Il6 MAINE AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. I906. 



related birds. The birds are vigorous, of good size, and able to 

 stand Up under hard work. They have good, large, yellow legs 

 and yellow beaks. They are well feathered and barred, but they 

 are not bred for the fanciers or the show room, although there 

 are many fine specimens in the yards. 



As evidence that the function of heavy egg yielding has 

 become fixed in the stock, attention is called to the fact that 

 many male birds have been sent out to farmers and breeders in 

 this, and other states, with which to improve the egg yields of 

 their flocks. The many voluntary statements, from the pur- 

 chasers, telling of the early and heavy egg yields from the pullets 

 gotten by these cockerels, is substantial testimony to the utility 

 of the stock; and added to the known average increase of 2 

 dozen eggs per bird for the hens in the Station flocks argue well 

 for the breeding. 



Other Methods oe Selecting Breeding Stock. 



The only reliable method of selecting breeding stock is by aid 

 of the data secured by the use of trap nests. It is, however, 

 only investigators, large operators, and breeders who make a 

 business of producing birds and eggs for breeding purposes, for 

 sale, who can afford the equipment and expense of operating 

 trap nests. Most poultrymen and farmers who carry small 

 flocks are usually too busy to give the regular attention required 

 by any reliable and satisfactory trap nest. They can better 

 afford to buy the few males required each year from some one 

 who makes breeding stock by trap nesting a specialty. 



There are one or two concerns that advertise to teach how to 

 pick out the pullets that are to be good layers, and how to pick 

 out the hens that have laid well. The price for the system is 

 $10 by one of the concerns, with a bond of $1,000 to keep the 

 secret. The warm friends of both systems tried them on some 

 pens of trap nested birds at the Station with known records, and 

 both parties went away sorrowing at the results of their work. 

 Their systems were unknown to the writer but it does not mat- 

 ter, for both were completely valueless as applied here. 



T\yo others came to show that it was not necessary to use trap 

 nests. One claimed to be able to tell the laying capacities of 

 pullets by the positions of the pelvic bones ; while the other was 

 sure he could tell the yields for the coming year, to within 8 or 

 10 eggs, by the length and shape of the toe nails. Another was 



