March 2012

7 March

All of the cock birds are now in single cages and around half of the hens have also been singled off. The birds are in an advanced state now, I've run a couple of cocks with their intended mates and although I'm yet to have any matings they birds haven't fought each other off which is normally a good indication that successful mating is not that far away.

I'll seperate the remaining hens this weekend and provide nest pans and nesting material shortly afterwards. I know a number of fanciers already have young in the nest, it's always an interesting time seeing how people can get a bit edgey when others have started, however for me it's about my birds being ready not what others are doing.

I've invested this year in some nesting material holders from supapets on-line, relatively inexpensive plastic cone shaped construction that fit on the front of the cages and allow the birds to pull in strands of material at a time. Nesting material all over the floor of the birdroom and cage is one of the few things that really gets on my nerves during the breeding season (petty I know!) so i'm hoping this small investment will bring me some joy in preventing that, or at least keeping it to a minimum.

12 March

A further nine hens were singled off over the weekend leaving just 5 hens in the flight cages, to be singled off this weekend. I've paired a couple of birds up this morning and added a nest pan and some nesting material. One pair is the variegated buff hen off the first page of the site and her half brother, I paired this pair last year and one of their young went on to win it's class and second best heavily variegated in the yellow hen class at the Midland show. I've been running the cock in for a week or so now and noticed he was feeding her this morning, that to me is one of the indicators that she's accepted him as a mate, I'm running them as a straight pair so I'm happy for him to help build up the nest.

The second pair is one of my priority pairings, a 3 year old three parts dark buff cock with my self blue hen, she produced some outstanding birds last year (5 in total 4 of which i kept and the 5th is with my good friend Graham) including my self green yellow hen which was 2nd best self green and sevemth best champion at North West and 2nd in a class of 57 or so self green yellow hens at the North of England. I have high hopes for this pair, the buff cock has produced some real quality for me for the past couple of years (his son, also a three parts dark buff cock) was 2nd at the North of England in a class of 40 plus and 5 or 6 the following week at the Midlands in a class of almost 50, so once again I'm hopeful of the quality.

I seem to be a week or two later than last year, largely due to the fact that the hens were a little slower coming into condition, although wih the lighter nights coming think and fast that's not a bad thing!.

20 March

And we're off!, first egg laid today from the vari buff hen on the home page of the site and the vari yellow cock (on the video gallery) once she's completed the laying i'll move the cock to her full sister, an unflighted bird who has many of the same qualities. 7 or 8 of the birds have now built up and i've seen a number of matings, one or two of the hens are still not showing any real interest.

I intentionally kept back more cock birds this year, 16 in total with 24 hens as the quality was there and i'd plan to run 10 or so as straight pairs to make things a little more straightforward (I've been building up to this position for 2 or 3 years now, making sure the lines were fixed and the quality was there so that the pairs should produce the quality too). At the weekend one of my "hens" decided it wasn't a hen after all, it's the full brother of my best green from North of England, and to be honest i'm quite glad it's turned out to be a cock, it's running with one of my self blue hens so i'm keen to see what comes out from them.

It seems from the discussions i've had that many fanciers are well and truely on with their breeding season, i've heard that some of the big partnerships already have in excess of 50 young. I'll have a target this year for numbers, but as always for me it's the quality that counts!

26 March

All systems Go!!!! busy busy weekend, set my first three nests on Saturday evening, a further 6 hens are laying so the next batch of nests will be set on Wednesday night and yesterday held the AGM for the North West Fife Fancy Canary Club, where i now hold the position of General and Show Secretary.

With the highs there are always lows, lost a three year old variegated buff cock yesterday, no obvious signs of illness and the rest of the stud are in rude health so suspect it's just one of those things that happens. Have a number of his sons in the breeding team and as a consequence will have a very busy buff cock this year!!!.

29 March

A further 5 nests set yesterday, my best green at North of England had only laid two eggs and showed little sign of wanting to incubate so i've marked them and set her two eggs under a pair of clears that i was also setting. She seems in good all round health and as she's a young and relatively late bred hen it's no real cause for concern just yet.

I've another 2 hens who've laid their second egg today, including one of my cinnamon hens, a further 5 hens building up, all bar 2 of my hens have now been mated so all being well should be a good strong first round. One of the advantages of setting a number of hens at the same time, and having birds across the colours is the ability to float eggs across nests, it's something i do quite often if i'm unsure of a hens rearing ability or if she show's little sign of being ready to sit, particularly with some of the key birds in the stud. It's something i will do with the eggs from my cinnamons this year in the first round, I'll let the hen lay and put her on dummy eggs before floating her eggs across a number of nests, as it's a straight cinnamon pairing all of the young should be visual cinnamons and easy to spot!.