The Feather's Practical Pigeon Book 



particularly the Fantails, the Jacobins, the Archangels, 

 the Magpies, and the Oriental- Frills. I mention these 

 because they at present are the most prominent; but 

 Turbits, Tumblers, Owls, Swallows, and all the old 

 favorites show the effect of increased knowledge and 

 care in breeding. The difficulty as to increase in the 

 numbers of the fancy lies in the fact that so many, as 

 age comes on, are obliged to give up their pets through 

 the demands of business on their minds and time. I 

 could count by scores men that I have known who were 

 the most ardent of fanciers, who to-day do not own a 

 bird, but there are few of those who, if circumstances 

 would permit, but would return to their love and again 

 take up the pursuit. 



Much has been written as to encouraging the love of 

 pigeons among children, and it is no doubt from among 

 the younger portion of the community that we must 

 look for recruits ; still if it were not for the older and 

 more experienced heads we would not have seen the 

 advancement in pigeon culture that we have in the past ' 

 few years. So let us hope that those maturer minds 

 who are now doing so much to elevate the standsird of 

 pigeons, may long be spared to us to keep up the interest 

 and enlighten and encourage the young. 



The question is often asked by the uninitiated, what 

 are fancy pigeons good for? What are they kept for? 

 CHir answer is always, only for pleasure. And then we 

 enter into a dissertation of how one man finds pleasure in 

 developing the fancy points of such varieties as Pouters 

 and Carriers ; another of Barbs or Almond Tumblers. 

 How one has a passion to possess a fine flock of all the 

 different colors of Swallows. How another makes a 

 study of Nuns, breeding them with an aim to perfecting 

 them to such ah extent that they shall have the neces- 



95 



