88 THE CALL OF THE HEN. 



the trap-nest. The trouble with this method is, that while the hen 

 may lay a large number of eggs, she may not have the faculty to transmit 

 her laying qualities to her offspring, and her cockerels may be deficient 

 in both egg-laying qualities and the ability to transmit what good 

 qualities they may possess to their progeny, 



Again, I have seen a great many cases where poultry-farmers would 

 send away and buy" a lot of cockerels. The man that raised and sold 

 them had no knowledge of how to classify them, and the man who 

 bought them knew he was buying cockerels and that is all he did know 

 about them. He could not be sure whether they would increase his egg 

 yield or not. He had to pay his money and take chances. It was 

 nothing more nor less than a gamble; but the days of gambling in the 

 poultry business are passed for the intelligent, progressive poultryman, 

 no longer will he be obliged to trust to luck or intuition. He will be able 

 to select his male birds with as much assurance as his hens, and instead 

 of groping in the dark, he will have the satisfaction of seeing and knowing 

 just what he is doing by bearing in mind the instructions-in this chapter. 



The reader will by this time be familiar with the different types and 

 capacities of hens, and will not be. surprised to learn there is a similar 

 number of variations in the male birds; and if one wishes to produce a 

 certain type and capacity in a pullet or cockerel, he must select the 

 parent birds that will produce that type. We know how to select the 

 hen; we will now take up the study of how to select the male bird. 



We go through the same movements in selecting or testing the male 

 bird as we do in selecting the hen, but we use a different set of charts. 

 For example, it is possible for a hen to change from six to three fingers 

 in abdominal capacity within a month and be healthy and active, and 

 in another month to return back to her original six-finger capacity 

 but it is not so with the male bird after he is mature. I have tested male 

 birds at nine months of age that scored four fingers abdomen, Vie-inch 

 pelvic bone, that did not change for four years, except that their pelvic 

 bones being 1 /ie of an inch thick at nine months old, I have found them 

 to be */8 of an inch thick at eighteen months old. They had increased 

 in thickness of bone from Vie to Vs inch. These were egg- type male 

 birds; the meat-type will vary more or less in the thickness of the pelvic 

 bones depending on how much flesh they put on or lose between the 

 different times of examining them. 



It will be easy to distinguish the egg-type cock bird from the meat- 

 type bird; the former has thin pelvic bones, whether in flesh or not, 

 while the latter has thick pelvic bones with a more or less lump of gristle 

 on the end of them, whether he is thin or in good flesh. I have found 

 that in classifying the male bird as we have the hen as to type and 

 capacity for a certain egg-yield it requires less abdominal capacity in 

 the male bird than in the female. For instance, the male bird that is 

 two fingers abdomen and Vie of an inch pelvic bone is the same type and 

 capacity for breeding purposes as the three-finger-abdomen hen, Vie-iridi 

 pelvic bone. The male of the same class, as regards capacity, does not 

 require as large an abdomen as the female; this is so self-evident that it 

 would be a waste of time to try to explain the reason for it. 



I have heard poultrymen say that the male bird is half of the flock. 

 I wonder if they stop to consider whether this is so or not. My birds 

 are wonderful layers, and I mate one male bird to every twelve hens, 

 and from a breeder's point of view I consider my male birds a great 



