POULTRY YARD

Taranaki Daily News, 11 October 1928, Page 14

POULTRY YARD

BY

G. H. AMBLER

GREAT LAYERS. IS PROUFICNESS HEREDITARY? One of our best-known breeders recently asked me the above question. His opinion was that they did not. Heredity is a great and important factor in egg-production, and the experience of myself and others is that it does tell in egg-production even as it does in all the other properties that one breeds for. The records of our laying competitions show us that strain has much to do with success. However, no one would be foolish enough to say that every hen from a prolific etrain would lay equally as well as every other. There is no principle of heredity that will make an exceptional layer that yields 280 to 300 eggs a year give progeny that will lay a like number. No one can say how much or how little of the male and female elements are transmitted in the course of reproduction to form the newborn chick, hence the inability to judge the accurate effect of the mating. Some strains tend one way, some the other. If we could forecast the actual transmission of inherited qualities as far only as it concerned laying qualities, we should all of tu very promptly see that none of our hens would ever lay fewer than 300 eggs per annum, but we cannot do it, because the tendency to variation is great, and, in fact, the variation is greater in some strains than in others, and this variation is due to the fact that the owners do not exercise the same care in the selection of their breeding stock as do others in which the variation is not so great.

All practical breeders know that in gome strains the prepotent power is on the aide of the cocks, and that, when due care is not exercised in the selection of the cocks and cockerels, the tendency is for that strain to fall away instead of advancing. This shows the value of an accurate knowledge of the pedigree of all breeding birds, and the qpre that should always be exercised in selecting and mating for the improvement of the egg-laying capacity. The maintenance and improvement through successive generations of any characteristic depend on mating sexes, both of which are strong in that characteristic. The only way to maintain progress is to have both male and female from pedigree ■tock of good laying records, so that on whichever side the prepotent factor is •trongcr there will be no retrogression of • serious nature in the laying quality of the offspring. If both sides of a mating are from proved stock then the trend Of the mating is towards high fecundity, and though either side may dominate in prepotent power, the tendency will be towards increased egg-laying quality in the progeny. In this way only can success be obtained. STRUGGLING AGAINST REVERSION. It must ever be borne in mind that in attempting to produce very high record layers, we are fighting against nature, and that she is ever waiting the opportunity to upset our schemes, and immediately wo falter elie steps in and takes advantages of our weakness. The development of the egg-laying quality is always affected by the inherited tendency to reversion, which crops up at times unexpectedly in most floeks of poultry, because of the all-powerful prepotent influence that is operating. The actual workings of the natural laws governing the development of all animals are elusive, and we must recognise that traits and individual characteristics are not steady and permanent, but are ever subject to variation. In fact, the dominant factor in uncontrolled, or careless, breeding seems to be that of variation, which in itself must render more or less haphazard the results of breeding. If this were not the case, how easy it would be in poultry breeding after we have established all the properties we seek to obtain, to go in producing stock of the highest standard by simply mating the progeny year after year without due regard to the fact that nature is working in the opposite direction to ourselves. WHAT IS A 300 EGG STRAIN? We hear people talk of their 300 egg strain, and they tell us in their advertisements that they can sell eggs and chickens from that strain. I say that no one has owned a 300 egg strain. Many of us have had odd birds that have laid 300 eggs or more in their pullet year, but one or two, or even half-a-dozen such birds do not make a strain, and one can only speak of a strain by its flock average. The average of the flock, be it 150, 200, or 210, or more, is the figure by which the strain should be known. THOUGHTFUL SELECTION. Thoughtful selection and mating causes the. egg record to rise and the tendency to variation to decrease, but there is ever the tendency to swing back to the average of the whole flock, in spite of our great expectation and care in mating, and this is one of the indisputable facts that show the fallacy of placing great importance on the extraordinary layer. The progeny of the phenomenal layer shares in the inherited tendency to revert to the average flock production, and the wise breeder aims to lift the flock average, which has some permanency. In the record breaker there is no permanency; it is at the best a fleeting success. Parents may excell in heavy laying records, but the laying of the progeny will tend backwards towards the average of the line, and great laying capacity can ba perpetuated only by the continual exercise of the greatest vigilance in the selection not only of the females but also of the males, and if one is more important than another it is the latter. It is not possible at all times to accurately judge hens by their sons, or cocks by their pullets, because the deeper forces of heredity operate in every mating, and the inheritance of fecundity is governed by the dominant prepotent power in that mating. Poor laying power may be inherited by the pullets from either the male or the female parent, and the game applies to good laying quality. Selection on the basis of high producing hens or pullets without due regard to the male elements will not give any permanent increased egg production, even if this method be long continued. Improvement will come only from continuous systematic selection breeding based on, and operated with a full knowledge of the near-by inherited qualities of both cock and hen. We must definitely know the egg record of our breeding hens, and also the record of the hens from which the cockerels are descended.

Whilst I do not agree with those who contend that a phenomenal layer never produces a phenomenal layer, I do agree that such birds are in the minority and not the majority. If phenomenal layers never handed on their properties, we should make no advance, we should be still thinking 130 a good flock average. “Like produce like” when handled by the careful thoughtful breeder, the man who knows that he is fighting against nature and is always on the look-out for the slightest tendency to reversion. Therefore I say that rightly mated phenomenal layers can and should hand on their prolificness. ANSWER TO CORRESPONDENT. Fenton Street, Stratford. —Keeping eggs for incubation. It is a great pity you have to keep the eggs for four weeks before putting them in the incubator, as doing so will considerably depreciate the hatch. However, from the first day of collecting the eggs lay them on their side in a flat tray or shallow box or towellling, and lay another piece on the top of them. The eggs might be turned a third of the way round whenever you add a new lot to them. You ask whether eggs a month old are suitable for incubation, and if you are thinking of a really good hatch we must say they are not very suitable. It is not impossible to hatch eggs that are over a month old, but if you could get them down under 10 days you would get very much better results.