Our Domestic Birds: Elementary Lessons in Aviculture

by John H. Robinson

[2] Photograph from Lester Tompkins, Concord, Massachusetts.

Description. Ordinary fowls are rather small land birds. The males at maturity weigh from four to five pounds each, and the females about a pound less. They are plump, rugged, and very active. If treated well they are bold, and with a little attention can easily be made very tame. If neglected and abused, they become shy and wild. The most striking peculiarities of the fowl are the fleshy comb and wattles which ornament the head, and the full tail which is usually carried well up and spread perpendicularly. The head appendages vary much in size and form. They are sometimes very small, but never entirely wanting. The carriage of the tail also varies, but except in a few breeds bred especially for low tails it is noticeably high as compared with that of other poultry. Fowls are readily distinguished from other birds by the voice. The male crows, the female cackles. These are their most common calls, but there are other notes—some common to both sexes, some peculiar to one—which are the same in all races of fowls. An abrupt, harsh croak warns the flock that one of their number has discerned a hawk or noticed something suspicious in the air. A slowly repeated cluck keeps the young brood advised of the location of their mother. If she finds a choice morsel of food, a rapid clicking sound calls them about her. When she settles down to brood them she calls them with a peculiar crooning note. The male also cackles when alarmed, and when he finds food calls his mates in the same way that the female calls her young under the same circumstances. Other poultry and sometimes even cats and dogs learn this call and respond to it. If the food discovered is something that a stronger animal wants, the bird making the call may lose it because of his eagerness to share the treasure with the members of his family.

In adult fowls the male and female are readily distinguished by differences in appearance as well as by the voice. The comb and wattles of the male are larger, and after he has completed his growth are always of the same size and a bright red in color. In the female the comb is much smaller than that of a male of the same family, and both size and color vary periodically, the comb and wattles being larger and the whole head brighter in color when the female is laying. The tail of the male is also much larger than that of the female and has long plumelike coverts. The feathers of his back and neck are long, narrow, and flowing, and in many varieties are much brighter in color than the corresponding feathers on the female. The male has a short, sharp spur on the inside of each leg, a little above the hind toe. Occasionally a female has spurs, but they are usually very small. With so many differences between male and female the sex of an adult fowl is apparent at a glance. In the young of breeds which have large combs the males begin to grow combs when quite small, and so the sex may be known when they are only a few weeks old. In other breeds the sex may not be distinguished with certainty until the birds are several months old, or, in some cases, until they are nearly full-grown.

Fig. 15. White Polish male (crowing) and female. (Photograph from Leontine Lincoln Jr., Fall River, Massachusetts)

The adult male fowl is called a cock, and also, in popular phrase, a rooster. The adult female fowl is called a hen. The word "hen" is the feminine form of hana, the Anglo-Saxon name for the cock. It is likely that the name "cock," which it is plain was taken from the first syllable of the crow of the bird, was gradually substituted for hana because it is shorter. Hana means "the singer." A young fowl is called a chicken until the sex can be distinguished. After that poultry fanciers call the young male a cockerel and the young female a pullet. The word "pullet" is also used by others, but the popular names for a cockerel are crower and young rooster. The word "cockerel," as is seen at a glance, is the diminutive of "cock." The word "pullet," sometimes spelled poulet, is a diminutive from the French poule, "a hen."

Origin of the fowl. Of the origin of the fowl we have no direct knowledge. It was fully domesticated long before the beginnings of history. There is no true wild race of fowls known. For a long time it was commonly held that the Gallus Bankiva, found in the jungles of India, was the ancestor of all the races of the domestic fowl, but this view was not accepted by some of the most careful investigators, and the most recent inquiries into the subject indicate that the so-called Gallus Bankiva is not a native wild species but a feral race, that is, a race developed in the wild from individuals escaped from domestication.

Appearance of the original wild species. The likeness of the fowls shown in ancient drawings to the ordinary unimproved stock in many parts of the world to-day shows that—except as by special breeding men have developed distinct races—fowls have not changed since the most remote times of which records exist. From the constancy of this type through this long period it is reasonably inferred that no marked change in the size and shape of the fowl had occurred in domestication in prehistoric times, and therefore that the original wild fowl very closely resembled fowls which may be seen wherever the influence of improved races has not changed the ordinary type. The particular point in which the wild species differed from a flock of ordinary domestic fowls was color. Domestic fowls, unless carefully bred for one color type, are usually of many colors. In the wild species, as a rule, only one color would be found, and that would be brown, which is the prevailing color among small land birds.