Cage & Aviary Birds

Cage & Aviary Birds is written by bird experts for bird fanciers and is packed with club, show and bird related news, advice, birds for sale and comment. Established in 1902, Cage & Aviary Birds provides a wealth of practical advice and tips from the top names in the bird world, plus opinion, controversy, species and hobbyist profiles and nostalgia.

UKBC ‘rewrites the rulebook’ for inaugural National show

Dipper dispute impresses judges

QUOTE of the WEEK

Also in the news…

Online Softbill Register launches

Need to feed beats zest for rest

Reintroduced Spix’s macaw project ‘loses’ two key birds

Park Life

Northumbrian Notes: my must-read choice

Editor’s Letter

Cage & Aviary Birds

Waiting out the moult • With showtime coming up swiftly, VICKY BROWN wants to be in quality-assessment mode with her frills and Lancs, but it’s all provisional while they’re still feathering up!

What mite have been • This summer it has been a real bonus if breeders have remained free of the menace of mite. MARTIN LAMBERT didn’t, but he has taken vigorous steps to counter them

STONE CURLEW: our weirdest wader? • Decidedly odd-looking, the stone curlew comes to life at dusk, makes appropriately eerie noises and is capable of staying motionless for hours. BILL NAYLOR explores the life history of ‘our’ species and its ultra-characterful relations in the eccentric thick-knee family

Saving money with our birds • Unless their pockets are much deeper than the average, fanciers will need to manage their finances carefully as 2022 turns towards 2023. FRED WRIGHT offers some pointers

BIRD NOTES. • In January 1919, the editor of the famous journal penned the following account of the difficult economic position facing the hobby in the wake of World War 1

Down the Decades: the 1940s • The wartime fancy was heavily focused on home-grown seed for birds and on raising money for the Red Cross. Yet behind the austerity many innovations were beginning to be felt, especially in the breeding of new colours of exhibition budgies and canaries

Yorkshires supreme once more • Now with a single-minded focus on his Yorkshire canaries, Steve spells out his fresh ambitions for the hobby and his part in it, in the breeding room at at the exhibitions

Helping the weavers to weave • MICHELLE DICKINSON has bred a variety of weaver species. Here she discusses her collection and her approach to breeding these marvellous birds. Dave Brown puts the questions

Keeping the health levels high • Moulting finches can be vulnerable to illness, which is the reason MARK JONES has been watchful and proactive with his birds

Call for a nationwide count • STEWART HENDERSON, a member of the WPA’s Conservation Breeding Advisory Group, describes the association’s annual census, which is open to all who keep galliformes

Club News • Welcome to the club and show pages – the bit that’s all about you

What’s on this week • Club meetings nationwide

Obituary

Club roundup • Show reports, dates, club notices