Trying the Russian Silver fox experiment with birds?

[QuoVadis]

Ever since I heard about it, I have been fascinated by the Russian Silver Fox experiment. You should Google it if you aren't familiar with it, but basically they tried to artificially recreate the process of domestication like in dogs, but in silver foxes. They did this by testing the foxes for signs of fear (not raising them to be bonded to people) and then breeding each generation the tamest of the tame foxes. Within a few generations they started having foxes react to human presence with wagging tails, whimpering to be petted, etc. despite that they had not been socialized or trained to trust humans. As the generations continued many foxes developed physical traits similar to dogs, like floppy ears and patches of white in the coat. I think it is so fascinating, and if I lived in Russia I would snap up one of the foxes not selected for further breeding as a pet. However over here int he US that will set you back about $10,000!

Anyway, I think domestication is so amazing, it would be super interesting to try to do something similar on a small scale in poultry. I know for example most small species of quail are still considered essentially wild birds, and will not get tame unless they are extremely bonded to humans. Being small and easy to sell they would probably also be perfect for this type of experiment. What do you think would happen if you tried to do something similar with say, blue scale quail? They are flighty and not really domesticated, so you could get like 100 of them, raise them without much/any human interaction, devise some type of test to see how fearful they are and then breed only the top 10-15% of naturally tamest ones. If you did this for generation after generation would you have a more domesticated blue scale quail, more like cortunix for example.

Thoughts? I would love to try this someday! Anyone ever bred really intensively for tameness or personality in poultry before?

 

[GitaBooks]

Silver foxes are awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The only problem is they are severely inbred which leads to major health problems for generations after creation, which is why in the future I hope to work with Domestic Foxes to prevent further health problems. And by working with them, I mean once I get the money to actually import them.
I already have plans to try a Domestication Project on a variety of species to test the changes in them, such as some of the exotic pets people keep, including Hedgehogs, Sugar Gliders, Degus, ect, as well as a few types of parrots (so they don't have to be hand-raised but can be tame and raised by their parents also).

It would be awesome if you did this! Just remember, health is the most important thing when breeding any animal, so always select healthy animals. Cull unhealthy animals, even if they are very tame.

Sounds so awesome! Let me know if you decide to do it!