144 POULTRY PRODUCTION 



discomfort will radically affect the reproductive organs, 

 with the very practical result of quickly cutting down egg 

 production. These conditions also tend to lower vitality 

 in both parent and offspring. 



Productive Type. — It is impossible, in our present state 

 of knowledge concerning the correlation between form and 

 function, to formulate a definite and detailed description of 

 the productive type, at all comparable with that of the dairy 

 type in cattle, beyond that indicated in the description of 

 the vigorous type, when taken in connection with the breed 

 types as given in the Standard. The present search for a 

 fowl that will produce white eggs of good size in large num- 

 bers, carry a light pin-feather, and be as easily restrained and 

 controlled as the present American breeds, gives a concrete 

 example of what some of the very practical, though perhaps 

 fundamentally superficial, items that make up the productive 

 type will be. The dark pin-feather is coming into disfavor 

 from a market stand-point because of its unattractive appear- 

 ance upon the dressed carcass. Some packers make a differ- 

 ence of two cents a pound in the price paid for poultry of 

 the same quality with the exception of the color of the pin- 

 feathers. This puts a handicap upon the dark-feathered 

 breeds, which will be much more apparent in the next few 

 years than it is now. The demand for a white egg for table 

 purposes is somewhat less insistent, and is slowly gaining 

 in some sections while losing in others. 



Longevity. — The desirability of longevity as a point of 

 selection has not received the emphasis it should. Its lack 

 is one of the fundamental weaknesses of the business of 

 poultry breeding. It is one of the causes at the bottom of 

 the generally recognized instability of poultry production as 

 a separate and specialized industry. 



In common with other live stock, there are three tests by 

 which a breeding bird may be judged. These are, in the 

 order of their efficiency, (1) the character of its progeny, 

 (2) its own individuality, and (3) its ancestry. 



The actual breeding test as shown by the character of 

 the progeny is worth far more than both the other tests 

 combined. This is increasingly true in the light of the recent 



