Artificial Selection and Domestication
Some believe that no species of raptor have been in captivity long enough to have undergone successful selective breeding for desired traits. Captive breeding of raptors over several generations tends to result, either deliberately, or inevitably as a result of captivity, in selection for certain traits, including:
- Ability to survive in captivity.
- Ability to breed in captivity.
- (In most cases) suitability for interactions with humans for falconry. Birds which demonstrated an unwillingness to hunt with men were most often discarded, rather than being placed in breeding projects.
- With gyrfalcons in areas away from their natural Arctic tundra habitat, better disease resistance.
- With gyrfalcons, feather color .
Read more about this topic: Falconry
Famous quotes containing the words artificial and/or selection:
“Look not too long in the face of the fire, O man! Never dream with thy hand on the helm! Turn not they back to the compass; accept the first hint of the hitching tiller; believe not the artificial fire, when its redness makes all things look ghastly.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“Historians will have to face the fact that natural selection determined the evolution of cultures in the same manner as it did that of species.”
—Konrad Lorenz (1903–1989)