The Breeding of Animals

Excerpt from The Breeding of Animals

The problems of the animal-breeder may all be grouped under the three subjects, reproduction, inheritance, development. The mere multiplication of the species is now, and always has been, the major work of the breeder of domestic animals. But the real breeder is not only concerned with the production of mere numbers of animals of a given species but is primarily interested in securing animals possessing the largest number of desirable qualities and the least number of qualities undesirable to man.

How to maintain the good qualities that have already appeared in an individual, and how to cause other and better qualities to become dominant in future individuals of the same species, is the problem of inheritance that chiefly concerns the breeder of the domestic animals. The highest attainments in the breeder's art have come only to those who have had a good knowledge of the principles and laws of heredity. The development of animals from the fertilization of the egg to maturity and their proper maintenance throughout their productive lives is second in importance only to inheritance. The environment of the animal, including food, climate, and exercise of functions, determines the degree of development in the individual animal. The term Development, as used in this connection, has reference to the unfolding of capabilities that have come to the animal through inheritance.

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