The Lizard Canary Association

The following is an article written by Paul Dawson and makes for good reading.

One way of inbreeding the Lizard Canary

To achieve the perfect a strain ?

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I have a basic shortage of space and attempt to use this to my best advantage and hate to hold onto birds that are not required for the breeding season.

The most useful bird in any breeding program is the hen, without this nothing will appear. The most useless is the cock, why because for most of the time he actually does nothing whatsoever.

So why have twenty cocks for twenty hens? Not only do they eat you out of house and home but take up valuable cage space as well, using this amount of cocks is fine every few years, but not for an intensive inbreeding programme that will improve stock in a much shorter amount of time.

If you where to put each cock into a show cage and mark each one on its merits and pick the best, second best and so on until the last bird was judged, there would be a tremendous differential between the first and last in terms of real quality. As the sliding scale from first to last widens is it really worth holding onto those last few, the quality must be less than those above it. So why perpetuate what can only be the worst birds in your birdroom and could well have been out of the cards at the shows if they were shown at all,or are they just making up the numbers to keep more pairs, so why carry deadwood.

Let’s take this a step further if you have twenty hens some would use ten cocks and use these as trios fine, all well and good but you still have cocks that if paired to the twentieth placed hen would still drop the average of the birds in the birdroom.

So if you had just eight or less cocks then the average would increase quicker throughout the stud, all things being equal.

Hens rarely come into condition on the same day, so if four of the worst hens gave all the right signs of needing to be paired to a cock then four cocks could be instantly used and these would must be the very best four you have. They do not need to be kept together for days on end to produce a mating or have to pair bond to produce young, if the hen gives the right signs then they will mate almost immediately.

Then their job done the cocks can be returned to there own stock cages, and wait for the next hens or for their return to the first hens that they have mated.

When the hens have laid the third egg of the clutch the cocks are not needed as the hens are quite capable of rearing the young on their own, spare cocks! So if the hens are slow to come into condition this will work to your advantage giving more time to have each hen mated. If they are all coming into condition then you will have to work that bit faster and have everything ready.

The next hens come into condition to be mated this could be ten all at once, so a little extra thought as to go into this. Eight cocks ten hens at least two hens have to share a cock preferably the best two cocks but it could just as easily be six cocks and four trios, not difficult just more sets of trios. Each time they have mated an hen the cocks are returned to their own stock cages.

Six hens left so if they came into condition in pairs the two best cocks would have to be used each time.

The next round could see the hens come into condition in dribs and drabs, then in each available case the best cock or cocks would be used to increase the average of the stud of birds you keep.

In the first round the best two cocks would have mated with twelve hens, thereby increasing the average standard of the stud by using the best available birds.

The basic idea is to produce birds that all share the same genetic makeup so in theory will all resemble each other, after a short time each generation will have most of the genetic makeup of the best birds in the stud. Having each bird with a similar genetic makeup will to a certain extent produce birds that are very similar in appearance and these in turn paired to each other will produce the same similarities.

This works best if you have a very good knowledge of the birds you keep and the traits they produce, if you have an eye for the birds all the better and reasonably good forecasts of matings can and will be predicted. Sooner or later these traits will appear and you will be able to produce birds of a particular standard almost at will, that is providing you had good stock to begin with and that the birds are in the best of health.

During this time the cocks need to be in the best condition of their lives to be able to perform on demand, so the best seed and other foods required to maintain this state of condition are given at all times. Wheatgerm oil, cod liver oil, vitamins are all given in moderation to keep the cocks in tiptop condition.

All it takes is planning and probably the most important thing is time to do it in. But all this would be useless unless proper identification of all the birds used was on hand and correct and updated written records of each bird’s activities as it happens is the only way to improve your stock.

I cannot over stress the use of proper identification this has to be close ringing all birds in the nest; this is the only viable way to have exact and precise knowledge of each bird and its pedigree.

This is a quick and useful way to improve your birds, but on another page I will go into it in a bit more depth. I am assuming that you are using the standard method of pairs and the occasional trio, to breed your birds. It could be said that if you used the best to the worst then the average may increase but I really don't think so (using normal pairings), it is a waste of the few good birds that you have.

This is a way of improving the average standard of your stock and can be used in all varieties of birds, this is one way that I have used, and have been able to maintain an excellent strain of "Consistent" Lizard Canaries.

By Paul Dawson

paul.

i have this pasted into a folder from last year,do you have a link to the site as i cant remember it.....

great advice,hence i am only using 1 gold cock and 1 silver cock

No link Steve but I have quite a few articles from Paul and I'll put them up over the coming weeks ---try to create some interest in the forum.

you know me mate,i follow everything you say.... you are my guru.

Yes Paul dawson has some very intresting articles on this subject two of which including the one above are included in my book THE LIZARD CANARY. Also my own on inbreeding and creating a inbred family or line.
another term for i nbreeding is line breeding which has been used for year by the racing pigeon fancy.

regards David.

All,

This year i will be putting 10 pairs down, albeit 2 of the hens will share the same cock.

This year 2 clear cap hens did very well for me on the show bench, i intend to mate these 2 hens to a gold cock i have purchased from the same strain.

next year all of the offspring will be paired to the best of the remaining 8 pairs, 8 birds will be selected and the resulting off spring will all be related to this nice gold cock or the 2 silver hens which have done me proud.

Thats my theory and I'm gonna stick to it, hopefully 2010 i will have a fine strain.

regards

Darren

i have seen those two hens mate and you are right,i hope you do well with the breeding.....

below is a section taken from my book on my own view of Line or inbreeding. This is something that I brought into canaries from my time with racing pigeon which use line breeding to great effect.


INBREEDING & LINE BREEDING

The meaning of inbreeding is the mating of closely related birds.
Inbreeding is also refereed to as line breeding, because the matings
are all from the same family of birds so they all come from the same line.
inbreeding can comprise of brother & sister matings or half brother & half sister, it can also be mother & son or father & daughter matings. below is an example of a line breeding programme.
1st year offspring
AC ----- AAC
+ Pair1
AH ------ AAH

2nd year pairs offspring
AH ------- AA/AH
pair1 +
AAC-------AA/AC

AC -------- AA/AH
+Pair 2
AAH ------- AA/AC

AAC----- AA/AAC
+Pair 3
AAH ------ AA/AAC

Explanation notes for the above.
AC AND AH is the cock and hen from the orginal pair.
AAC and AAH are the offspring of the first year.
AA/AC and AA/AH are the offspring of the pairing of a parent to an offspring. [pair 1 & 2 ]
AA/AAC AND AA/AAH are the offspring of brother and sister pairings. [pair 3 ]

This type of pairing is very close inbreeding and is not always liked by some people.
Off course this should only be done if the offspring from the original pair are as good quality or better than their perants.
This process can be done with two or three different pairs, creating 2 or 3 different lines with the offspring from each being paired either back into the line or put to others from another line to create your own family stud of Lizards. But always only the very best should be used.
But at all time you must adhere to the golden rules, which are gold to silver and also the cap pairings more can be read on this in the section on breeding.
With this type of breeding accurate records are a must!!!!!!!!!!
But off course with all line breeding from time to time you will require an outcross.
A outcross is a bird not related in anyway to the line or family you wish to introduce it in to. You may be able to do this with in your own stud from a different family. But usual it will be from another fancier. This outcross should be from a well established stud of Lizards with approved track record. The outcross should possess the points that you are looking to improve or correct.
You need to be asking other lizard fanciers for their opinion on your birds. And ask them which points they think you need to improve in your stud. If you take there advice onboard, you then know what type of outcross you need to bring in.
by DTA LIZARD STUD
Aka David Allen