Brian Buckley - Beginner Budgerigar Breeder & Exhibitor

 

from early beginnings

At the age of 7 I was bought my first pair of budgies by my parents, I think I must of mithered the life out of them after seeing birds in a aviary at a local park, they were a pet pair from a local breeder who lived very close to me, a dominant pied skyblue cock and cinnamon grey green hen within weeks I had added a lutino cock and a dominant pied light green hen to the ranks from a local pet shop, bought two wooden cages and nest boxes and put them down to breed, from that day on I was hooked. The two pair produced some lovely youngsters that I was proud as punch of, and that's were my interest flourished and took shape,

I converted my parents brick shed into a birdroom and went from there.....it wasn't until many years later that I saw my first exhibition budgies at a local Show and was amazed at the size difference and shape, I totally fell in love there and then and started down the road towards show budgies.

Within a short time I had moved on my pet birds and was scouring the local area for breeders of show birds, I managed to get a couple of quality birds from here, there and everywhere and put them down to breed in ernest,

At first all went well in the boxes or so I thought, but clear eggs, smashed eggs, dead in shell and chicks dying soon put me in my place. I had never experienced this type of loss with my pets birds, I continued breed them whilst not really know what I was doing a many of the good quality birds I initially bought with high hopes where wasted. Over time I started to loose birds due to a mystery illness, birds that were happy and healthy one day would looked fluffed up and very withdrawn the next, eventually losing there battles for life one by one. This mixed with a new house with limited space forced me into making the dissension to give up the hobby.

the Present day................

How I came back into the hobby was a complete accident, many moons back I was given the opportunity of owning a Pet Budgie and cage that a friend family had grown tired of, on arrival i was shocked to find the most moth eaten canary I had ever clapped eyes on. A scrawny, dirty and balding mess of a bird, I wanted to call it bagpuss but the children name it thomas, after many months of feeding, baths and tonic and many moults Thomas turned back into a beautiful looking fife canary, and man the boy could sing.............but after all the hard work both from me and him he eventually passed to the big aviary in the sky............after a bit of tears from the children I decided to try to get them another thomas and made my way to the local pet store where I found a whole array of canaries, but my eye was drawn to the budgies, so I bought a pair and a new bigger cage, took them home at which the kids fell in love with them,

Within a week I had the bug back and got in touch with Dan Maddocks a local show breeder and went to see his birds Dan made me feel very welcome and showed me some of the birds he had at his disposal, again as before I was stunned at the size and quality of the birds. This only spurred me on and to top a really good visit Dan supplied me with two pair of quality birds a pair of his own bred birds and a pair he had previously bred with, (Big Thanks you to Dan a top bloke). I got home and quickly looked for some breeding cages to start them breeding in quick time,

after a while I soon realized that I may have to add some birds to generate some noise level, well if I'm really honest I just wanted more birds...so on close inspection of one of Dan birds I noticed it was Barrie Shutt Rung, I had already been on Barrie's Web site and was amazed at the quality of his birds and so I decided to get in touch with Barrie so see if he had any other birds for sale, Barrie was very helpful and gave me sound advice but didn't have anything for sale at the moment but did say he would email me when anything came up, after a couple of weeks an email arrived to say Barrie had a sales page on his site I logged on quick time and quickly put my name on four birds, and quickly arranged to pick them up, met barrie and was given a carton containing my birds, couldn't wait to get them home, barrie had told me to let them settle in for a week or two before judging them, sound advice but to my surprise when I got home there were six birds not 4, and they were all superb quality.

Many thanks for that Barrie..........

 

I have since then been up to spend a day with Barrie and his Birds, and what a great day it was, I think I learnt more about Budgies and Budgie management in the first five minutes than i had in the previous 20 years, Barrie was full of tips and advice and I took great pleasure in viewing his birds and seeing how he does it, I even managed to leave with a couple more Birds............so now its up to me to put the birds and knowledge I had learnt to good use..............

 

So now a new chapter Begins..