THE EARTH'S BOUNTY 



of the club is to have males and pullets match 

 as nearly as possible, and experienced breeders 

 discovered long ago that to accomplish this 

 feat it was necessary to keep two distinct 

 families, each specially mated, to produce 

 males and females. 



When I commenced to read up on the sub- 

 ject, "line-breeding" and "double mating" 

 were my stumbling-blocks. I read dozens of 

 articles in different poultry papers before 

 I was able to grasp the true meaning of 

 either. Two perfect birds who match and 

 have won first prize in a show room will, 

 if mated, invariably produce light or dark 

 birds, and as invariably will the indis- 

 criminate mating of two distinct blood lines 

 of barred varieties produce blurred or imper- 

 fect markings. So the only way to get ex- 

 hibition birds is to mate standard-color males 

 to slightly darker females who were sired by 

 the same father. In other words, mating a 

 bird to his half-sister, of a slightly darker 

 color than himself, and the male progeny will 



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