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THE AMEBIC AN NATURALIST [Vol. LII 



for use in breeding operations. While there is an evi- 

 dent tendency for a high winter producer to be also a high 

 producer for the rest of the year, it seems also true, as 

 far as the 1913-14 records are concerned— those of 1915 

 being at this writing incompletely worked out, though of 

 the same general order— that there is no special tendency 

 for birds of late start to stop early rather than late. Of 

 course it is essential that a bird lay well in the winter if 

 she is to make a good yearly record, and in this sense the 

 winter egg production may be of value as a measure of 

 fecundity, but good winter production does not insure a 

 good annual production, nor does a low winter production 

 necessarily mean a poor annual production. It is true, 

 however, that birds that make the very highest records 

 must lay throughout the entire year. From the data in 

 hand it seems probable that winter egg production of 

 Rhode Island Reds is not as valuable a measure of the 

 innate fecundity capacity of a bird as it is for the Barred 

 Plymouth Eocks. 



On the average, the flocks, if grouped according to the 

 month hatched, have an annual record that differs by an 

 amount equal to an average winter month's production, 

 viz., 10 eggs, as shown by Table VIII. Or, to put the 

 matter a little differently, the average egg production of 

 pullets hatched in March, April or May is approximately 

 the same from February 1 to November 1. We have no 

 evidence that the early hatched birds, on the average, stop 

 laying earlier in the fall than those hatched later. 



The influence of time of hatching on a division point at 

 thirty eggs is very marked in the Rhode Island Reds. In 

 Table VI the egg production of pullets laying at all dur- 

 ing the winter is divided into an over-thirty and an under- 

 thirty class. In the former are 68.8 per cent, of the 

 March-hatched pullets, 58.7 per cent, of the April-hatched 

 pullets, while of the May-hatched birds there are only 

 26.6 per cent. The means of the over-thirty class are 

 63 eggs for the February-hatched pullets, 54.9 for the 

 March, 46.3 for the April birds, while that for the May 



