Year end update

2011 is almost end and it was another sucessful year, but not without some failure. Toward the end of the year, with some personal issues, i did not have much time to take care of the birds as i normally would so i had to reduce my bird collection to only 2 pair of shama and few doves. I do not know i can have much time in the up coming new year to take care and breeding shama as before, but i am sure still involve in keeping and breeding them. Wake up early in the morning everyday and listen to their song relax me. To all shama fans around the world: wish you have a wonderful Christmas and great new year! A very sucessful breeding year with lots of very nice shama's babies! P.s. there is a new forum for all the shama lover out there. Please join the forum if you can to learn and share your experiences in shama keeping. The website address is www.shamaclubsingapore.lefora.com Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Not one, or two, but three Troupial chicks!

Pics are taken at night

Out of the nest

First Troupial chick out of the nest today (approx. 17 days after hatched)

New clutch of shama chicks

Two chicks of Venezuela Troupial in the nest

It's about 12 days after hatched.

Pics of shama chicks

Two of the younger chicks

New clutch of white rumped shama chicks

The father and his three out of four chicks:

 The mom:

 

Male chick approx. 2.5 months from other shama pair:

And few chicks at approx. 6 weeks old

Egg of Troupial pair hatched!

17 days later since the last post, today I found one egg hatched from the Troupial (Icterus icterus) pair.  So excited!

Incubation of Venezuela Troupial

Counting to the day the eggs hatch!

Troupial (Icterus icterus) female starts to incubate

I don't know exact when the female starts to incubate her eggs, but I began to notice on last Sunday 06/19/2011.  I have no idea how many eggs in the nest and whether the eggs will hatch or not, but this is a huge step toward my goal of breeding Venezuela Troupial sp.  According to all the information i can gather from internet, books, etc.. Female troupial will incubate her eggs for about 15-16 days, and fledge in 22-23 days.

1 month old chick and 2 weeks old chicks

This guy is one month old from the main pair:

Five chicks from the second clutch:

13 days old chick

Possible courtship of Troupial pair (Icterus icterus)???

White rumped shama chick

Serama chick and his father

This young cockerel has been re-home to one of my friend house up North.  Hope he will turn out to be a great and handsome rooster.

  This is the father, my current only rooster:

Intervention: Hand-rearing white-rumped shama chick

I noticed since yesterday afternoon that one of the young pair (both parents are less than one year old) stop feeding their chick (I know only one chick hatched on their first ever attempted to breed).  For the entire this morning, I observed that the male is more interest in trying to copulate with the female, while the female is not ready yet and she did not interest to fly to the nest any more.  Since early in the morning, there was only one waste deposit by the chick, this also indicated that the chick has not been feed for a while.  By late noon, early afternoon, the chick called almost non-stop and knowing it's hungry, I have no choice of enter the aviary and hand rearing the lone chick.  This chick is about 8 days and eyes are already open.  Hope I have enough time to take care it as working and family time might prevent me to take care of this chick properly.
As for the cause of why the parents are abandon their chick, I would assume that this is the first ever breeding for them and lack of experiences, and eagerness of the male trying to breed again are main contributed factor in this case.

Male white-rumped shama

Troupial (Icterus icterus) pairs begin to build nest

I have the pair of Troupial (Icterus icterus) since last summer and up until now, they still shy when I come near their aviary.  Few days ago, I noticed that both the male and female start to tear off bit and pieces of leaves and hold in their beaks pieces of small branches, feathers, etc.  so I put some long grasses, bit of vine, small branches, coconut fibers, dried bamboo leaves, etc.  Hopefully after they finish building the nest, they will lay some eggs.  I'm so excited!

The female with pink band on top of the nest. The pair below with the male in blue band

Tiny Serama egg

One of my Serama hen laid a tiny egg yesterday.  It would be interesting if this egg develop and hatch, but I doubt it will.  The other two eggs are normal size egg of Serama hen.

First shama thrush chick of the 2011 season

Only one chick hatched and left the nest yesterday.  All other eggs are non-fertile.  This one looks like a male to me.  Maybe better luck on the next clutch (fingers crossed).

 

Update 05/16/11: Both long tail pair and their children pair had some eggs hatched on Sunday 05/15/11.  Not sure how many eggs hatched but I'm sure there are at least one in each nest.

Canary

I adopt a male white canary last month.  He sings very well and I love him.  Because the shama thrush breeding season is late this year, I decide to get him a mate.  There are few nest inside the aviary (used to breed shama thrush), but the female canary choose the food cup instead.  Five days of incubation and hope to have some canary chicks soon :)

Finally I have shama baby(ies)

First clutch got abandon by the mother due to heavy traffic around the aviary during the first few days of incubation.  First egg of second clutch hatched today morning.  Hopefully there will be few more hatch in the next two days.  One other shama pair should have babies mid-week next week.  Yay, so happy!

Update:  04/22/11:  It seems that there is only one egg hatched in this clutch.  It's a sad thing but I'm still happy.  Maybe next clutch will be better, finger cross! :)

Audio of white-runped shama(s) sing in early morning :)

Below is the audio file (approx. 10min long) of shama birds sing their songs in early morning in my backyard.  This is what I have to endure every morning in Spring/Summer time beginning when the sun starts to rise :))  They sings almost non-stop for about an hour, and throughout the day.  Enjoys! :))

Woot, one pair might have eggs!

  One of my female shama begins to sit inside the nest tonight and possible to start to incubate.  This is the pair that most pride in my collection as they produce nice long tail babies last year.  The weather this year here in So Cal is very wet and cold.  More than a week into Spring season yet the temperature here is still around upper 60s F in the morning, and upper 40s F/ low 50s F at night.  Hope other pairs of shama start to lay eggs soon.

Introduce male and female shama together

Originally, I plan to introduce male and female shama together at around end of March, 2011; however, with my current work travel schedule to the East Coast in early March and with too many birds for my brother to take care of, I decide to introduce 3 out of 4 pairs together during this weekend so that my brother won't have to spend much time feeding them.  After few days of letting the male see the female through separate cage, I introduce the male into the female breeding aviary on morning of Saturday.  By the end of Sunday afternoon, two pairs out of three seems compatible with each other and the last pair is instantly fall in love with each other :)).
This year I will do inbreeding for two pairs to see if their offspring will have desire or bad traits.  Plus I also introduce new blood line which supposedly came from Taiwan.

Recapture a spotted dove (Chinese laceneck dove)

I acquired a pair of spotted dove (Streptopelia chinensis chinensis) about 2 months ago from a good friend of mine and keep them in a wired cage 30in x 24in x24in.  I plan to build an aviary for them within this month with intention to breed them again in the Spring as I had successful of breeding spotted dove before.  Few days ago, while open a door to put in the seeds, one of the spotted dove sudden flew around and escape the cage.  As I watch the female spotted dove flew away, the male spotted dove starts to call.  I thought that I lost that female dove and have to find a replacement if I want to continue with the breeding project.  I put seeds on the feeding tray right outside of the cage just in case the dove decide to come back.  The male dove calls frequently during the two days his mate is missing.  Two days later, yesterday afternoon, I saw the female spotted dove eating on the feeding tray that I put outside the cage.  I wait and wait and I can see that the female dove did not want to fly away any more and just stay outside right in front of her mate's cage.   When the sun is completely down, the female dove stay on top of the cage and sleep there. About a hour after dark, I walk slowly toward the dove and using the net, I finally caught her.  It's a joyful moment for me :)  I wonder if the male happens to fly away in this case, does the male dove come back?

2011 white rumped shama breeding season is near

Here in beautiful SoCal, the breeding season for songbirds/ softbills is about to start in just about a month or two.  Conditioning the birds to be ready for breeding is very important and for those who interest in breeding white rumped shama or any other tropical songbirds, it should start now.  Of course, if the birds are feed with high quality diet all year round, then just provide the birds with a bit extra nutrients than normal would be suffice; otherwise, this is the time to improve on the health status of the birds before the breeding season begin.
This year, I probably start the breeding season for white rumped shama a bit later than last year due to busy with work schedule and kind of weir weather here lately.  Plus, I start on concentrate on quality than quantity, hehe....