This is the variety of budgie that attracted me many years ago when my Mum had a book called "The Cult of the Budgerigar". The violet whitewing as Mr Watmough called it, is shown on a glorious colour plate. I couldn't believe that there were budgies of such a stunning colour and contrast.

 

2 years ago I decided to try my hand at clearwings as they are known to be a really tricky variety to breed. You either get tiny birds with clear wings or big birds with badly marked wings and tail.

 

Although not huge, this boy is not tiny either (still a long way from the current show standard size of normal varieties) but he is exactly what I love about this variety. Clear white wings contrasted against a lovely violet colour. I think he is something quite special.

 

 

Edited September 1, 200915 yr by nubbly5

he is such a beautiful fella and I can see what draws you to the clearwings :rofl:

Yes it is very hard to breed,for size & keep the wings

clear.Just have to breed for type & hope the

judge is a type judge & not a big is better judge.

Oh well done~He is gorgeous!

WOW I looooooooove him! Did you breed him? WOW go for it!

and................. keep us posted!!!

OMG Nubbly5, that bird is AMAZING !!

:what: :what: :what:

 

Far OUT!!!!!!! How did you get that?????? :doh:

I would do anyting for that bird! You are really lucky nubbly!

Edited September 1, 200915 yr by CUTE.SPANGLED.BUB

Thanks Guys and yes I did breed him and I'm pretty proud of him and a couple of his brothers and sisters. Although I have to say my attempts at quickly increasing size using normal splits has given me birds with crappy wing clarity, as I was told would happen actually........ sigh. I guess clearwings will become a bit of a labour of love.

 

But I am really glad that I took the time to seek out foundation stock with superior wing clarity rather than just the big heavily marked birds. Ifeel that I have a better base from which to work and I just love having these little flashes of colour flying around the aviary.

 

I'll put some effort in and do a photo expose of the variations you get in wing clarity one day.

Thanks Guys and yes I did breed him and I'm pretty proud of him and a couple of his brothers and sisters. Although I have to say my attempts at quickly increasing size using normal splits has given me birds with crappy wing clarity, as I was told would happen actually........ sigh. I guess clearwings will become a bit of a labour of love.

 

But I am really glad that I took the time to seek out foundation stock with superior wing clarity rather than just the big heavily marked birds. Ifeel that I have a better base from which to work and I just love having these little flashes of colour flying around the aviary.

 

I'll put some effort in and do a photo expose of the variations you get in wing clarity one day.

 

okay so if Normal splits give you crappy wing markings, how do you increase size and keep the wings clear (she asks after having just bred 4 Normal splits ....)???

Yep Renee that IS the question...........

 

I'll be choosing the best of the bigger ones and putting them back into the clear family. That's my plan anyway.

Yep Renee that IS the question...........

 

I'll be choosing the best of the bigger ones and putting them back into the clear family. That's my plan anyway.

 

I have heard that Henry George only breeds Clearwing to Clearwing ..... but I wonder if he's always done that

I knew there was a good reason I put clearwing breeding in the TOO HARD BASKET. They are all yours to solve the mysteries of clearwing breeding Nubbly

An english breeder of clearwings only breeds clearwings to dilutes, this keeps the wings clear of markings. A judge in Australia can disqualify a clearwing from this pairing as the cheek patches are a different colour from normal to clearwing pairing and clearwing to clearwing pairing.

Im going to breed clearwing to dilute (that is when I can get a dilute) to see what happens on the show bench.

I found clearwings in my sister;s aviary with pure white wings unfortunately they are too old to breed with.

Nubbly your violet clearwing is beautiful.

Yes I've heard so many different things about breeding clearwings. Mainly breeding clearwing to clearwing. When I bought my first ones I was told that they were clearwing to clearwing for many generations. Then out popped these really weird diluted clearwings. After long conversations with John Mulley and others re these birds it appeared that they were a dilute but with the clearwings modified by the clearwing. I have to say that there definietly seems to be more than just the 3 phenotypes of greywing, clearwing and dilute in this series.

 

Anyway, after pinning down the breeder he did admit to having used dilute regularly to up the size. He advised that I kept the biggest of these clearwing dilutes and put them back into the clearwings (I had already sold them and then split the pair as I believed that they were of no benefit to my breeding program - bugger). He was one of the many that said normal splits will bugger the wing markings (which they do) but how else to get features like feather and size into them when they don't already have it? Anyway he is not the only one I've heard of who uses dilutes - common practice apparently but I can see I would still lose something in wing clarity as the dilutes are still not 100% clear anyway.

 

That's why I plan to run a family bred soley for wing clarity (chosing the biggest of them each time to breed though - so I still might be able to slowly increase size at the same time anyway) and then play around breeding splits from them or putting in marked outcrosses and then breed these back with the wing clarity family. Maybe that's completely the wrong way to do it - I guess I'll find out.......

 

I will be trying dilute too but have to wait for the babies that I bought to mature.

Edited September 2, 200915 yr by nubbly5

Sounds like you've got a real task ahead you.

Good luck with it.

PS. That boy above is lovely.

He is beautiful. Can I ask how big he is compared to other varieties of show budgies?

I have not actually measured him but I would guess he is about 3/4 the size but also less feather than my normal (normals, cinnamons, opalines, spangles) varieties.

... one reason I don't breed clearwings. I am trying to get Recessive Pieds and DECs to the size of my Spangles.

I have not actually measured him but I would guess he is about 3/4 the size but also less feather than my normal (normals, cinnamons, opalines, spangles) varieties.

 

Sorry if a dumb question....but why are they smaller Nubbly5?, compared to the other varieties?

Recessive varieties and traits in general seem to be smaller and harder to improve. Clearwings are particularly hard as when you DO try and improve their size by using stronger varieites like normal green etc, you lose the wing clarity.

Anyway, after pinning down the breeder he did admit to having used dilute regularly to up the size. He advised that I kept the biggest of these clearwing dilutes and put them back into the clearwings (I had already sold them and then split the pair as I believed that they were of no benefit to my breeding program - bugger).

 

Would any of those be the ones you sold to me?

hey i am giveing it a go what have i got to lose i am only 15 in 10 days so i will see if i can get sume more and i will talk to you nubbly wan i get home

Recessive varieties and traits in general seem to be smaller and harder to improve. Clearwings are particularly hard as when you DO try and improve their size by using stronger varieites like normal green etc, you lose the wing clarity.

 

So I guess thats why my DEC cock is small compared to other varieties......Good luck Nubbly, look forward to your progress....

Anyway, after pinning down the breeder he did admit to having used dilute regularly to up the size. He advised that I kept the biggest of these clearwing dilutes and put them back into the clearwings (I had already sold them and then split the pair as I believed that they were of no benefit to my breeding program - bugger).

Would any of those be the ones you sold to me?

No unfortunately (or fortunately - depending on how you want to look at it) I sold them all to the pet shop. I actually don't think I would have used them in preference to the 11th place 2008 Nats bird anyway as they were a similar size to him just looked like a dilute body colour with clear wings.

hey i am giveing it a go what have i got to lose i am only 15 in 10 days so i will see if i can get sume more and i will talk to you nubbly wan i get home

Definitely worth a bash Shannon and at 15 you've got more time than me to perfect your clearwing line!!! Seems to me you are going about it well so I wait to see your name up at the Nationals soon!

Recessive varieties and traits in general seem to be smaller and harder to improve. Clearwings are particularly hard as when you DO try and improve their size by using stronger varieites like normal green etc, you lose the wing clarity.

So I guess thats why my DEC cock is small compared to other varieties......Good luck Nubbly, look forward to your progress....

Sure is! And DEC are an even rarer variety not yet really represented at the Nats (except as part of the exhibition class) so people don't worry too much about trying to "improve" them.

 

 

 

Here are some pics of the clearwinged dilutes for some comparison and to show you what I was talking about.

 

This is the violet boy from above.

 

This is a dilute version of the violet.

 

This is one of his full colour siblings in dark green.

 

And this is another one of his siblings this time a diluted dark green (or olive).

 

Out of a nest of seven chicks 4 were dilutes and 3 were full coloured - bred from an olive clearwing cock to a dark green clearwing hen. You can imagine my surprise - first year into breeding clearwings - when these popped out. My idea of dilutes were what you would normally see with wing markings so I was very perplexed about these and started asking around. From what I understand these are dilutes but with their wing markings modified by the clearwing. Almost another arguement for a co-dominant trait like the full body colour greywings now breeding as 100% greywings but with a full body colour. I assume if I bred 2 of these chicks together I could start a strain of clearwinged dilutes that bred as pure dilute.

Edited September 3, 200915 yr by nubbly5

Sorry for the questions Nubbly, but if the recessives and clearwings dec's etc...are genetically smaller.. then why do they have to be bigger to show them? Why is the show standard different to what they are naturally? Hope that makes sence.......