POULTRY PRODUCTION AND POULTRY INDUSTRY 31 



Back of these shows, which are comparatively seldom held 

 for profit, are usually to be found an enthusiastic group of 

 fanciers organized into a more or less local association. 



The characteristics or points by which competing birds 

 are compared, are those beauties which, taken collectively, 

 make up the bird representing the prevailing fashion. The 

 useful type has not been made the basis of the show type 

 with poultry to nearly so great a degree as with other food- 

 producing animals or with draft horses. Improvement in 

 this line during the last few years, however, has been very 

 marked, and there is a noticeable tendency for those fanciers 

 who carry on breeding operations to become breeders from 

 the stand-point of production. 



It is to the credit of the fancier, however, that there are 

 distinct types and breeds of poultry. Both breeders and 

 producers are under lasting obligations to them for the 

 possibility of that uniformity which is so essential as a basis 

 of successful feeding in flocks, and in marketing modern 

 high-class products. 



A second reason why the fanciers outnumber the breeders 

 is that there has been no merit system in general use for 

 purchasing poultry products, and hence there has been little 

 incentive toward improved products. When market poultry 

 and eggs are universally purchased from the farmer on the 

 basis of their quality, as cream is bought on the basis of 

 butter-fat content in many sections, and a better price is 

 paid for good goods than for poor goods, poultry breeding 

 in the best sense will become a practice and the number of 

 production-breeders will more nearly approach that of the 

 fancier-breeders . 



A third cause has been the lack of anj'thing like definite 

 rules of selection in production-breeding practice. There are 

 now happily being worked out certain correlations between 

 form and function wdiich are giving some characteristics at 

 least, of a producing type. With the increase in knowledge 

 concerning the inheritance of egg production, the growth of 

 the practice of pedigree breeding and of the dependence 

 upon the progeny test in estimating the breeding value of a 

 given bird this cause bids fair to disappear. 



