ABSTRACTS. 299 



5. No test of the progeny of particular matings with respect 

 to their laying ability. 



This may be diesignated as the period of mass selection. 



2. The Period from ipo8 to ipi2. — •For reasons which ha^'e 

 been fully set forth elsewhere^ it was decided not to continue 

 the breeding along the same plan after 1907. The new plan, 

 put into operation first in the breeding season of 1908, was 

 calculated primarily to furnish definite information regarding 

 the mode of inheritance of the character winter egg production. 

 It involved essentially the following items : 



1. Trap-nest record of the performance of each individual 



female. 



2. The selection of both males and females was made on a 



double basis, including in addition to the individual's 

 own performance as in the earlier plan, also the idea 

 of progeny performance. In practice this worked 

 out for hens in the following way; Plans were made 

 to see whether there could be formed by selection 

 and propagated three distinct strains of winter egg 

 producers, namely, high, mediocre and low. This 

 involved, on the individtial performance side, the sepa- 

 rate selection in the first years of three classes of fe- 

 males as breeders: (a) good winter producers, with 

 records before March i of above 30 eggs; (&) medi- 

 ocre winter producers, with records below 30 eggs ; 

 and {c) poor winter producers, which laid no eggs be- 

 fore Alarch i. The division at 30 eggs was, after the 

 first year, merely a nominal one in the selection of 

 high producers. Actually only birds were used in the 

 a class whose records materially exceeded 30 eggs, 

 running up to over 100 eggs in some cases. 

 The progeny performance idea was carried out in two 

 ways in the breeding. In the first place, no female 

 was selected for the high winter production breeding 

 pens, for example, unless, in addition to her own hig'i 

 winter record, all her sisters and her dam, were hign 

 producers. In the second place, of all females ful- 

 filling the above qualification only those were bred a 



'Pearl and Surface, loc. cit. 



