Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 177, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 July 1912 — Problems in Egg Culture [ARTICLE]

Problems in Egg Culture

Scientific Experiment* to Be Mad* t* Demonstrate the Possibility of Improvement. The Cambridge School of Agriculture is trying to make hens lay red eggs. There is always the best market for eggs which are of the richest red brown in color, and the problem is to develop the right kind of hen. The Cambridge experimenters hope to produce a red egg-laying hen of prolific habit, just** they have produced a strong rust-reslstlng wheat of high yield by working on the curious law of Mendel. Hens have so far proved admirable examples of the working of this law, In respect of single and double combs and in respect of color they are perfectly, obedient to the proper scientific principle. They “behave” as they ought, to use the technical verb. Why should not the eggs behave as well *s the feathers and comb? - There 1* also the subsidiary question of food. It may be possible to alter the egg color by food as well as by hereditary influences. It has been done In the case of canaries.

If Cambridge achieves the poultryman’s ideal of a hen that lays yearly 250 two-ounce red eggs, no one win then say that the universities are not practical or even commercial—New York Sun.