COLOR AND STRUCTURE OF PLUMAGE 91 



and the saddle feathers of his back differ from that of the rest of 

 his plumage. This peculiarity of striped neck and saddle feathers is 

 an old characteristic and is exhibited by the jungle fowl. The neck 

 of the Silver Penciled Wyandotte female is also striped, as is the 

 female bankiva. 



Although the Silver Penciled is a comparatively new variety of the 

 Wyandotte breed, the pencil character is an old characteristic, arising, 

 undoubtedly, from coarse stippling in the bankiva. 



In the wild fowl, lacing does not appear, and the details of its 

 production are not known. Spangling certainly preceded it, in which 

 event lacing may be believed to have arisen from crossbreeding 

 spangling and penciling. (See illustrations of early laced and span- 

 gled feathers, Chapter XIII.) 



The Columbian color type has been produced by crossing white 

 fowls on Rhode Island Reds, by crossing white fowls on Silver Pen- 

 ciled, white on Light Brahmas, and white on Barred Rocks. It 

 appears that the lacing in neck and saddle, and the black in wing 

 flights and tail, are black points of the bankiva which often are 

 dominant in breeding; and when a cross is made that eliminates the 

 bulk of the body plumage color, making the general color of the bird 

 white, the exclusion of color is not complete and expression is still 

 given to these black points which make the Columbian color type. 

 Black is inherited in tail by the Rhode Island Red and by those 

 buff offshoots of white crossed on red. 



It is known that the Plymouth Rock owes its barring to that older 

 variety, the Dominique. The barred pattern is carried in hereditary 

 form, and, unlike the Mottled Java, it is not merely an intermediate 

 condition between black and white birds. The inheritance of barring 

 illustrates that there is a factor for this color pattern as well as the 

 presence of pigment to give expression to the pattern. 



Breeding color and markings. Whether we find the color of a 

 variety easy to breed or not will depend upon the success with which 

 we simplify that color type in our mind and master the breeding 

 tendencies of the variety. That means that we familiarize ourselves 

 with the history of the race and the way its different characters 

 behave in transmission. "To know the constitution of the race, to 

 know the factors that lie hidden in the germ plasm, as well as those 

 characters that are on parade, enables the intelligent poultryman to 

 make use of desirable characters to best advantage and, at the same 

 time, to avoid those errors in breeding which result from insufficient 

 knowledge of the fundamental constitution of the race involved," 

 writes Dr. P. H. Hadley, of the Rhode Island Agricultural Station. 



It is not uncommon to meet a man who expresses the desire to 

 own sufficient ground and equipment to enable him to go into "fancy" 

 poultry, and then devote his best thought and effort to building up 

 a fine flock. But fine flocks exist only because they represent an 

 aggregation of a lot of fine individual birds on one plant, and they 



