The familial incidence of spontaneous osteopetrosis gallinarum

Abstract

Thirty-nine spontaneous cases of osteopetrosis have been studied in the Onderstepoort experimental flock of fowls, and the disease has shown a striking tendency to affect some families more than others. Evidence has been advanced indicating that a susceptibility to the disease depends on a recessive character. There is also some indirect evidence that susceptibility depends on a unifactorial recessive. Malignant conditions, such as leucosis and carcinosis, were not found more frequently in fowls with osteopetrosis than in the flock as a whole. Families stigmatized with osteopetrosis almost never provide birds worthy of inclusion in a high class breeding pen. We have stated the grounds on which a hen should be admitted to a good breeding pen, and we have indicated what success has crowned our efforts to evolve a strain of fowls resistant to neoplastic conditions, while being also highly desirable in all other respects. The literature dealing with osteopetrosis in fowls and man has been reviewed and the points of similarity and dissimilarity have been discussed.