OF STANDARD FOWLS 
shown that the side of safety in animal breeding 
is in believing that there is a deterioration. 
Speaking for myself, one experiment along 
these lines embracing a period of four years 
proved to me most conclusively that deterioration 
from in-breeding is a fact. I was breeding Pit 
Games at the time. Cockers of those days and 
even today in eastern New York and western 
Connecticut practiced out-breeding always to per- 
petuate stamina, vigor and fighting qualities. 
They never used a male in breeding anyway re- 
lated to the females. Color and markings were 
ignored. The only qualification was to stand the 
gaff. In-breeding was believed to lower vitality 
and to produce inferior birds. Yet contrary to 
this, Harrison Weir’s book quotes many instances 
of grand fighting strains long and intensely in- 
bred. So moteitbe. Suffice to say my experi- 
ence was vastly different. Desiring to perfect 
feather markings and color from a beautiful pair 
of Pit Games so that the progeny would be of one 
color and markings, I in-bred both sire and dam 
to their young for four seasons. I was careful in 
the building of yards to have them covered to 
prevent contamination from my birds flying out or 
others flying in, and was as watchful in that re- 
spect as every first class breeder of Pit Games 
must be to preserve their one essential quality. 
Yet at the end of four years I had a dandy strain 
of runaways; feather bred in but courage bred 
out. This to my mind was nothing less than a 
deterioration from in-breeding. Believing thus, 
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