THE BREEDING OF CHICKENS 



159 



re\'elatioiis ccmcerniiig the inlieritauce of fecundity. As 

 a stallion bred in a speed-producing line, but not himself a 

 great performer, can only be discovered to be a sire of great 

 speed by the performance of his get, so the actual breed- 

 ing ability of a male bird, with reference to fecundity, can 

 be discovered only through the i)erf()rmance of his daughters 

 at the nest. Under present practice, it is proljably safe to 

 assert that in nine cases out of ten, by the time the records 



Fig. 77 



^. C ^\^ Leghorn, C>regoija, with a five-,\'ear record of 9S7 eggs. She 

 rounded out her 1000 eggs early in lier sixth year. (Courtesy of Oregon 

 Agricultural Experiment Station.) 



of the daughters of an unusual breeder are a%'ailable and it 

 is discovered that he has a whole bevy of high-producing 

 daughters, he is discarded and lost track of, if not actually 

 destroyed. As long as the sire of prepotent sons and high- 

 producing daughters can beget a few dozen chicks a year, 

 he is a profitable investment to any breeder and of great 

 value to his breed. To hope for stability in breeding for 

 production there must be time to judge a male's breeding 

 powers by the performance of his offspring, so that he may 



