CHAPTER VI 

 ORNAMENTAL FOWLS, GAMES AND BANTAMS 



Ornamental Varieties. — Some varieties of poultry are purely 

 ornamental in character and purpose. They have no particular 

 virtues as to egg production, neither are they superior for table 

 purposes. The Bantams are in this class. They are raised 

 simply for the interest attached to their oddity or beauty. Other 

 breeds are deemed fancy, by reason of some unusual character- 

 istic, or scarcity, though in reality they may be good layers, or 

 splendid table poultry. Custom has placed them in the orna- 

 mental class, because few are adapted to the farm or general 

 commercial use. It is easily understood that the more varie- 

 gated the fowl's plumage, or the more eccentric its shape and 

 feathering, the more difficult, almost impossible it is to breed 

 them to any degree of uniformity in large flocks. Ornamental 

 breeds almost invariably require special matings, and years of 

 experience to know how to make such matings, hence their ap- 

 peal to the fancier. 



No one will deny that the work of raising fowls for purely 

 ornamental purposes is most interesting, and some fanciers have 

 found a big outlet for their products, thereby making their work 

 profitable, but these cases are the exceptions and not the rule. 

 Those who would enter the poultry industry for pecuniary gain 

 had better start with one of the breeds described in the earlier 

 chapters of this Analysis of Chickens, such as the egg breeds, 

 meat breeds, or dual-purpose breeds. 



The Polish varieties are generally regarded as strictly fancy 

 chickens, though they are known to be one of the oldest breeds 

 of pure-bred fowls. Their ancestry has been traced back to the 



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