CHAPTER IX 

 SILVER PENCILED PLYMOUTH ROCKS 



This variety had its birth in the Boston Poultry Show, 1900 Different 

 breeders at work producing it The crosses that were made Wonder- 

 ful quality is shown at the New York Show Popularity begins to 

 decline and quality suffers How to start and breed good Silver 

 Penciled Plymouth Rocks. 



Silver Penciled Plymouth Rocks were recognized as a Standard 

 variety in 1907. Silver Penciled Wyandottes were already an 

 accepted variety, and their existence not only suggested the possi- 

 bility of transferring the beautiful color type of the grand old Dark 

 Brahma to the Plymouth Rock, but single comb sports from flocks 

 of Silver Penciled Wyandottes were material available for use in the 

 production of a Silver Penciled Plymouth Rock. 



The first strain. One of the earliest breeders of this new variety 

 of Rock was W. C. Crocker of Foxboro, Mass. Along in the 1870"s 

 when Breeding Partridge Cochins, he conceived a fowl that would 

 be his ideal of beauty and utility. In writing of this conception in 

 later years, he said: 



It was one with the beautiful penciled plumage of the Partridge Cochin, but 

 without feathers on the shanks to be dragged in the mud and filth ; and, .second, 

 my ideal fowl must be an active, up-to-date, wide-awake American fowl, and not so 

 lazy or stupid it had to be put to bed or on the roost every night. I see breeders 

 of Cochins do not attempt to have them roost at all. 



Dr. Crocker, however, dropped the poultry subject for some years, 

 but in 1899 again took up the matter determined to make what he 

 wanted. He visited the Boston Poultry Show in 1900 and was sur- 

 prised to find that his plan had been anticipated and that Ezra Cornell 

 of Ithaca, New York, and George H. Brackenbury of Auburn, 

 New York, were exhibiting Golden Penciled, now known as Part- 

 ridge, Wyandottes. Crocker was greatly enthused. Cornell and 

 Brackenbury were also breeding Silver Penciled Wyandottes, on 

 which they had been at work since 1894. Brackenbury suggested the 

 breeding of a Silver Penciled Plymouth Rock, or as Crocker later 

 called his birds, Silver Plymouth Rocks. 



Crocker laid the foundation by securing single comb sports from 

 the Cornell-Brackenbury Silver Penciled Wyandottes. These were 

 bred in 1900 to a single comb sport of the fine old line of Dark 

 Brahmas as bred by Newton Adams, Utica, New York. The cross 

 was then assisted by Partridge Plymouth Rock blood, in the same 

 way that the Dark Brahma was bred with Partridge Cochins thirty 

 years earlier and that the Silver Penciled Wyandotte was helped at 

 its origin with Partridge Wyandotte blood. 



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