The Effect of Dubbing, Environmental Temperature and Social Dominance on Mating Activity and Fertility in the Domestic Fowl

LOW fertility has been a problem of economic importance to the poultry industry for many years. It is a conservative estimate that 10 to 15 percent of all eggs set are infertile. This represents a large monetary loss to poultrymen each year. There are at least three ways to solve this problem: (1) find a method to detect infertile eggs before they are set, there being no practical method at present; (2) increase the fertility of eggs set by genetic means; or (3) increase the fertility of eggs set by providing optimum environmental conditions for the expression of this character. The results herein reported provide further information on environmental factors affecting fertility. The objectives of these experiments were: (1) to study the effect of dubbing males on their mating activity and fertility; (2) to study the effect of environmental temperature on mating activity and fertility; (3) to study the relationship . . .