FOOD VALUE AFD USES OP POULTRY. 17 



so old it will be brittle, and in an old bird, tough and bard to bend 

 or break. Unfortunately there are sometimes tricky dealers who 

 break the end of the breastbone before showing the bird, and thus 

 render the test worthless. If the feet are left on the carcass, they 

 furnish a mark of age. In a young bird they are soft and smooth, 

 becoming hard and rough as the bird grows older. The claws are 

 short and sharp in a young bird, growing longer and blunter with 

 age and use. Spurs generally occur on male chickens. On male 

 broilers and tender roasting chickens they are small; on older, higher- 

 flavored ones they are prominent but flexible ; on cocks they are long 

 and attached to the bones of the legs; on capons they seldom develop 

 until the second year of age. 



Turkeys up to a year old are said to have black feet, which grow 

 pink up to three years old and then gradually turn gray and dull. 



The age of pigeons can sometimes be told by the color of the 

 breast, which becomes more and more purplish as the bird grows 

 older. Red feet are also said to be a sign of age in a pigeon. 



In ducks and geese the flexibility of the windpipe is a mark of 

 youth. It can be easily squeezed and moved when the bird is young, 

 but later grows rigid and fixed. 



Turkeys, ducks, and geese are often marketed with the wing feathers 

 on, while guinea fowl, pheasants, and other game birds are very com- 

 monly sold without any plucking. Capons are frequently marketed 

 with the feathers left on head, hackle, saddle, legs, and wings. When 

 the plumage is naturally handsome it adds much to the attractive ap- 

 pearance of the bird. Since laws for the protection of gamebirdshave 

 become more strict the feathers of some kinds of poultry have come 

 to be valued for millinery and other ornamental purposes. Aside 

 from this, they are of aid to the housekeeper because they give a 

 clue to the age of the bird. If the tips of the quills at the end of the 

 wing are sharply pointed the bird is probably young; the blunter they 

 are, the older the bird 



SEX. 



Commonly it takes a trained eye to distinguish sex in dressed 

 birds, but fortunately this is not important save in the case of capons. 

 When caponizing has been properly done the head is small for the 

 size of the body, ,the comb and wattles are pale and withered, the 

 body plumper, rounder, and larger than in an ordinary fowl, and the 

 spur abortive. If the operation was incomplete, the head will be 

 like that of an ordinary bird and the body less rounded. Such birds, 

 known technically as "slip capons," are much inferior to true capons. 



