122 The illustrated Book of Poultry. 



of colour must be secured in the birds purchased as the foundation of a strain ; but hens may 

 be purchased nearly bare of leg-feather if required, and the deficiency counteracted by mating with 

 a vulture-hocked cock. (This and other technical terms will be explained later on.) Where there 

 are several good chickens at command the stock should be purchased to suit them, viz., mature 

 hens to mate with a cockerel, and 'a two-year old cock for the pullets already in hand. 



Having delayed buying till he can buy with judgment, it will be desirable now to provide if 

 possible at least two unrelated pens,* and even more if accommodation can be provided for them 

 By so doing the beginner provides for future crosses, and can keep his strain in Ids own hands 

 without any further cross for some years, when it should be well established and its qualities 

 defined ; and year by year, if he proceeds with judgment, he will come nearer to his wishes. 

 Otherwise, if the plan recommended by some of buying a cockerel every year for " fresh blood" 

 be followed, the breeder never knows what he is doing ; and may spoil all after years of labour by 

 an unlucky cross, which brings with it some lurking fault not visible in the bought bird, and 

 therefore never suspected, but which contaminates the whole yard for that year. The danger of 

 this is all the greater from such constant crossing preventing the home strain from acquiring any 

 strong individual character of its own which can withstand the foreign influence ; whereas if it be 

 carefully bred for some years, the strains of which ic was first composed will amalgamate, and it 

 will develop more or less defined features of its own, by which "Mr. X's strain" will by degrees 

 become known to other breeders. It is in fact the ideal or standard of the breeder which becomes 

 stamped upon it ; and as the eye becomes trained to perceive the finer shades of difference, these 

 individual distinctions between various yards are easily recognised ; just as in the diff"erent herds 

 of Short-horns, all of which arise simply from the diflcrent ideal standards of perfection as 

 conceived by different breeders. 



The principle on which a strain is brought to perfection after commencing is very simple, and 

 consists only in the careful selection of breeding-stock year after year, with a view either to banish 

 defects or to develop beauties. This we must enter into more fully in the succeeding chapter ; we 

 will only add here that too much must not be expected at once. The breeding must of necessity 

 be somewhat uncertain the first year, owing to the different materials of which the yard is com.poscd 

 and the want of experience in mating them ; but each season will mend matters, and there is a 

 pleasure not easily conceived of in seeing year after year the chief faults disappear in your birds, 

 while their beauties become more and more developed, and the proportion of show chickens steadily 

 increases, till you perhaps carry off the " blue riband" of the season with the produce of the very 

 birds which most disappointed you at first. // is your ivork — the result, not of mere money, but of 

 your patience and skill — and it is work of this kind we wish to encourage and see more of Merely 

 to win a prize with a bought bird is nothing ; but to create a new strain better than all your 

 predecessors is to be of some real benefit, and to be a real " poultry-fancier." We have known a 

 poor man sell his best chickens to richer people at ten pounds api/.ce, and beat the purchasers ne.xt 

 year with the produce of what was left ; for in this field there is no favour, and mere money cannot 

 contend against knowledge and skill, which will always come to the front in the end. 



The delay and preliminary study we have been so anxious to inculcate may be dispensed with 

 if the amateur can engage the services of a really first-rate practical poultry-maii or manager. 



* When we say the pens should be "unrelated," it is chiefly the absence of inJividiial relationship which is meant. In 

 many cases, for reasons more fully explained in the next chapter, much trouble and uncertainty in breeding may be avoided by 

 selecting all from the same jwra'. It is chiefly a question of time ; birds from the same strain usually producing the best immediate 

 fruit, while a skilled breeder would probably sacrifice somewhat of this, and in time produce better results from selections which 

 j;ive him at starling a good supply of unrelated blood. 



