Heathrow

Only thing with that hen is she has shocking posture which I am hoping is correctable in future chicks. Watch the posture, can be difficult and frustrating to rectify. Cull anything chick with poor posture. Might be a good pairing to the DF Spangle, looking at the pictures he has good posture and her head features would compliment and strengthen his.

Totally agree with nubbly5, great advice with respect to the Hens class.

Very Nice Hens Kaz!!! i like the spangle hen best, she has really good feather density, she's wider in the cap than the Lt Green Opaline Cinnamon. The light green Opaline Cinnamon has good cap feather length, but not the width or density.

I'm not wanting to take business away from Daz, Bird boxes galore make and sell all sorts of travel and carry boxes. There is pictures of travel boxes on there website, google - bird boxes galore and follow links

Try using 19mm square, with the sharp edge taken off with a planer. Enables hens to grip the perch better when mating.

Take egg and replace with an artifical egg or a white marble, she will soon learn that they are too hard to break and give up

try Rob Marshall - Birdhealth.com. Carlingford Vet clinic.

Name - Heath Pets - 150 Budgies Fav colour - Green ??? Astrological sign - Taurus Age - early 30's Weakness - ?? Strengths - ??? Fav - Budgies Fav tv show - Dont get time to watch tv, too many kids Live - Northern Vic How long have been a BBC Member - ?? a year maybe Anything else - I have a beautiful wife and 5 1/2 kids. Best family

That's great Splat- great for Gordon Chandler to win the Diploma, nearly 12 months to the day his friend and breeding partner Roy McDermott passed away.

Great Question - I dont now the answer, but there are sure to be changes to the Annual shows everywhere to accomodate the ring change.

Hmm - Now that I've had success at the Nationals, my aim is to get a bird in the team each year.

I dont think its necessary harmful for birds to come into contact with pathogens that are bad for the birds. I believe some contact is good for the development for immunity. It's only when birds become stressed for a variety of reasons that birds can become visible ill. Take Megabacteria as an example, most Budgies in the country will have Mega, it only becomes a problem when birds are stressed. Unfortunately we then look to treating the bird, rather than treating the strees factor. Same goes for Polyoma virus. Im not a fan of continually using the same worming treatment either.

Wrong Macka - the 2 you mentioned are Judging at our diploma show in 2 weeks. I believe James and Trevor were judging at Riverina today.

Pearce - MB is right, quarantine issues pervent birds leaving Australia. The pinnacle in the hobby is the Nationals, last weekend in May each year in a different state. The weekend prior each state has it's selection with approximately 1000 birds to select from. Nationals are state based team competition. I think Victoria has only lost 1 ? National Championship in the last 10 years

Eastern district have a good auction, normally there are some good variety birds as well as strong normals available. Last year i bought a nice well marked lacewing hen. Top price last year was around $800 ish.

I'm interested to know what Magnification is suggested for avian diseases. Looking on ebay there is a digital USB connection for microscope images that can be saved to harddrive, has anyone had any experience with this?????

No Neville there are plently of Clearwing around of the standard with the clean wings. I think what is happening is that when folks (usually beginners with no understanding of genetics) try to increase the size by using Normals they produce birds with heavier wing markings. They show them on the bench and are told they are Greywings. As they don't know any better they then bred them as Greywings or dump them off to others as Greywings. I don't think problem will ever go away. As for the second bird. I disagree. The body colour is too strong for Cinnamon to be present. I bred Cinnamon Clearwings and Cinnamon Dilutes. The Cinnamon does not express in the same way on a Clearwing or Dilute the way it would on a Normal. The tail is not necessarily to dark. As I said the photo is dark and as such has darkened the colour of the bird including the tail. Also if this bird is the result of continously breeding in a Greywing line it be modified because of it. Compared to the body colour the tail is way too dark for it to be a dilute

Splat - You should try them on Spark, both before and after a Show for a few days. Spark is a electrolyte product from vetafarm, I used it it for the first time last year and works well.

Number 3 - looks to be a Opaline Greywing with poor colour. Tail is too dark to be a Dilute

How many breeders use a microscope for disease identification????

Dark Green Opaline Spangle

Quality birds are still quality birds regardless of the ring colour. Pair your birds when in breeding condition to give you the greatest chances of improving!!!

I Breed through winter, my birdroom is insulated and heated.

Daz - My thoughts. When i first joined the forum i read this post and thought what a great read, and it still is today. All great advice. I started back breeding budgies in 1999, with stock from a local breeder who was locally competitive. In 2002 i made the decision to get serious, along with the local breeder we visited a Breeder in NSW who has wall to wall outstanding birds. And the most impressive birdroom setup in the country. This was the first step to becoming competitive on the show bench. I needed to develop a 5 year plan. The plan i developed seem very ambitious at the time. These are some of my objectives Number of birds that i wanted to breed year Maintaining a mix of varieties Development of Families around foundation birds Show results Disposal of surplus birds Other things like becoming a judge and being involved in the hobby. Most of those objectives have been met, In 2007 I won at the Nationals in Adelaide. One of the things i have changed along the way - dont pair birds just for the sake of it. Every pairing must contribute to the overall plan. I have developed another 5 year plan, based around what has gone right and where I see I need to improve. In the Latest BRASEA auction catalogue/bulletin there's an interview with Gerald Binks. His best piece of advice for all of us in the hobby - "Attack it"

I agree, she's a lovely baby. Tell us about her background