SPANGLED BUDGERIGAR BREEDERS' ASSOCIATION NEWS
May 2007

The Spangled BBA held their Spangle Day at a new venue in Crewe, hosted by the South Cheshire B.S., making it a true national society by moving its Spangle Day/AGM around the country. The chairman Stuart Forbes was pleased to see so many members attending and thanked them for bringing birds to the show. He welcomed Eric Peake back as a speaker who is not only a wonderful international artist but a very knowledgeable speaker on budgerigars.

Prior to his presentation Eric informed the meeting that all the proceeds from the sale of the prints of various coloured budgerigars that he brought with him would be donated to the research fund into PBFD. He also donated a pencil sketch of a spangle that was raffled for club funds.

Eric started his presentation with the aid of a slide show by saying that there is a right way and a wrong way on progressing any new variety that is based on a mutation. Birds of the parrot family (psitticene) can breed very early in their life and if mass-produced that they are subject to a lot of predation. In captivity we are breaking up colony birds to pair for breeding. Early birds were extremely prolific and of deep colour and we breed them for that as well as to add extra size and colour into them. The spangle in its early days was exactly the same.

Eric reminisced on the early days of the spangle when the Swiss fancier Rolf Christensen brought these spangles from Australia and sold a few to the late Alf Ormerod. They were of the pet type in those days. Alf came to a B.S. meeting in early 1980’s with 2 show cages and the first spangle that was ever seen was a grey green. Two weeks later Eric visited Alf to photograph the babies from these birds. Alf paired the original ones to his best grey greens and bred over 200 spangles in those early days but would not sell them till he established the variety in number. In the September 1983 issue of the B.S. Bulletin the first spangles were shown on the show bench. They were very small in comparison to those spangles that won 3 times BIS at the B.S. Club Show some 20 years later.

Eric also showed a hand drawing of a feather from a normal bird’s wing and compared it with that of a spangle. The normal bird feather will have 3 colours made up of a grey in the centre then edged with black and a further edging of yellow (green bird) or white (blue bird). In the spangle this wing feather is yellow on the inside with a black edging and a further yellow edging (in a blue bird it will be white that replaces the yellow). In both cases the yellow (or white) replaces the grey colour.

Eric said that Alf Ormerod always advocated the use of the normals to establish a normal spangle strain. Because of the quest for size over the past 25 years with this mutation many of its original characteristics have been lost and especially the bulls-eye spots. Again in our quest for size we have many problems with present day birds with cysts and feather problems.

Eric showed many slides of birds of the past and the first spangle (a cobalt cock) that went to the USA was to Norman Byers from Harry Bryan. The slides shown were of all varieties that highlighted the good and bad of each variety. Eric criticised those fanciers who put clearwings into the spangles just to improve the size of the clearwing and at the same time clear the wing marking. The downside to those clearwings was that many bred with clear tails.

Eric’s presentation portrayed the depth of his knowledge together with his presentation quality and ability, demonstrated by his slides.

While Eric was busy presenting his slide show and answering questions, our outgoing president Les Martin judged the 49 birds present from 10 exhibitors. The Best in Show, best young bird and best single factor spangle went to Jerry Donovan’s skyblue cock. Jerry also won the best double factor spangle award with a white cock. Stuart Lansdowne won best opposite sex and best novice with a light green hen. Anne & Bob Whattam won the champion any age award with a skyblue cock. Best intermediate was the Harazny & Duncalf partnership with a grey cock while Ron Young won the best beginner award with a grey hen.

The Alf Ormerod Memorial Trophy for the 2006 Most Spangle Young Bird wins went to A. Stevens.

At the AGM, John Cosby was inaugurated as the new President, Eric Peake was elected to the post of President Elect and Les Martin a committee member. All other officers remained the same and were announced as: G. Al-Nasser, Life Vice President; S. Amos, J. Attwood, F. Canham, B. & C. Heale, R. Molkentin, F. Silva, R. Stringer & R. Thumwood, Vice Presidents; Stuart Forbes, Chairman & Treasurer; Clifton Wixon (88 Highworth Crescent, Yate, Bristol BS37 4HL. Tel: 01454 881334 e-mail marionwixon@blueyonder.co.uk), Secretary; Marion Wixon, Vice Chairman & Editor; John Cosby, Membership Secretary; Rod Clarke, patronage secretary; Janice Al-Nasser, Publicity Officer; Sue Clarke, Trophy Steward; Bob Allen, Cy Thorne and Ian Brickwood, committee members. The society has its own website (www.spanglebudgerigars.co.uk) to view.

It was decided by the committee that the next Spangle Day will be held on 27th April 2008 (week 17), to be hosted by Bristol BS.

The new president John Cosby, in closing the meeting, gave a special THANK YOU to the host society and especially the ladies who provided the refreshments throughout the day.