Irrespective as to how the breeding season has gone, I like to have most of my breeding pairs split up by the end of May. This gives me some time to clean up the birdroom and cages and consider my tactics for the forthcoming show season.
Who would have thought it – after the months and months of planning for the various Millennium Shows up and down the country we are a little over a month away from the start. For me and many others, this is marked by the Specialist & Rares Show held in Coventry each year – note the new venue for 2000. Last year at this event was particularly interesting for us. Not because we did well with our birds but it was the first time we had used the new style BS Show Cages. We had our cages converted by Phil Proctor, who does a really good job, but we had completely overlooked that fact that we needed finger drawer drinkers that he did not supply. Thankfully one of the trade stands in attendance came to our rescue.
Over the years Brian and I have found ourselves in various Church halls, social clubs and village halls giving talks to budgerigar clubs. I used to tell the story of how Brian called me up one day, towards the end of December with a dilemma. The problem was that his number one pair was playing up. Although they had quite clearly pair bonded, the hen had not entered the nest and almost a month had passed. Brian and I live five minutes away from each other and so I popped down to see him. To cut a long story short, when hanging up the nest boxes, on this particular cage Brian had forgotten to remove the small wire door that allows the birds access to the nest box. This always brought snorts of laughter from the audience and I suspect, from some of the reactions that he was not the only one to make this mistake. The moral of the story is to pay attention at all times.
As Regular As Clockwork
While talking about Brian I must tell you what happened the other evening. Yvonne and I were having dinner with Brian and his wife Ruby. Their dining room overlooks the patio and in turn the birdroom. "Just look at that," said Brian. "That hen comes of the nest twice an hour at regular intervals!" We looked and couldn’t see anything because she had, we supposed, now gone back in the box. Half an hour passed and Brian said, "Look, she’s out again!" After our meal I took a walk up to the birdroom. You’ll never guess what I found – a week earlier Ruby had hung an old Cuckoo clock on the back wall of the aviary and not mentioned it to Brian.
One of the hot subjects associated with Budgerigars a few years ago was the exportation of British budgerigars to Australia. The discussions centred around who was coming over, who they were and were not visiting plus the difficulties associated with quarantine in both the UK and Australia plus the long flight over. For a while the results obtained by the Australian fanciers were well reported and both good and bad things were heard. Today, when reading Australian Budgerigar Society magazines, other than advertisements telling of British and German bloodlines nothing much else is ever said. So how about it Australia. Are your considerable investments paying off? If the door were to reopen for importing Budgerigars would you come knocking once again? Write or email me at the usual address and let us know.
Web Site Well Visited
The Budgerigar World web site (www.budgerigarworld.com) is now a little over 12 months old and we can report more than 20,000 hits in the first year. This represents single and return visits to the site. As far as the Internet is concerned this number represents a drop in the ocean, especially when compared to the large commercial sites that exist. However, it does demonstrate that there are plenty of people world-wide who are still interested enough to search for information. When the site was launched we had just a few pages but now it has grown to more than 250 pages and includes a free insertion to the Online Breeders Directory for all fanciers who appear in the Budgerigar World magazine Breeders Directory. Also included is probably the largest Budgerigar Related Web Site links on the internet today, providing plenty of opportunity to research the subject and to make contact with fanciers wherever they live.
At the forthcoming Budgerigar Society Convention there is the rare opportunity to meet and listen to the eminent American research veterinarian Dr Branson Ritchie. Dr. Ritchie obtained his DVM from the University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine in 1985 and his PhD in Medical Microbiology from the same institution in 1990. In 2000, he received the honored title of Distinguished Research Professor. As a member of the multi-disciplined Psittacine Disease Research Group at the University of Georgia College of Veterinary Dr. Ritchie has been involved in characterisation of the PBFD virus, development of a DNA probed based assay for PBFD virus, development of the avian polyomavirus vaccine and development of DNA probed based assays to detect polyomavirus, adenovirus and Pacheco's disease virus.
In conjunction with researchers at LSU, the Psittacine Disease Research Group has developed and tested assays for detecting chlamydia nucleic acid in clinical samples and are involved with the LSU group in testing a vaccine to prevent chlamydiosis. Currently, the psittacine disease research group is working on characterisation of the suspect PDD virus and testing of subunit vaccines to prevent polyomavirus-and PBFD virus-induced diseases. The research group has published more than 50 scientific publications on infectious diseases of companion birds and Dr. Ritchie has edited two textbooks, Avian Medicine: Principles and Applications and Avian Viruses: Function and Control. In addition, Dr. Ritchie is a Diplomate of the American Board of Veterinary Practioners, a Diplomate of the European College of Avian Medicine and Surgery and the avian/exotic section editor for the Compendium.
Not to be missed!