BR23 Blog

Slightly off topic for those expecting a budgerigar post.

I've been aware of the Python computer programming language for a while (name inspired by the Flying Circus). I discovered Python only fully last year. And I like it. I like Python a lot. It's not perfect, but has a lot of likes.

My website uses PHP as a language and I've written a small but effective framework on it. For me at least. A few days ago I red this: http://me.veekun.com/blog/2012/04/09/php-a-fractal-of-bad-design/
I never though about PHP as hard as the author did but it is all true! I've been bending PHP to get my framework to work and there still are strange quirks. PHP is a pain to develop a good web framework in.

So the compelling thing to do is to rewrite my little framework into Python.

Went to the world famous talk of Jac Cuyten about feather this morning. It was recommended and I missed it when my local club organized it but now go a new importunity when a neighboring club organized it.

I've got a lot of information to process now. I've pulled some feathers of some of my better birds:

Two brothers: the spot feather isn't representative as the spots are bigger and more square in shape. Feather going towards buff, long square

Visually this birds doesn't look that much less as the two brothers above. But clearly a more medium feather. The top of the spot has a depression.

So it confirmed what I wanted: a wider spot and feather and the two brothers and better spots on the yellow face. But I can certainly already work with what I've got. Maybe I can use this wider feather:

Unknown bird (though I have an idea), wider rounder feather. Buff.

I haven't bred that many birds yet: about 40. I could breed a lot more but I'm only focussing on a few cocks. A few nice ones though from different pairs:

• sky blue cinnamon (unsure about pedigree - second grade pair anyway)
• light green cinnamon hen & cobalt Australian yellow face (from a second grade pair) - unfortunately lost an older brother & sister of these birds
• light green cinnamon cock and cobalt violet? Australian yellow face opaline-cinnamon hen from what I consider my best pair (my podium cock x mother of mini baby show winner) - a sister is still feathering up

That doesn't seem much, but I'm very critical given what I've bred last year.
It seems some of my second grade pairs are producing good useful birds. I'm glad for that as it will introduce partly new blood into my main line.

And some colours:

• A pied bird that shows markings like a recessive pied, but it should be a dominant pied - perhaps it was transferred?
• A fallow (newly born):
  
• A young sky blue half-sibling from the above fallow (and split fallow) showing a head spot typical for a split recessive pied. Oops.

I'll keep breeding, things have picked up and I still have a few cocks and hens I want offspring from. One of those just had its seventh egg fertile after health issues and several tries breeding with it. It's not with the best hen, but we'll see: light green x sky blue

I went to the barhead show yesterday evening of my local club (BGC BraLim).

The highlight was without a doubt the amazing winning barhead by André Goossens: Dense feathers on neck & head, eyebrow, directional feather and a width of face on a barhead that can compete with a good adult.

He had a few other good birds, among them a very nice blue cinnamon that won its full class. It was from his first season experimenting with lacewings. He got a few lacewing hens of poor quality and paired them with his cinnamon line. He liked the dense feather on the neck & head of this split. But the modern directional feather and with of face should be better. Well, better according to his norms, because this was an excellent bird that deserved to win its class. He was giving himself three years to get the lacewings to a decent level. At this pace he'll breed lacewing show winners by then.

The fallow cock got beaten up by his second hen (sky blue). Nothing serious but I was forced to split them up. I gave him another hen: not a main hen but one from my fallow line.

Now I'm trying the sky blue hen against a light green cock that was intended for her from the start. So far no fighting.

When I was looking in the cage with hens for another hen I noticed a reasonable Australian yellow face cobalt opaline cinnamon hen. Visually and pedigree wise better then the grey green hen. So I swapped out the grey green hen (glad to got rid of that ugly colour) for this one. Also a pairing I was thinking of before the start of the season: Australian yellow face cinnamon cock x Australian yellow face cobalt opaline cinnamon hen. Love at first sight.

Paired up a few more pairs. Some of them have been together before, separated and are now together again. All pairings are cock orientated: trying to get offspring of the cocks by pairing them to matching and/or proven hens.

• grey green spangle opaline cinnamon cock x dark green hen
• sky blue fallow cock x sky blue hen
• sky blue (violet?) cock x cobalt cinnamon hen
• Australian yellow face cinnamon cock x grey green cinnamon hen

Spangles and I have had a diverging relationship so far. I'm hoping to get some now as I do like a nice spangle. The dark green hen is one of my top hens. The cock is finally back in condition.

I'm trying to get my fallow line back on track. Four fertile eggs and counting with its first normal hen from my fallow line. And now I'm pairing the fallow cock to a sky blue hen. One of my lesser hens visually but with a pedigree right in the centre of my top line. I'm hoping for some decent splits to work with next season.

The other two pairings are an effort to get chicks from both cocks by pairing them to proven (slightly lesser) young hens that match pedigree wise. Colour isn't a main consideration, but if the blue cock carries the violet there is a chance at real violets with this cobalt hen. To bad the second hen is grey green (I'm not a fan). Although at least she isn't pied as well like her sister. The sister has 5 chicks by the way: at least 3 pieds unfortunately (too early to tell if they also carry the grey factor).

Looking at the bright side at least the grey and the pied will make it possible for me to compete in more classes (so possibly more points). But given the late start of the season, certainly with the better birds, I doubt the young birds will be able to hold their ground on the show. We'll see starting with this Friday's BGC BraLim mini baby show.

It should have been a lot more then 20. But a first round being almost entirely clear eggs, some very young cocks and quite a few cocks not in condition.

In the mean time I changed a few things round and things picked up. So now I've got more then 20 banded and still pinkies from quite a few pairs in the boxes. Hopefully some of these pinkies will be better then those I've already got (see previous post). There are quite a few pinkies from my better pairs, so I'm hopeful.

The first of March has passed so normally I would stop breeding. But with the slow start I will do at least one more round, maybe even two. Effectively moving the breeding season more towards spring/summer breeder. I still have to decide what I'll do in September when the next breeding season is supposed to start. We'll tackle that issue later.