own special stamp, "his mark," upon the birds which he will soon 

 call his "strain." There is a farm stamp, too. 



A breeder of fawns who was especially anxious to preserve 

 and continue a certain type, wrote another — a farmer — for birds 

 of that type, to be descended from birds sent out from the yards 

 of the first, some years earlier. It was made plain that only such 

 birds were wanted. The testimony of the first breeder to the 

 outcome is as follows: "I asked, before ordering, if they were 

 just as had of me, and in return the breeder wrote that they were 

 my strain, pure (with the words underlined). When they came 

 and I examined them, I could see that other blood had been used ; 

 the penciling was different, not so distinct, of a prettier shade of 

 fawn, if anything; but they were hardly as good in shape and 

 style, and I was in a panic. I thought I would return them, but 

 finally sold most of them, telling the customers just what they 

 were. The remaining suspects I shall put in a yard by them- 

 selves and observe them." Eventually, it came out that the 

 breeder from whom these ducks came had had one male from a 

 third breeder runing with the females of the first breeder's stock. 

 There was no suspicion of intentional error, as far as I know, for 

 breeder number two was considered honest ; but the incident 

 shows both how soon change of strain is seen in the progeny, and 

 how difficult it is to get just what one wants and definitely or- 

 ders. 



Being a very honest man, the writer of a certain letter was 

 anxious to know about the tendency to flying because he had 

 told customers that a two-foot fence would confine these ducks. 

 I chanced to have a personal word to add to the solution of this 

 problem, because I had bred for some time the very strain he 

 reported as being such flyers, and had never used anything but a 

 two-foot fence to confine them, nor ever known them to fly over it. 

 But it is perfectly easy to train these birds, or any others, to be 

 breachy, by using fences too low or too weak when the birds are 



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