Sometimes its just hard to detect what is going on inside that egg. Here is a picture to help explain what one might be looking at when candling an egg. Pictured are egg stages.

#2 # 4 & # 6 are the one you don't want to see.

Fifth nest started hatching 4/26. Today there are 3 chicks, pic to follow.

Can you count four? All yellow, 4 eggs hatched, two did not, one was clear and the other questionable.


Canaries are born naked and blind. In the nest, they are totaly dependent upon their parents for food. They leave the nest around 16 days old and begin to feed themselves. Soft nestling food such as Abba Green Nestling Food mixed with couscous can be given to the hen/young the second day after hatching.
Chicks may be removed from the parents to a small flight cage when they are fully able to feed themselves. This occurs at 25 to 30 days old.

Fourth Nest 2015

Green Hen #4 hatched two of the 4 eggs layed in her first nest. The cock bird is the feeder as she did not want to get off the nest..

____________________

These two pictures show a full crop on the baby..Dad is feeding them really well. Well, dad and I are feeding them..I have to make sure there is dry nestling food in the cage before they go to bed, and that I get the soft food to them early in the morning.

_______________________________________________________________

Looking at the pin feathers in this pic, it looks like one is  going to resemble  dad, white with the black variegated marking. And the other looks green feathered.

                               

_________________________________________________________________

This is the pair, hen being the green and dad the white.

At two weeks now, the hen is off the nest and feeding the chicks, she should start building another nest in a week. This is Green Hen #4. 

(I think I have been watching Westminster to long)

Third Nest 2015

There are three all yellow chicks in this nest from Hen #3 in the Brown flight cage rear nest. She is an excellent hen and got the Purple Pin award from me for raising and feeding her brood. This is her 1st nest.

The three yellows

______________________________________

The parents

W S cock bird

 Hen #3

Sprout Seed Mix

"LIL BIRD MIX

Sunflower (inshell), Wheat, Spelt (hulled), Triticale, Barley (hulless), Oats (hulless), Millet, Buckwheat (in hull), Brown Rice, Black Lentils,Crimson Lentils, French Blue Lentils and Red Lentils, Adzuki Beans, Mung Beans, Fenugreek, Brown and Golden Flax, Alfalfa, Red Clover,Oriental Mustard, Daikon and China Rose Radish, Quinoa, Sesame, Amaranth

Smaller birds will love this beautiful mix of 27 seeds - all from sources which are certified organic - and so will your big birds =:-D As we've said, the name of the mix indicates the relative size of the seeds in that mix. Our avian advisors assure us that any size bird can enjoy any of our mixes. A smaller bird will just take longer to eat a larger seed, while a bigger bird will go through these faster.."

I am making this for my canaries now, mix some with the couscous and the babies get fed well, the boys keep singing and everyone is well nourished. 

      Link: http://sproutpeople.org/lil-bird-sprout-mix/

My Aviary

My 2015 Aviary Room Set Up for the Canaries.

The White Flight Cage, a community flight cage for 10 birds until breeding season started. After breeding season the 2015 young birds will live here

To the left of the white cage and pictured below is the smaller Brown flight.  

These are 2014 Canaries in the Brown Flight Cage. Six yellows, one white, two variegated yellow and one green.

Next is my Breeder Stack Cages from Abba.

Each cage has a divider in the middle..I have four breeding pairs here. The Johnny Appleseed pair is on the bottom.

Pictured here is the new white flight cage.

Is that a pink "Bourkie" keet I see ?

I think it is....!

Second Nest for 2015 hatched three chicks.

The 2nd successful nest this year was from yellow hen in the brown flight cage, her nest is there on the left. I have it covered with a tissue so as not to disturb her while working in aviary room.

Here are the three yellow chicks at a week, showing some pin feathers.

This young one is about 24 days old

This baby has fledged the nest here..They are wearing red 2015 leg bands, # 5-6-& 7.

I don't often see 6 eggs in a nest....

Hen is on her 2nd nest now

 and has 6 eggs. Her mate is a Waterslager.

This is the Hen #3

Here is her Waterslager  mate.

                                                                   Hen Hilda

Canaries as Pets

A canary can make a wonderful pet for the young and for the old, to look at and for the joyous songs they sing. They are active little birds, always in motion, looking for food, taking a bath and always interested in the activity around them. 

Today's canary comes in many colors. The original wild canary (Serinus serinus) was a drab greenish brown color. The yellow color that most people associate with a Canary has been developed by selective breeding. Today's canary can be green, white, yellow, red factor, with variegation's and ticks of darker color. Some have crest on top of their head. Example is the Gloster, a type canary.

There are three main breeds of canary: color canaries, type canaries, and song canaries. There are numerous varieties in each breed and there are mixed breeds of canaries. My selection here is the Waterslager song canary. Would love to add the Hartz to my aviary.

Pet canaries are usually purchased for their singing ability. Males are the singers. Hens may chirp but do not sing aloud. Hen can also make wonderful pets as they cheep and chatter and do their housework each day. 

A canary can live 10 to 12 yrs. They are independent birds and do not like to be hand held. They are delightful companions and will recognize you with a twitter, chip or song when feeding or when entering the room. The male (cock bird) canaries song will radiate through your home. Canaries are meant to be seen and heard.

    

For Sale Singers

Are you looking for a song canary for your home enjoyment? These Singers are available. Beautiful, healthy, 2014 home raised birds that I bred and raised. My canaries are not made available for sale until they have gone through their first molt in late fall. They have been supplemented and are breeding/singing condition. These are my Suburban Canaries prod of Am. Singers, Waterslager 

malinois waterslager pieter joris - YouTube  and Rollers.

Email veldt@comcast.net

            Food Supplements: Bee Pollen, Vitamins, Calcium & Probiotics.

Bird Club information:

http://www.ncbc-dc.org/

Here are the nesting material baskets I fill with unscented tissue strips, & natural burlap strings. I also give them a 2" square of 'Warm and Natural" 100% cotton batting that they love to pull and line the nests.

  

Here is my Johnny Appleseed Hen & her nest basket. She and her mate are a new addition this year. JA's are 1/4 Yorkshire and 3/4 Waterslager...

and here she is in her newly built nest...Eggs? Not yet!

Here are the first 3 chicks of 2015. They are green variegated.

two days old to about week

appearance of pin feathers on the wing 2nd week

"dagwood" head

Hen feeding the chicks, you can also see the cock bird.

Markers for Yellow hen in White Flight colony cage.

Looking at the top row, these pins tell me...This is the 2nd nest for this hen, she laid the 1st egg on Sat and laid a total of four eggs that I boxed giving them back to her on the 3rd day..so Tuesday is 14th day and chicks should hatch. The cock bird was a Waterslager. The bottom row tell me that in her first nest she had 3 chicks and was a excellent hen.  See below post for description of pin

           

Clothes Pin Markers for the mated canaries > tracking nest activity..

Activity Pins

I painted my first clothes pin markers 15 yrs ago and have continued to use them as a way of visually keeping track of the nests activity. The White pins with the egg number is changed each day as the eggs are laid. The Yellow pins are the day of the week & marks the day the 1st egg was laid, then turned over for week #2 giving me a hatch day. The day of the week is adjusted according to boxed eggs or natural layed eggs. A red pin with "hot" on it says eggs are being incubated. Do not disturb here. Once hatched the Dk. Green Nestling food pin marked #1 & #2 lets me know these chicks get soft food & when the chicks are 14 days old (ref to the Yellow  day pin) Gray pin are marked Fledged & added after Nestling food #2. This year I added light green for nest building, Blue for the first egg/boxed and pink for chicks hatched. Purple for the Hen that is outstanding in caring for her chicks..

My breeding stack for the bird 2015. Here are the cock birds singing their song to attract a mate.

I have since moved birds and paired them for breeding. I have 6 pairs with the two bottom cages fully opened and the top two divided.

The first Nest of 2015. Warm and Natural 100% cotton is a fav of this hen..

It all starts with a pretty little nest, with some Red Burlap and a newspaper to read..Then comes the eggs and then the chicks...

It's all about Yellow

Just a cute little chick

My canary breeding for 2015 is starting with 10 hens.  The Johnny Appleseed hen is a purchase of this year, the rest are hens that I raised last year. I have 15 cock birds, of which 8 are for sale..
https://www.ebayclassifieds.com/m/MyAds

I am the first

#1

This is the first chick hatched in 2015. Red nest, in the white colony flight cage, hen is a green and yellow variegated, the cock bird is the same with some red factor showing on his wing butts. Petamine breeding formula was given to both parents as a supplement to breeding.