88 
The Australasian Book of Poultry. 
birds of the previous year, which are three-fourths Jones and one-fourth Brown, and also others of the same 
year, which are three-fourths Brown and one-fourth Jones. 
Tlie system thus far is easy, and the method to adopt is to mate a Cock which is three-fourths Jones 
and one-fourth Brown with Pullets one-eighth Jones and seven-eighths Brown, making up a second breeding 
pen with a Cockerel which is seven-eighths Brown and one-eighth Jones with Hens that are three-fourths 
Jones and one-fourth Brown. For a third breeding pen, a Cockerel seven-eighths Jones and one-eighth 
Brown can be mated with Hens three-fourths Brown and one-fourth Jones ; and for a fourth breeding pen, a 
Cock which is one-fourth Jones and three-fourths Brown with Pullets which are seven-eighths Jones and one- 
eighth Brown. This will produce stock which can be mated one with the other, keeping them as far apart ir 
blood as possible, mating birds two years old and over with young stock, and only selecting as breeding stock 
the most vigorous and healthy specimens, which combine the qualities which the breeder is aiming at. The 
birds breeding would require a pedigree table to be kept, and each year's stock would require to be marked, 
so as to distinguish them. This can easily be done by perforating small holes through the web of the foot 
or the web of the wing, using a red-hot needle for the purpose. There is very little pain attached to the 
operation, and no disfigurement whatever to the bird's appearance. 
If any care has been exercised in selecting and mating the stock to perfect given points, the results 
should be very high, and more than this, the breeder will have formed a strain which can be depended upon 
to breed true, and not sport, as long as foreign blood is not introduced. 
We give these directions to be taken as general principles, not as hard-and-fast rules to be adhered to 
under all circumstances. Possibly, the progeny of the first cross inherited some glaring and conspicuous 
fault which was not patent in their ancestors. In this case a bird may be selected in another yard, and introduced 
to eradicate or counteract the fault. One thing the breeder must definitely do — that is, make up his mind as to 
what point or points he is aiming at, and select each year for his breeding stock those birds which are the 
nearest a[)proach to the desired qualities. 
There are certain rules in breeding high-class stock, and the knowledge of these are indispensable 
to the beginner — for instance, how to obtain size. In this quality experience has proved that the 
hen has the greatest influence, a.nd that a small hen will not produce large chickens in anything Hke the 
proportion desired by the Fancy Poultry breeder (in breeding Bantams, however, the smaller the hen is the 
better). Although the hen exercises the most influence over the size of the progeny, the cock has also some 
influence in this respect ; but, if it is compulsory to breed from a small bird on one side, let that bird be the 
cock. The hen also influences build and shape, but this does not affect the cockerels bred as much as the 
pullets, as the chickens have a tendency to inherit the shape and build of their ancestors of the same sex in a 
modified form, and a skilled breeder can turn this to good account. 
In points of colour the hen in some instances possesses the greatest influence, but in other points outside 
of size and structure the cock has by far the most, and it would require a hen possessing extraordinary 
excellence in these points to remedy any defect in that point or points in the cock. Thus, taking the comb 
for instance, a cock faulty in comb would not produce progeny (either cockerels or pullets) that were not 
defective, no matter how good the hen was in this respect ; but a hen with an imperfect or inferior comb can 
be bred from with fair results, providing the cock excels in this point. 
The same results will also be obtained in breeding for leg-feathering, tail, hackle, or ear-lobe. The cock 
must be good in these points, or none of the progeny will be. The hen may be deficient, but if the cock 
excels in these features some of the chickens will be correct. 
This is accounted for in many ways. Artificial selection has produced and fixed to a certain degree the 
Fancy Points, but which are difficult to retain if foreign blood is introduced, having a strong tendency to 
revert back to remote ancestors. To illustrate this, a cock may be in-bred to a great extent, and possess in a 
marked degree the prepotency to stamp certain characteristics on the progeny ; and a hen of quite a different 
strain of the same variety may be bred to an equal standard of excellence as the cock. These, on being 
mated, will invariably " throw back," as it is called ; and the stock thus bred will in nearly all instances be 
