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ISSN 1492-8132
Issue 153, © 2006
No reprints without permission
Sponsor's Space
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The folks at Bird & Cage aim to provide bird keepers with a great selection of great quality birdcages and accessories for very good prices, along with some of the best customer service you will find anywhere.
A recent customer says,"Just wanted to let you know that I received my cage in perfect condition. It is very nice, roomy, and sturdy. Not hard to put together at all. I have ordered cages from you in the past, and this is by far the best. Worth every penny, and very affordable! I am so thrilled that I plan on ordering another one for my owl finches in a couple of weeks! Thanks so much for all your help, I am so glad we found you!"
Owners of smaller birds will want to see the NEW oversized breeding or flight cage with 1/2 inch bars in durable wrought iron. This new cage is even better than the 480! Meanwhile, parrot owners will want to check out the NEW stainless steel parrot cages; built to last a lifetime, gorgeous, and super-easy to keep clean, too!
Everybody will appreciate the wide selection of flight, pet, and breeder cages thoughtfully presented in a series of easy-to-browse listings. You can save 20% in the Sidewalk Sale of overstocked cages, and on the rest of the site you will find a wide assortment of breeding cages, all kinds of cage accessories, a variety of stands and playstands, and some of the best flight cages anywhere. There's even free shipping if you live in the continental US!
For more details, please visit BirdandCage.com.
Bird Site Review
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Here's a site that offers visitors the chance to own our own pieces of bird-keeping history! Offering original colour plates from antique fallen-apart books, these rare, lovely, hand-painted lithographic prints are still colour-perfect, a hundred or more years after they were painstakingly hand-painted in exquisite detail and stunning colours.
Each picture is in good condition (or better), and could be the perfect gift for those antique art collectors or bird-lovers in your family. Or maybe you simply enjoy having beautiful antique pictures on your walls for everyone to admire!
Many of these pictures are quite valuable, and will make a good investment, since their value will continue to increase as they age. Each is available in limited quantities only, so act fast if you want to reserve yours before they're sold!
Help Needed
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Do you know of a great bird site which deserves a review? Maybe you have a favourite tip or trick that you like to use, or know of a product that has made your bird's life better or easier to manage in some way? Why not share them with other Flock readers? Send us tales of how you cope, or how your birds confuse and puzzle, interest and amuse you, and we will share them with the rest of our readers in a future issue. Just send an email here.
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"I ordered 'Canary Tales' by Linda Hogan last year...Although I fully recommend buying the book, I find Robirda's book much more complete, easier to read with less difficulty finding information."
Welcome to Robirda's Companion Bird eZine
For breeder or pet bird owners who care.
Website News
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We are very pleased to announce that we've just received our copies of the new 15-month Flock Talk Photo Contest Calendar! We'd heard from so many people who enjoyed browsing through all the Flock Talk Photos while the contest was running, that we decided to put them all together into this year's calendar.
A few of the photos were big enough to be featured on their own, but most were smaller, and we weren't sure if they could be used. Luckily, we were wrong - the finished calendar displays groups of the smaller photos in some marvelous, detailed, and just plain gorgeous photo collages.
The entire calendar covers the months in the last quarter of 2006 and all of 2007. Each month offers clear, bright photos that fill close to an entire 11 inches wide by 8 1/2 inches tall page. And of course we remembered to include special dates in the calendar's notes, and there's even entries to help you with your canaries' lighting schedule!
You really have to see and feel these calendars to get an idea of the quality, but you can get a look at the photos you'll find included, along with a shot of the open calendar, on our new webpage. (Be sure to scroll down in order to see all the pictures!)
Feature Article
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It's a little too easy to become confused about what terms are the correct ones to use, with regard to canary colours. The situation is not helped by the fact that different breeds may use differing terms for similar conditions, and of course there's always somebody who doesn't know the right term, and so invents one in the attempt to describe what they're seeing!
Too many get into a muddle trying to sort these various terms out, so to find out just what we should really be calling our canary colours, we went to one of the world's foremost recognized canary experts for the definitive answer. As usual, his answer was brief, concise, and clearly presented. We're very pleased to share it with you here, and hope you find it as useful as we do!
by G.B.R. Walker
Copyright © Aug 2006
All rights reserved
It is my belief that many prospective coloured canary breeders are lost to the fancy because of confusion over terminology. This is a disservice that can easily be overcome if a few basic rules are followed. To give a person a true representation of what bird is being viewed, we need to break down the description of the bird into at least three basic areas. Whereas terminology changes, this applies to all breeds of canaries.
Firstly, every canary has a feather type:
Non Intensive is the normal feather. This is of medium width and carries a frost on the tip of the feather. The frost tends to be wider in females than males. The Intensive is a mutation of the Non Intensive and gives a narrower feather with little if any frost. Certainly an exhibition example will carry no frost whatsoever, whereas females almost always carry a faint frost. It is normal to pair Intensive to Non Intensive to preserve good feather quality. The Intensive being a single gene dominant mutation, the expected progeny of this pairing will be 50% Non Intensive and 50% Intensive.
The Mosaic feather, although present in some type canary breeds, is only recognized in coloured canaries. This is a much wider feather with very heavy frosting that masks lipochrome colouration except in specific points. The ideal female will only show colour on the rump, at the very top of the wing (known as wing butts) and as small well defined lines extending backwards from the eyes. The male will in addition to these colour points have a small well defined mask similar to that of the European Gold Finch and a small coloured area on the chest. Mosaics should only be paired to other Mosaics albeit care must be taken on the relevant feather width or feather lumps will appear.
In coloured canary circles Non Frost used to be used as a substitute for lntensive, and Frost for a Non Intensive. In type canary circles an Intensive is called yellow and a Non Intensive is called Buff.
Secondly we have the ground or lipochrome colour. Every breed of canary has yellow and the mutated dominant white. Coloured canary breeds in addition have Red (introduced by hybridization) and a second White, the recessive white. A mutation causing an optical illusion of paler variants of yellow and red, also applies to coloured canaries. This is referred to as the Ivory factor. Thus a colour canary can be:
Or the mutated versions:
As it is difficult to be certain that a dominant white also carries the ivory mutation, rarely are classes awarded for them at show. Normally however, an Ivory White will not carry the yellow colouration found in the flight feathers of all but a few Dominant Whites. The phenotype of the Recessive White does not change with the addition of the ivory factor.
The third area in common for all canary breeds is the classic colour. The normal bird is an optical green, known as Yellow Black i.e., yellow lipochrome with black striations and more often than not brown frost. However, two mutations have occurred that effectively increase the possibilities of classic colours to four.
Firstly the brown mutation occurred (known as cinnamon in type canary circles). This effectively changes the black striations to brown and gives the bird a plum red eye. The Agate mutation effectively reduced the width of the black striations and diluted the black pigmentation of the legs, beak etc., leaving them visually devoid of pigment. This mutation combined with the brown mutation gives us a diluted version of the brown know as an Isabel.
The terminology changes depending upon the lipochrome colour in some instances, whereas in others the classic colour is simply appended to the lipochrome description.
In the Black series a yellow ground bird is called a Yellow Black. A Black bird with Red lipochrome becomes a Red Black etc. This principle can be used for the other three variations. Over the years strains of variegated and birds totally devoid of pigment (clears) have evolved. What is sometimes misunderstood is that whilst no pigment may be evident, the bird is genetically one of the classic colours.
So, every canary carries one each of the three areas described above. It can not carry more than one. A Black can not be an Agate, an Intensive can not also be a Mosaic, etc., etc.
As I stated earlier, all breeds of canary follow these rules, albeit in type canary circles, the terminology colour breeders use is either changed or discarded totally. To make life easier for newcomers to any section of the fancy, we need to be concise in our descriptions.
Having got this area sorted, it is then easy to add the name of any of the recognized mutations to this list. At this moment they are defined as the Pastel, Ino, Satinette, Opal, Onyx, Topaz, Cobalt or Eumo.
by G.B.R. Walker
Copyright © Aug 2006
All rights reserved
Check out our top bird-lover's products, in order of popularity!
Canary Song CD;
Encourage your canary to sing more with a CD
our customers say is the best! www.robirda.com/songs.html
Canary Book;
Learn the ins and outs of keeping canaries with Robirda's book, 'Brats in Feathers! www.robirda.com/brats.html
Canary Video;
Learn how to handle your canaries the easy way, safely and with confidence! www.robirda.com/canarydvd.html
Avi-Culture® Probiotics;
Live, avian-specific probiotics to
encourage good health! www.robirda.com/aviculture.html
The Canary Cam DVD Slideshow;
Watch a series of photos of canary
families raising babies! www.robirda.com/camshow.html
Care Sheets;
Use our always-popular illustrated printable Care Sheets to share with other bird club members, your customers or your friends, and help them to learn how to care for their pet birds! We offer Care Sheets for Canaries, Cockatiels, Small Parrots, Handfeeding, Soak Seed & Nestling Food, and Genetics & Lineage Charts. www.robirda.com/care.html
A recent customer says, "I received the dvd...wow, it was excellent! I loved the part about checking the health of a canary... Hats off to you, you are really a canary whisperer!"
Another says,
For a full list of all our products and services, visit the webpage at www.robirda.com/products.html
"Hi Robirda! Thanks for your thoughts. My little one is singing as loudly as ever. He looks much better today. Your advice was most welcome; I'm particularly grateful about the recipes! I sent you the same amount the vet charged me; you have done no less than he did. You are a real blessing to all of us canary lovers the world over."
"I cannot thank you enough for your kind and considerate responses to all of our questions. Your website has really been a wonderful find for us! And we absolutely love your canary CD!"
Song CD
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Do you like to keep your canaries singing? Help encourage your canaries to sing more with our CD, featuring Robirda's canaries in full song. Or, use it to help call more wild birds to your feeders, or to help make your pet parrots more comfortable.
You'll get 12 16-bit true-stereo tracks, each averaging almost 5 minutes long, for a total of over 58 minutes of canary songs, with no distracting background music. We've even posted a short sample for you to listen to!
We get a great deal of positive comments from happy customers, so we're sure you'll be pleased. A recent customer tells us:
"My 'baby' Jingles and I are both thrilled with your CD! It arrived within days of my purchase and it's the best CD out there! I have purchased every CD available, and yours was the only one my canary responded to. He was in subsong before, but is singing his little heart out now! The CD has attracted the wild birds outside his little garden sanctuary, so my canary has lots of vocal competition now, which makes him sing even more."
To find out more about our Canary Song CD, click here!
Tips 'n Tricks
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Flock reader Nancy writes, "Hi, just thought I would share a little idea for birdie fun!
"As I was browsing in a thrift shop I saw packages of shower curtain rings for a whopping 98 cents. They caught my eye because I had birdie toys on the brain, trying to keep my feathery family doing their aerobics in style.
"After hooking several together with some bells for good measure they were attached to the cage roofs. Before long my three red babies started jumping in, on and through them to their swing, on to the next set of rings, clinging to the side of the cage, flying around to where they started to begin again.
"One of the babies even hung upside down from the perch to get a flying leap for the lower rings. Those babies had a real circus act going!!! When things calm down, I clip lettuce or veggies to the rings, that they think is just tons of fun."
( You can see Robirda's canaries playing with a similar set of shower curtain rings, these ones with a strand of millet threaded through it, here.)
For You & Your Birds, With Love
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We rely on YOU to help keep this publication and its associated websites alive. If you find help you need in this ezine or on one of our websites, please consider joining our sponsors.
To read testimonials or find out more about becoming a sponsor, click here. If you're looking for something different, check our home page for links to all our great products!
Our next issue is due Monday, Sept 11th. We hope you and your birds stay safe, well and happy in the meantime, and we look forward to seeing you all then!
"You have the most informative and helpful small bird site on the Web. I have found your information priceless and inspiring."
"Everyone always asks me why my birds are such beautiful singers and breed such magnificent babies...I tell them that I learned from Robirda! While they give their birds all kinds of 'magical' formulas, I just follow your guide to 'keep it simple.' My birds are now very healthy, and there has been no recurrence of the infection. Thank Goodness!" R.C., Florida
"Just a short note to tell you how great your ezine is... As a long time bird lover I thank you for your wonderful mag. Keep up the great work!"
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