April 2010

Monday 12

The birds have been in the new set up for 3 weeks now and yesterday the first 3 nests were set. Each were nests of 4 and all out of my dark line, including 4 eggs from an overyear self green buff hen and a self vlue cock, the half brother to Gerald Spencers best Fife in show at the 2008 North of England fife.

A further four hens are currently laying and with at least three more likely to in the next couple of days. All but 2 of the 19 hens have built up now so initial fears that the move would knock the birds out of condition seem unfounded, if anything I'm struggling to remember a time in the 10 or so years I've kept exhibition Fifes that so many have been ready at more or less the same time.

Of course the real challenge is still to come, and time alone will tell if the eggs are full or the first round will be a success, but I have my fingers crossed.

I'm giving a talk tonight at Liverpool Old Swan CBS on canaries, I used to hold a number of positions at the club prior to moving away from the area so it will be good to see some old familiar faces and hopefully some new ones too.!

Thursday 22

The first of 11 nests set are due this weekend, 6 more of the hens are currently laying with a further 2 mated and built up, 2 hens are showing some signs of being interested but as yet haven’t been mated up.

There’s around 70 or so eggs that make up round 1 I’ve checked a couple of the nests and the majority of the eggs look to be good, there’s still along way to go however and experience of breeding birds has taught me never to count the young until the end of the season as so much can happen along the way.

It’s always an exciting time of year seeing the first eggs laid and then hopefully hatch, but there’s always frustration along the way to. This year I’ve been lucky enough to set the eggs in batches, so if there are any single nesters or if any of the hens don’t feed well I’ll have some flexibility to move them.

Still along way to go in the season, but an encouraging start.

Monday 26

Another 5 nests set over the weekend and the first chicks hatched, two nests one with 3 full eggs and one with just one, so I've made 2 nests of 2 up. I'm keen to see how they get on but obviously very early days.

Several nests are due on Friday with more due on Sunday and another batch the following week. I've checked a number of the eggs due to hatch this weekend and whilst as expected there are one or two clear eggs there are a fair number that seem to be full, still along way to go before they hatch but the first hurdle overcome.

A couple of the hens don't appear to keen to sit but as I'm setting 4 to 5 nests at a time I'm able to mark the eggs and shuffle them around, it helps to have a number of dark and light birds so I can set dark eggs under light birds and vica versa which helps in identifying the young when they hatch.

It's been a relatively steady start and as I'm a little later than usual (I know if some breeders who are well on to their second rounds already) I'll hopefully avoid too many clear eggs.

It's always interesting to see how many eggs each bird lays, the norm would seem to be four eggs in a clutch, but I have a couple of hens who've laid 5, some who've laid 3 and one hen who's only laid two eggs. I've set her on a couple of dummy eggs and i'll lift her after a week or so and let her go to nest again.

There are 4 hens still to lay, 3 of them have built nests and I've seen them mate up so they should lay eggs in the next 5-7 days the fourth has shown little interest. However I don't think she's that far away and with all 4 birds I've left the cock birds in - although with 3 of the cocks I'm running with other hens. There's always a risk of pair bonding - however I overcome this by taking the cock away and leaving him in his stock cage alone for a few days and he always seems to overcome it.

I've had some problems with me home pc - hence the much promised gallery is still to come, as soon as it's fixed i'll be onto it!