AN AMERICAN BREEDER ON POULTRY JUDGING.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 287, 4 August 1888, Page 3

AN AMERICAN BREEDER ON POULTRY JUDGING.

Five years since the Standard underwent a revision.; the work accomplished was as perfect as the accumulated experience of years of breeding and judging could make it. Despite an apparent clearness of expression thelanguage.of the Standard was found capable of many interpretations, and two or | three years following the revision of 1883, a constant cause for complaint among exhibitors lay in the very irregular scoring of many of our most popular judges. So far was this incongruous interpretation carried that at times one could read claims of rival breeders', scores being Bicknell scores, Brown scores, and Felch scores. Within the past two years this lack of uniformity has to a great extent been corrected, until today a score from either of the above-men-tioned gentlemen may be relied upon as being within \ point of what the others wouid write, provided always the company, or rather the competition to which the specimens be exposed, be the same. Here was and here is to-day the weak point in our scoring system. How often have we seen in a class of 40 average birds, the win nera run up to 94 or 95. Again, the week following, in a class of medium birds, we find the winners marked 94 to 95. Should we run across a show of wonderfully fine quality we find the prize birds on nc higher plane than those previously mentioned. Perchance at a later show during the same season these three lots of winners, pitted against what would in kennel parlance be termed a " champion class," gain no higher honours (we refer now to scores alone) than did the good, the bad or the indifferent specimens which they had previously defeated. Is this right? Is this just ? No, decidedly no ! But, as the French say, " QueJaireV Here we see birds whose owners, with a pride born of a small success, and about to die of a great defeat, had the temerity to place in the high places to which they were not born ; we see specimens, so pompously crowned with tinsel and glitter, find their level with the poor solace of " Well, Mr X. don't see as did Mr Y." Breeders, I tell you plainly, the last remark does not cover the ground, the trouble is deeper seated ; our judges are human and years since, immediately after the 1883 revision, the custom of giving every winner a score of from 94 to 95 originated, and no man has had the moral force to beat it down. You, I, every man of us, breeders, and exhibitors, who, at great expense attend shows in different parts of the country, and who depend on the scores of our prize winners to sell our stock and eggs, would kick like a mule at a score of 91 or 92. Why? Simply because all about us, our rivals, men whose birds by actual test are no better than ours, and in many instances not so good, are advertising scoi'es that outcount us from two to four points. The man who has not served his apprenticeship, the amateur, the beginner, purchases what he believes to be the best. What can he do but believe Mr A.'s birrt scoring 94 betser than Mr B.s scoring 92? So far-reach-ing has this unfortunate "good natured " scoring been in its effects that to-day a thoroughly posted man, when desirous of proem-ing fresh blood, asks, "In what show does Mr A.'s birds get their score?" and not, as he did four years since. " Whose score does Mr A. advertise ?" To a great extent the personal equation of the judge has been merged into a sort of average reflection of the entire corps of judges. In the place of the unsatisfactory personal equation, a quality so arrogant as to require a life-long struggle on the part of most men to but partially subdue it, thus stalks the grim spectre of the " local equation " if you will, or the effect the surroundings and the competition arrayed against the specimens produce upon the scoring judgment of the judge. We know of numerous cases where breeders whose birds have scored 94i to 95 in some small local show, have sent them to Boston or New York, and although the winners therp scored under 94 and the 94J, 95 points birds were unnoticed, those owners have blazoned forth, " My Strain Champions of the World outscore the Winners at — and — by — points." ,So they did, but hardly in the sam& show. The novice, the amateur, seeing so flaming an announcement, rushes off and buys, -with what results we must ask the novice .-and the amateur to tell us. I am positive all fair-minded breeders will join with me in respectfully requesting the judges to put forth their best endeavours to make their work uniform. Let a 90-point bird be a 90point bird and no more at home, at Kalamazoo and at New York. We all have a grand opportunity to turn over a new leaf. The revision of the Standard, with it« new features of authoritative outlines, permits us to wipe out all the old scores and start with a clean slate. You gentlemen judges have about agreed as to how much certain defects should be cut, now cut the same for a defect when you have 10 birds in line as when you have 500 ; if the best birds in a class of 10 would score but 90 points in a class of 500 cracks, score him 90 and xo more in the class of 10.— P. H. Scudder.