530 



POULTRY CULTURE 



FIG. 563. Single-Combed Buff Leghorn 

 hen ; a nice specimen l 



in black fowls and in black plumage 

 in all fowls is often due to poor con- 

 dition when the plumage is growing, 

 a point to be considered with due 

 allowance when birds are being se- 

 lected for breeders. The fault is 

 most conspicuous and most serious 

 when it appears in the flight feathers 

 of the wings. If found here in con- 

 siderable amount in birds of a stock 

 which has been quite free from it, 

 the presumption is always that the 

 bird was a little out of condition 

 (perhaps lousy) when the feathers 

 were growing, and that, if in good 

 condition at the breeding season, it 

 is likely to produce offspring that 

 under good growing conditions will 

 be as free from the fault as its ancestry. A breeder working with stock that 

 he does not know may, for once, give to a bird with too much white the 

 benefit of the doubt. Then if the fault seems racial, he should secure birds 

 free from it to breed with his stock, or perhaps get altogether new stock. 



Undercolor. In all the pre- 

 ceding discussions of selection' 

 for color, surface color only has 

 been considered. Undercolor, 

 the color of that part of the 

 soft feathers which does not 

 show as they lie in natural posi- 

 tion, is of nearly equal impor- 

 tance. Defective undercolor is 

 a much more serious matter in 

 a breeding bird than in an ex- 

 hibition bird, though even in 

 the latter it is a serious fault. 

 Standard specifications as to 

 undercolor are in many in- 

 stances lacking, and rarely give 

 the breeder a clue to the weak 

 places in undercolor. 



In all black-red types the 

 prevailing tone of the under- 

 color is slate, that is, there is white distributed quite evenly through the 

 undercolor that does not appear (or is desired not to appear) on the surface. 

 1 Photograph from owner, Monmouth Poultry Farm, Freneau, New Jersey. 



FIG. 564. Single-Combed Buff Leghorn cock 1 



