124 THE CALL OF THE HEN. 



I used males of my own raising, I should have done better, but I had 

 not. By the way, I found two high-priced and "high-scoring" birds 

 used at the Crookston Station in 1904 absolutely without value, and Mr. 

 Greene now agrees with me fully that they were, although he was at 

 the time quite indignant when I pronounced his costly beauties worthless. 



I may say here that, while I found one very good exhibition bird in 

 this experiment station flock that was wholly worthless as a layer, I am 

 pleased indeed to be able to state that one bird which had taken several 

 prizes for markings, etc., I found to be a priceless layer. I never saw 

 but one bird that came anywhere near being that hen's equal. I found 

 one, however, with very poor markings that outranked any hen but her. 



From this time on breeding hastened matters fully as much as selec- 

 tion, and I soon had or rather, to be accurate, at the end of six years 

 from my first start I had a FLOCK AVERAGING CLOSE AROUND 

 250 EGGS EACH PER YEAR; A FLOCK PAYING ME MORE 

 THAN DOUBLE THE PROFIT MY FIRST FLOCK COULD. Dur- 

 ing the last few years of this period I again and again, for experimental 

 purposes, mated excellent hens with narrow-pelvic-boned males, and every 

 time a crop of pullets that varied greatly in egg-yield was the result. 

 Again and again I bred wide-pelvic-boned males with narrow-boned 

 females with the same results. But wide-pelvic-boned males with hens 

 of the same formation (with the exception now and then at far-apart 

 intervals, a freak) brought excellent layers. Occasionally a male bird 

 failed to transmit well, but this I afterwards found was only when it 

 was wholly lacking in masculine qualities, as denoted by the width and 

 depth of head and back of neck, with other indications common to mas- 

 culinity in all other animals. From this time I began mating wide- 

 pelvic-boned males with my widest hens and a marked increase in the 

 number of great layers was evident in fact, the third year it was the 

 great exception to find anything but first-class layers among the pullets. 



ITS ADVANTAGES. 



The advantages of this method for one owning even a small flock 

 of birds are so apparent that space need not be given to discuss it. To 

 one having a large flock it means, must mean, a small fortune, in addi- 

 tional profit, with no more labor or investment; to those engaged in 

 selling eggs for hatching it is bound to mean everything in the near 

 future. It would be simply suicidal for a farmer, or anyone depending 

 upon the eggs of his flock for the profit, to be so unbusinesslike as to buy 

 eggs for hatching from untested flocks. We do not believe it would 

 be possible to find one who would do so, after knowing from experiment 

 stations and otherwise that the method is unfailing. 



Some of the advantages over trap-nesting have been stated; per- 

 haps the strongest being that we cannot trap-nest roosters. In ad- 

 dition, I might call attention to the fact that trap-nesting a single bird 

 must extend over the entire year to be at all accurate, and would take 

 many times the amount of time it would require by this method 

 to settle the laying possibilities of a thousand pullets. A little more 

 time would settle the laying powers of a large mixed flock at mixed 

 laying seasons, which might require two or at least three examinations 

 a week or ten days apart. 



