Henny Mutation Jungle Fowl - an update, a miracle

Well, before I start, let me update a little on the weather these past few weeks. Most times it is terribly hot followed by downpours. And my RJF hen couldn't pick a worst spot to lay her eggs. Its just beside my garden wall.
Whenever it rains heavily, the water will rise and then quickly subside after the downpour. The spot where she lays her eggs is prone to be water logged. At one time in the darkness of night, I actually went out with an umbrella during a downpour to check on her. The water is 1 inch high but she still faithfully sits on her eggs.

A few days ago, she abandoned her eggs because the water rose too high for her. All her eggs were submerged in water. The quickest time taken for the water to subside would at least be half an hour after the rain. I thought the eggs were goners.



Surprisingly, on the morning of 16th November, 2 chicks were seen peeking out from under the hen. By evening, it appears that only the 2 chicks survived the ordeal (out of 5 eggs). Another 2 eggs had well formed dead chicks in them and 1 egg was not fertile.

These are the 2 miracle chicks that made it:



I will stop breeding the pair of RJF and put them up for adoption. My intention were to try breeding the henny mutation cock to an original RJF hen. It has been done, and a total 6 chicks (including the above) were born out of the pairing. All chicks were raised indoor to improve their chances of survival.

Breeding Jambuls Pt3

Last Tuesday, one of my Jambul escaped and it took me about an hour to get him back. It would have made some nice videos, but I was rushing to go out and wasn't in the mood to get the film rolling for his sake ;)

Quite challenging to trap him back. Tried putting out his cage with fruits and crickets in it to attract him. Also placed a "jebak" out with a slice of papaya in it. He seems attracted to the "jebak" initially and managed to land at its edge and eat the papaya. He refused to jump into the perch in the "jebak" that will trigger the trap door to be released.

After which he was preoccupied flying all over the aviary housing a pair of breeding Jambuls. Kekek and opening wing in display. Sigh!.... I think the pair will probably abandon their nest with all these activities. It would all have been fun like the time Chiku escaped if I wasn't rushing for time. Finally caught him with some latex glue, locally known as "terap". This "terap" has a nice texture and is sticky enough to hold the Jambul but not too sticky that the feathers are stuck to it.

Breeding Jambuls Pt2

A nest was made probably 2 weeks ago. Never seen the nest being used until today. Noticed the female is sitting in the nest which is made inside a coconut husk. Very positive development. Time to be more vigilant in providing supply of live food ;)

Red-whiskered Bulbuls - different judging criteria

There are no birds that are judged with as varied a criteria as the Red-whiskered Bulbuls (a..a. Merbah Jambul, Candek) that I know of. In fact there are 3 distinct cage designs that are commonly used and its popularity depends much on its locality.

First there is the Thai cage or I usually call them the "A" framed cage. It is a square cage broader at the base than the top.
Note:(Correction 11th Nov): I was told it originates from S'pore - this "A" cage)
Then there is the tall cage which is popular in Singapore and was popular in Malaysia not too long ago.
Thirdly there is the "Penang" type cage which is square in design with the top and bottom of roughly the same size, usually slightly bulging in the middle.

The perches placed on these different types of cages are also different in layout. It would have an impact on the behaviour of the birds and therefore, different criteria are used in judging a bird in competition.

I compete my Jambuls in an arena where the favoured type of cages used are the "Penang" design. However my prefered type of cages are the Thai cages. Now, how that would impact on the performance of my birds? I would think they would be at a disadvatage since "perch play" would also score some points. However, winning trophies is not important to me, more importantly the reason that I compete my birds is to benchmark against others and see how I fare against other good specimens base on my own criteria.

The best arena to be critically judged, in my opinion is the normal "chai" place, where most hobbyists gather to train their birds. Here, fellow freinds and strangers would sometimes share comments on birds. It is for the owner to filter from the genuine feedback to dishonest sarcarsm ;)