38 



THE AMERICAN BREEDS OF POULTRY 



have carried the lantern to the poultry house because they were 

 interested in the birds that were roosting there, are the men who 

 have given us the breeds. They have had in their nind's eye "the 

 better fowl," and we need to recognize and appreciate the contribu- 

 tions that they have made. 



Breeders supply seed stock. The fancier-breeder is a negligible 

 minority in the production of poultry and eggs for human consump- 

 tion, but as the producer of seed stock for a great animal industry, 

 he is the master key. Where is the farmer who has decided to get 

 better poultry, a more uniform and more productive flock, to get this 

 better stock except from a breeder of Standardbred poultry? 



There are those who profess to be interested in utility alone. But 

 when they come to buy foundation stock they do not purchase mon- 

 grels; instead, they secure stock birds, eggs for hatching, or chicks 

 of the improved races. Who established these breeds and varieties? 

 If devoid of the breeding instinct, the commercial poultryman does 

 not improve the stock which he carries on his plant any more than a 

 feeder of hogs improves the breeds of swine. Indeed, the breeders 

 who made the breeds, who are the custodians of the standards to 

 which they are bred, who from year to year reinvest the blood 

 of the best poultry of America and bring forth a new generation, are 



First prize_ pen of Buff Plymouth Rocks at the Kentucky State Show, 1898. 

 Here is a reddish-buff male and four females that are buff only in hackle. Only 

 the conscientious study and painstaking work of constructive breeders has developed 

 the pure buff birds of today. Let those who would belittle the work of fanciers 

 realize that such a pen as is here illustrated would today be typical of the variety 

 were it not for the fancier-breeders, 



