A month ago my German Shepherd dog died instantly of a heart attack. Prior to that we had not noticed anything out of place, but having kept this variety for many years we were prepared for problems with its back legs, but that did not materialise. He was just eight years old when he died running across our lawn. This variety of dog seldom lives longer than ten years in the U.K.
You may wonder what this has to do with a page in a Budgerigar magazine. It has everything to do with that one word ‘Pedigree’.
What do we really mean when we refer to that word ‘Pedigree’? It means the animal has come out of a recognised background and has been recorded accordingly. My dog had such a pedigree and quite possibly, if I wished, I could have traced its ancestry back quite a few generations. But I am not an exhibitor of dogs and could not care what my dog was related to in past generations. In other words, its long pedigree did not count at all to me. But the dog itself did. It had become part of our family and died far too young.
Where pedigree comes to play its part is in the price being asked by the breeder. The longer the pedigree the longer the price, or that’s what it looks like to me. But why spend a lot of money on an animal with a big pedigree when you have no intention of showing it?
That’s where the connection comes in with our Budgerigars.
If you listen to Budgie talk anywhere it is centred on exhibition birds and the price some people say a breeder is asking for his stock. If the breeder referred to is a national or international one, he is bound to be accused of charging astronomical prices for his birds. "Only those with the money buy from him", is a usual phrase - but others, who claim they are hard up, are known to have also bought there. Why?
The answer, as I see it, is clear: they want to win and sell just like the one they are so ready to accuse. Frankly, I see nothing wrong in that. If you are a dedicated exhibitioner of budgerigars you have to keep a standard. You have to breed to win and to breed those winning birds you might need a certain feature improved. The better the quality of your own stock then the price of a similar or superior bird to introduce the necessary feature is higher accordingly.
Finding such a bird is no easy task. Whilst one carrying the visual feature can be recognised, it is not quite as easy to find one with that feature established in the family. This is where (it is claimed) pedigree comes in.
Pedigree in dogs is vastly different to that in budgerigars. Dogs are registered through the Kennel Club. Budgerigar records are all done by the breeder and unfortunately, some are not as good with their book keeping as others. I cannot see close relatives to top winning birds being available in any case unless the owner has been tempted with big money, because the life span of budgerigars is so short nowadays. Dogs, on the other hand can be mated back in generations through their pedigrees.
It is my view that the ‘Budgie Scene’ in the U.K. these days is vastly different to that of twenty years ago. Then you had breeders producing hundreds of birds each year and were staging teams of thirty and more in the B.S. Show. You have only a mere handful in that position today and fewer still that can claim they have their own stud of birds developed over the years. Real stockmen have become scarce.
I am also wary of those whom I know have turned their aviary into a United Nations organisation. Whilst the sources of their stock could be from the best in the world, their way of pairing-up could have ruined everything. It is no secret that some of the most expensive birds ever sold have come into the U.K. but when paired up to the buyers own birds produced young which could make one cry. The reason has to be in the fact that two birds, from two different backgrounds had genes, which did not match. The original breeder knew his birds - he knew what, when and how to pair up and that is why such people produce the winners others can’t.
On the other hand, if you are in the hobby because of your love for budgerigars - their colour, their chatter, their company and the people you are bound to meet, why spend on birds closely related to winners when others, more moderately priced, would suffice? I cannot see any justice in encouraging raw beginners to spend a hundred pounds on a bird. A cheaper bird would be far better. In fact, I believe there are fanciers in the hobby that would supply sufficient birds to set up a beginner quite comfortably for such a price. Any hobby can be killed in its early stages by over-investment and it would not surprise me that the main cause of those leaving the hobby after a couple of years is the price of birds and their failure to breed. Even some champions find the modern bird extremely difficult to breed, let alone raw beginners who do not have the same expertise.
People should be encouraged to breed budgerigars and to get at those very people we have to adopt publicity drives. I believe the time has come when we have to involve the media far more. We must also follow up the interest shown in the Internet. In the past people came into the hobby because there were fewer other attractions, but it appears some of those running our hobby today have not realised that. It is no good waiting for people to come to us, we must go after them if we wish to progress. We have to get out of our show halls and committee rooms and pre-sent the hobby to the masses. How are we going to do that? Well, those good people now running our hobby can be a lot of help. They have the backing of well-established organisations. We really need new ideas and the will to implement them.
© Gwyn Evans 1999
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