THE CALL OF THE HEN. 67 



capacity. If she is five fingers abdomen and two fingers out of condition, 

 we call her seven fingers abdomen, and proceed as above, which gives 

 us the same results. 



There are two other matters I wish to call the attention of the reader 

 to in this place. One is, that I have found hens occasionally that laid 

 a great deal better by the trap-nest than they scored by the Hogan 

 test, but it was owing to a mistake made in measuring their abdomens, 

 owing to the rear of the breast-bone turning up, sometimes almost an 

 inch over normal shape, thus indicating a smaller abdomen than really 

 was the case. The other matter is a more serious one in fact, very 

 serious in some flocks. It is the bagging down of the abdomen over 

 the rear of the breast-bone. Every hen used in the breeding-pen should 

 be examined for this defect, for if one of them is bred from, she is almost 

 sure to transmit her weak ovarian system to her offspring. Some of 

 these hens will make -remarkable egg records for a year or so, then will 

 never lay another egg; and again, the eggs are liable to be very infertile 

 and more or less thin-shelled; and if you have great numbers of hens, 

 you can hardly tell when these hens stop laying for good, unless you 

 trap-nest them, as their pelvic bones do not close up as readily as hens 

 in normal condition. 



An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure in this case, as 

 it is very easy to prevent all this trouble. I meet hundreds of the above 

 hens in my visits to poultry plants, but never have a case in my yards. 

 I examine all my pullets when about a year old for possible breeders. 

 If a hen satisfies me as to Capacity, Type, and Prepotency, I then hold 

 her as if I were testing her for capacity, except that I hold her by the 

 right leg only. I then lay my hand on her breast, so that it (my hand) 

 will conform to her shape, and draw it stowly along her breast-bone 

 (or keel) from front to rear. When my hand reaches the rear, if I feel 

 the slightest indication of her abdomen dropping the least bit below the 

 rear of the breast-bone, I reject the hen as a breeder, and thereby save 

 myself a world of trouble in the future. 



CHAPTER IX. 



PREPOTENCY. 



We will take up in this chapter Prepotency, the science of breeding 

 poultry, so that we can breed with a definite knowledge of what we are 

 doing, and not leave it to intuition or chance. It is an old saying that 

 "like begets like;" this seems to be true in some cases, but seems not 

 to be true in other cases. Students of human nature can readily see 

 where it has apparently failed. Some children will resemble and act 

 like one parent and some will resemble and act like the other parent; 

 then again, some children will be like neither of the parents. Breeders 

 of horses and cattle are well aware of the variations in offspring from the 

 type and characteristics of sire and dam. It is more through persistency 

 in breeding than the general knowledge of any scientific principle that we 

 have succeeded in producing the grand types of animals we see at our 

 State fairs. The breeding of poultry is no exception to the above rule. 



