amount of egg production 

 indicate that the laying capacity of fowls was as great centuries 

 ago as it is at the present time. Recent observations on wild 

 birds in captivity show that even birds which pair and usually 

 lay only a few eggs each season have a laying capacity at least 

 equal to the ordinary production of hens. Quails in captivity 

 have been known to lay about one hundred eggs in a season, 

 and an English sparrow from which the eggs were taken as laid 

 produced over sixty. 



The constitutional capacity to produce ovules is now known 

 to be far greater than the power of any bird to supply the ma- 

 terial for the nourishment of germs through the embryonic stage. 

 The principal factors in large egg production are abundance of 

 food and great capacity for digesting and assimilating it. 



Incubation. A bird before beginning to lay makes a nest. 

 Some birds build very elaborate and curious nests ; others merely 

 put together a few sticks, or hollow out a little place on the 

 ground. In birds that pair, the male and female work together 

 to build the nest. Even in polygamous domestic birds like the 

 fowl and the duck, a male will often make a nest for the females 

 of his family and coax them to it as a cock pigeon does his mate. 



If the birds are left to themselves and the eggs are not mo- 

 lested, an aerial bird will usually lay a number of eggs equal to 

 the number of young the parents can feed as long as they require 

 this attention, while a terrestrial or aquatic bird will usually lay 



