Breed

“ When the animal possesses much stamina and peculiar merit, which it is desired to perpetuate in the breed, it may be done either in the ascending or descending line, as in breeding the son to the parent, or the parent to his own progeny. ”

“ If the offspring of a cross such as is described in the preceding paragraph are mated with birds of one of the parent breeds, the offspring of this mating will have three fourths of the blood of that breed. If these in turn are mated to birds of the same pure breed, the offspring will have seven eighths of the blood of that breed. Animals bred in this way are called grades until the process has been carried so far that they are practically pure-bred. ”

“ From all sides evidence may be gathered showing a like persistence of varieties among animals. We have our distinct breeds of sheep, our distinct breeds of cattle, our distinct breeds of horses: each breed maintaining its characteristics. The many sorts of dogs which, if we accept the physiological test, we must consider as all of one species, show us in a marked manner the hereditary transmission of small differences—each sort, when kept pure, reproducing itself not only in size, form, colour, and quality of hair, but also in disposition and speciality of intelligence. ”

“ It is certain that he can largely influence the character of a breed by selecting, in each successive generation, individual differences so slight as to be inappreciable except by an educated eye. This unconscious process of selection has been the great agency in the formation of the most distinct and useful domestic breeds. ”

“ In our domesticated animals we know this to be the case, and it is by means of the continual selection of such slight varieties to breed from that all our extremely different domestic breeds have been produced. ”

“ If this rule is neglected—if he draws indiscriminately from all the different varieties or families of a breed—some large, and some small—some long-woolled, and some short-woolled—some medium, and some superfine in quality—some tall, and some squatty—some crusted over with black gum, and some entirely free from it—breeding will become a mere matter of hap-hazard, and no certain or uniform results can be expected. ”

“ He supplies pedigree animals of all kinds to the farmers of all other lands, and he has attained this preeminence by careful attention to the great, indeed the surpassing, importance of purity of breed. ”

“ This artificial selection on the part of man has given rise to the various breeds of dogs, the 150 different kinds of pigeons, etc., all of which breed true. The critical question is, Have these all an individual ancestral form in nature? ”

“ Now we know of no facts which forbid us to suppose that could a breeder continue his operations indefinitely for any length of time—say for a few million years—he could convert the short-horned breed into a hornless breed; that he could go on and thicken the tail, could shorten the legs, get rid of the hind limbs altogether by a series of insensible gradations, and convert the race into forms like the Sirenia, or sea-cows. ”

“ But, in fact, a breed, like a dialect of a language, can hardly be said to have a distinct origin. A man preserves and breeds from an individual with some slight deviation of structure, or takes more care than usual in matching his best animals, and thus improves them, and the improved animals slowly spread in the immediate neighbourhood. ”

“ Domestication has, indeed, wrought wonderful changes and improvements in the breed of many creatures. Horses, oxen, sheep, pigs, dogs, and poultry of all sorts, are increased in bulk, tamed, ameliorated in habit and disposition. ”

“ When the new breed has spread widely, it gives rise to new strains and sub-breeds, and the best of these succeed and spread, supplanting other and older breeds; and so always onwards in the march of improvement. ”

“ Crossing is occasionally used in order to obtain a combination of qualities found in two distinct breeds, and also because it is found to increase the constitutional vigour; but every breed possessing any exceptional quality is the result of the selection of variations occurring year after year and accumulated in the manner just described. Purity of breed, with repeated selection of the best varieties of that breed, is the foundation of all improvement in our domestic animals and cultivated plants. ”

“ With our domestic animals, when a foreign breed is introduced into a new country, or when a native breed is long and carefully attended to, either for use or ornament, it is found after several generations to have undergone, whenever the means of comparison exist, a greater or less amount of change. ”

“ Any peculiarity may be made inherent in a breed by sedulously cultivating that peculiarity. Avoid above all things breeding in and in brother and sister, mother and son, father and daughter—all bad, but the first far worse than either of the others, since the blood of each is the same. The other two are only half so. To perfect form should be added high ranging qualities, high courage, great docility, keen nose, and great endurance. That is the acme of breeding. A few judicious crosses will enable you to acquire it for your kennel. ”

“ If he wish to perpetuate the difference, to form a breed with the peculiarity in question strongly marked, he selects such male and female individuals as exhibit the desired character, and breeds from them. Their offspring are then carefully examined, and those which exhibit the peculiarity the most distinctly are selected for breeding; and this operation is repeated until the desired amount of divergence from the primitive stock is reached. ”

“ The young males, if they breed before they acquire their full colouring, must either be by themselves at this period, or with the barren females, which, as I have already said, separate from those that are breeding. ”

“ As breeders of domestic animals, when they choose certain varieties in preference to others to breed from, speak technically of their method as that of 'selecting,' Mr. Darwin calls the combination of natural causes, which may enable certain varieties of wild animals or plants to prevail over others of the same species, 'natural selection.'
A breeder finds that a new race of cattle with short horns or without horns may be formed, in the course of several generations, by choosing varieties having the most stunted horns as his stock from which to breed; ”

“ This is valuable, in proportion as it shows an animal to be descended, not only from such as are purely of its own race or breed, but also from such individuals of that breed as were specially noted for the excellencies for which that particular breed is esteemed. ”

“ But when we compare the dray-horse and race-horse, the dromedary and camel, the various breeds of sheep fitted either for cultivated land or mountain pasture, with the wool of one breed good for one purpose, and that of another breed for another purpose; when we compare the many breeds of dogs, each good for man in different ways ”

“ The possibility of establishing a breed depended, therefore, in the first place on the natural variability of wild animals and plants, then on the variations induced in animals and plants under subjection to the new conditions brought about by man’s interference, next on the extent to which these variations, natural or artificial, persisted through the series of generations, and finally on man’s intelligence in altering or maintaining the conditions of the environment, and in selective mating. ”

“ In breeding, the smallest individuals which are suitable in other respects for breeders, should be selected in order to keep down the size and offset the tendency to breed larger in successive generations. ”

“ If the very best examples of a breed are selected as the starting-point, and the produce is bred from indiscriminately for many generations, the distinctive points, whatever they are, rapidly decline, and there is also a more or less gradual but sure return to the primitive wild type, in size and even colour of the plumage. The purest black or white originally, rapidly becomes first marked with, and ultimately changed into, the original red or brown, whilst the other features simultaneously disappear. ”

“ These breeds are always produced in the same way. The breeder selects a pair, one or other, or both, of which present an indication of the peculiarity he wishes to perpetuate, and then selects from the offspring of them those which are most characteristic, rejecting the others. ”

“ We see what selection, though acting on mere individual differences, can effect when families of cattle, sheep, pigeons, etc., of the same race, have been separately bred during a number of years by different men without any wish on their part to modify the breed. ”

“ Now it has always been known that breeders could produce a race of markedly peculiar form or characteristics by selecting the individuals possessing this quality in the highest degree and breeding only from these. The breeder depends upon heredity, variation, and his selection of the individuals from which to breed. Similarly in nature new species have arisen through heredity, variation, and a selection according to the laws of nature of those varying in conformity with their environment. ”

“ During the formation or improvement of a breed, its members will always be found to vary much in those characters to which especial attention is directed, and of which each slight improvement is eagerly sought and selected. Thus, with short-faced tumbler-pigeons, the shortness of the beak, shape of head and plumage,—with carriers, the length of the beak and wattle,—with fantails, the tail and carriage,—with Spanish fowls, the white face and comb,—with long-eared rabbits, the length of ear, are all points which are eminently variable. ”

“ The wild breed, from being untameable, can only be kept within walls or good fences; consequently very few of them are now to be met with, except in the parks of some gentlemen, who keep them for ornament, and as a curiosity ”

“ Concerning parents of pure and mixed breeds respectively, severally tending to reproduce their own structures in progeny, we may therefore say, figuratively, that the house divided against itself cannot withstand the house of which the members are in concord.
Now if this is shown to be the case with breeds the purest of which have been adapted to their habitats and modes of life during some few hundred years only, what shall we say when the question is of a breed which has had a constant mode of life in the same locality for ten thousand years or more, like the quagga? ”

“ From a species in this condition modern poultry breeders have made hundreds of distinct varieties. The easiest method of making a variety in domestication is to select specimens for breeding as near the desired type as possible, and to breed only from a few individuals in each generation which come nearest to the ideal type. ”

“ In our domestic breeds the difference is never greater, but is often less, and varies much in degree even in the sub-breeds of the same main breed. Thus in certain Game fowls the difference is as great as in the parent-form, whilst in the black and white sub-breeds there is no difference in plumage. ”

“ The longer a type has been fixed the greater the certainty that the law “like produces like” will be justified; and to secure the best results it is of the first importance that we should study the pedigrees of the animals from which we propose to breed. ”

“ In making the selection of the gilt, consider the pedigree and the individuality of the animal. Unless you know the pedigree it is best to leave that to the reliable breeder with whom you are dealing. ”

“ It is probable that, apart from preferential mating, the varieties thus produced will tend to breed together rather than to be crossed with the parent form or varieties living under different conditions. ”

“ Though in some cases—as that of dogs—community of origin will perhaps be disputed, yet in other cases—as that of the sheep or the cattle of our own country—it will not be questioned that local differences of climate, food, and treatment, have transformed one original breed into numerous breeds now become so far distinct as to produce unstable hybrids. ”

“ There is no doubt that breeds may be made as different as species in many physiological characters. I have already pointed out to you very briefly the different habits of the breeds of Pigeons, all of which depend upon their physiological peculiarities,—as the peculiar habit of tumbling, in the Tumbler,—the peculiarities of flight, in the “homing” birds,—the strange habit of spreading out the tail, and walking in a peculiar fashion, in the Fantail,—and, lastly, the habit of blowing out the gullet, so characteristic of the Pouter. ”

“ Whether the whole amount of difference between the various breeds has arisen under domestication is doubtful. From the fertility of the most distinct breeds [13] when crossed, naturalists have generally looked at all the breeds as having descended from a single species. ”