White
birds with an odd black feather or two are invaluable for breeding purposes.
In Belgium breeders do not show their Whites so well as we do in this country,
and they do not look so well.
The breeder of Whites should never use birds that show a yellow or strawy tint in the plumage. To keep the purity of colour the Whites should be housed in covered runs, or the sun will turn the plumage yellow. Should a breeder find his birds throwing yellow strawy feathers he should mate a Black hen to a White cock or cockerel, and select the best White pullets for breeding back to their feather. Cockerels from such a cross should never be bred with. Nor should any of the pullets that show signs of any other colours than black or white.
The beaks, legs, and toes of Whites should be white, and the eyes orange.
Cuckoos, generally speaking, are the most typical of the bearded bantams, especially in their possession of the true owly head, the sloping comb, and broad full beards. Cuckoos should have orange eyes, white beaks, legs and toes. Cockerels and pullets often show a trace of blue in the legs, but this is not considered a fault, although the purer the leg the better.
In Cuckoos the finer and closer the stripes on the feathers the more valuable the bird. Birds with four or more stripes on each feather are the more highly esteemed, as birds with only three or fewer stripes are too light for good competition. Mottling in the plumage is a bad fault, as is red in the hackle or on the shoulders. For breeding purposes hens that have a few solid black feathers should not be discarded, but those with the least red should be avoided.
In a general way the pullets come better marked than the cockerels, but this can be avoided by carefully noting the breeding stock, and by avoiding the use of light coloured cocks or cockerels. Cuckoos do not breed so true as the Blacks and Whites, and there is always a large proportion of wasters - some too light, others too dark, others in which the colours are blurred and not distinct. But these troubles will only urge the true fancier on to keener effort, and the exercise of greater care in the selection of his breeding stock. In breeding Cuckoos it is usually easy to pick out the birds that will be the best colour almost as soon as they are hatched, as they usually have a white spot on the head whilst those that will be too light in colour are light blue.
To keep the balance of colour some breeders resort to double mating, using dark cocks to normal coloured and light hens for the production of cockerels, and the lighter coloured cocks with dark hens for the production of pullets. Black Cuckoo bred birds are most useful in the breeding pen. The Cuckoos are not yet up to the pre-war standard of the variety.
Very beautiful are the Porcelains when they are of high quality, but, unfortunately, they too often are irregular in colour, owing to the spangles at the ends of their feathers being shaded, or too dark in colour. The feather of the Porcelain should be a pale lavender-silver with a light cream spangle at the end.
Blues are difficult to produce, and really most disappointing. It is said that the best Blues have been the result of mating a Cuckoo cock to White hens. Blues have also come from Porcelains, and Porcelains from Blues. With both there is a great tendency to throw birds with a creamy or yellow tint when the rest of the colouring is good.
The Millefleurs, or Spangles, breed fairly true to colour, but care needs to be taken not to breed with birds that show too much white, or that are weak or washy in the other colours. To preserve the colour and secure birds rich in colour and with well defined spangling, light coloured birds should be avoided in the breeding pen. There is always a tendency for the chicks to be lighter in colour than the parents, therefore one should use breeding stock that is on the dark side.
The breeder of the d'Uccle bearded bantam has a more difficult task than he who breeds the d'Anvers, as in addition to colour and markings he has also to consider the feathering of the legs, but the difficulty is more apparent than real because the other properties are of greater importance than leg feathering, and a bird that is otherwise good will not lose much by being a bit short of leg feathering.