Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Why are most good Shamas short tailed?

This is a general perception and observation - that most good Shamas are "short-tailed". Why is it so? Perhaps I could shed some light with a little statistics.

It is estimated that 1,000 Shamas are caught weekly throughout Peninsula Malaysia. Out of this, probably only 10 are of 8+". In a year only about 10 specimens that are truly 9+" are found (most 9" birds in the market are actually 8+"). And this happens for 7 months in a year.

Is this sustainable? It probably is, if we don't lose more forest.

Now, the sheer number of short tailed birds would tremendously increase the chances of finding good specimens. And as we move up to the longer tailed specimens, please note that statistical probability of finding good birds among the longer tailed birds is reduced. There! that is the reason why most good birds in competitions are of those shorter tailed types.

And I haven't even begin to touch on captive bred birds ;)

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