About us  Pierre and Maja Swart:-  From The Start to our Present Operations.

    The Start 

We joined the Karoo Budgerigar Club in 1993.  In 1994 we travelled 800 km to Johannesburg to our first show. We did not show any birds but simply worked as stewards and during that weekend we learned more about budgerigar breeding in South Africa than we had in the previous two years. Our first major purchase was two Doc Robinson bred birds from somebody who had previously purchased them directly from Doc Robinson and we were all fired up. One was a Grey cock which bred well and he was the founder bird of our Stud today. In 1995 we travelled more extensively to the shows meeting Reinhardt Molkentin who had just emigrated from Germany. The following month Pierre travelled 1000 km to Reinhardt Molkentin's residence to purchase two pairs of birds.

 

    DAILY ROUTINE

In the morning the birds receive chickweed / spinach / endive which we grow in a small garden. Pairs with chicks get larger quantities. The next boxes are checked where chicks are expected to hatch. In the afternoon clean filtered water is given to all birds. Cages that have self-feeders are checked. The birds get their soft food mix, which consists of grated carrot, broccoli, sweet potato, cut corn, soaked germinated grouts and seed with egg food mixed together. The next task which is the highlight of the day is checking the nest boxes. Much time is spent watching the birds in the flights, as well as those birds which have just been paired up. This assists a lot when it comes to pairing up birds and birds that are ready for breeding is easily spotted. Every week the flights are scrubbed with a disinfectant. The flights have been built at a slight angle so that it makes it easier for rinsing and washing.
Viru-kill is used for this task. The partnership is simply run. Pierre and an assistant clean the bird room, as Maja is allergic to the dust particles. Maja will assist in choosing and preparing the show team, she likes the show side of things more than Pierre does. She will normally choose the winning bird from the Stud a few days prior to the actual show date. When it comes to culling Maja is the strict one and Pierre will always defend a particular bird.

 

    PAIRING

We always try to pair related birds. Birds are paired up to improve the quality of the bird and never for a specific colour. When  pairing up rare varieties, the same rule applies.  Pairing opaline to opaline or cinnamon to cinnamon is acceptable as long as an improvement is envisaged in the protégée bred from this pairing. The cock and hen are normally placed into the breeding cage at the same time and the nest box is kept open for them to enter into. If the hen does not enter the nest box within three days, we remain patient for another day or two if it is a maiden hen, otherwise the pair will be split up.

Wheat bran is used as nesting material, you can easily notice when the hen has been in the next box or not. We prefer the pairing of nephew to niece and half brother to half sister. We never pair up hens younger than eight months old. It is our experience that hens paired up younger than 8 months are only successful in the first round and become troublesome hens after that. We do not hesitate to pair up a cock bird as young as 6 months old if they are ready for breeding. Some cock birds mature at a very young age. When pairing up birds, at least one bird must have natural showmanship (swank), which is not always obtainable, but we do prefer to do this pairing. The next boxes are never cleaned or fiddled with the until the first egg has been laid.

 

    SHOWING

We show a big team only when the show is in our home town or close by.  The size of the team depends on a few things, but it basically comes down to how much space we have available when travelling. The birds get sprayed daily for four weeks before the show, spots and damaged tails are removed ten to eight weeks before the show. Two days before the show the spots get plucked and the faces of the birds are washed to open the feathers just above the cere. This is very important, many fanciers don't do this and therefore do their birds an injustice. It is the little things that count. Maja is the expert in removing and cleaning blood feathers, she is always able to “repair” any damage and is “paid” with success on the show bench. This has been proved over and over. The seed for the show team also gets washed and sun dried. Daily training of birds is not practised in the stud, but when it is a bird's first show it is placed into the show cage a few times and if it is does not settle down naturally, it gets to sleep over in the show cage that night. This normally does the trick! It is our opinion that birds that are not natural showers never really do well on the show bench. Birds that are nervous in the show cage must be of outstanding quality before we keep it.

On the way home after a show the drive back is always made short with the show catalogue that is discussed in length by the two of us. Upon returning from shows we make sure the birds are placed back in their original stock cages with fresh water grit and soft food. No matter how late the hour, even if it is 3 am in the morning, the birds are attended to and fed and watered before we go to bed. When dealing with sick puffed up birds, we don't advocate long periods of medication being used. We prefer to treat the sick bird for a short period. if they don't recover, so be it.

 

    BIRD SELECTION IS ONGOING

The selection of birds is an ongoing process. We have three flights, one large flight where all the birds are transferred to from the weaning cages. The birds in this flight are normally the outstanding and average ones. This flight is observed very keenly, therefore birds that don't belong are removed if their quality is not up to standard. Another flight is used for keeping adult birds. From this flight the breeding pairs are chosen. Cocks and hens are housed together. This way the hens don't get fat and lazy and by observing them it is easily established which birds are in breeding condition. We also make use of an American Aloe stump in the adult flight for the hens to chew on to get them into breeding condition and makes the selection of breeding birds easy. The last flight is where all the culled birds are kept. Youngsters that show no good features or promise at all go straight from the weaning cages into this flight.

 

    SHOW RESULTS

Our first big win came in 1996. Winning Best Beginner on Show in Port Elizabeth with an Opaline Sky Blue Cock, all offspring

PALM-041-98 Mauve Cock 1999 National Best Intermediate on Show

 

of the Grey Cock bred by Doc Robinson. At the end of 1999 Pierre went to the 1999 National Show in Benoni. Everybody expected Jenny Huber (who was dominating the Intermediate Section at that time) to win again. However we won Best Intermediate on Show and Best Intermediate Young Bird on Show with a Mauve Cock PALM-041-98. This really started many wins to follow.

We paired up an outstanding grey green cock that was bred from one of Reinhard's birds with an average opaline grey hen that we had purchased from Pat de Beer in Cape Town. One cock in particular, an opaline grey green won four Best in Shows. Maja named him "Simply" because he was "Simply the best". He was a wonderful bird and although he had some faults he always seemed to catch the judge's eye. At a show in 2001 he won Best in Show. His sister was an opaline grey green hen and she won Best Opposite Sex and a grey spangle cock won Best Young Bird in Show. We have produced a large family around this bloodline, although "Simply" never bred.

 

 

At the National Show in 2003 we again achieved something previously never done by winning Best Opposite Sex with a Texas Clearbody Hen. In 2005, four out of a possible six Best in Show's were achieved. Pierre judged the National and as such could not enter for the show. In 2006, six out of possible seven Best in Show were achieved; we also won best any age on show on the 2006 National. We were promoted by two ribbons in the champion section which was only once achieved by another champion exhibitor before, namely Reinhardt Molkentin.  Things even got better in 2007, which Pierre & Maja always predict will be our best year with a possible five out seven Best in Shows including Best Bird on Show and Best Opposite Sex on Show at the 2007 National. We were over the moon.  Again we were promoted two ribbons to silver medal champions and were also rewarded with the medal as Champion of Champions for 2007, a reward that is allocated yearly by the Budgerigar Society of South Africa for the best achieving Champion breeder.

In 2008 we entered four shows and won three Best on Shows. On the National Show we won Best Any Age on Show. We have done exceptionally well on the Nationals since 2003 winning a Major Award every year except for 2005 when Pierre judged. We were again awarded Champion of Champions for 2008 and were promoted to Gold Medal Champions.

In 2009 we entered all the Area Championship Shows and won all Best on Shows. This was not planned and came unexpectedly as we won each show. After each show we decided to try for the next one, we only entered at the last minute and made sure that our birds were in show condition where possible. Our winter weather is extremely cold and we have a couple of days each month which is warm and puts the birds into a moult.

One week before the National in Cape Town we had warm weather in the vicinity of ±26º in comparison to our normal winter day temperature ranging from -5 to a maximum of ±10 - 15º. Our hearts sank in our shoes because the birds went into a moult and “Zee” dropped a couple of flights and some of the others dropped tails and the birds started to produce pin feathers on their heads. The closing date for the National were a week before the show which did not give us much time to make sure that our birds were in top condition before entering. We worked endlessly on their heads two days before the show to open the pin feathers. At the end only we only had two birds that were reasonably in condition. We had entered only 14 birds and benched 13 as one of them dropped another tail and could not be benched.

The two birds that were reasonably in condition were a Grey Cinnamon Spangle Cock which won Best on Show at the National and the other were a Yellowface Spangle Cock, “Ziss” son of “Zee” which won Best Any Age on Show. The Grey Cinnamon Spangle Cock was named “Titan”. Only birds that do very well on shows or looks like a stunner in the nest gets a “name”.

Photo on left is "zee"
Winning six Best on Shows in one year is an achievement that was never ever achieved before by another exhibitor. Four different birds won the six shows. There was “Zee” Yellowface Cobalt Spangle Cock which was only taken to the Free State show in 2009 and became the first Supreme Champion registered in South Africa. To become a Supreme Champion the bird need to win three best in shows.

 

Gauteng Area Championship Show was won by “Zack” Yellowface Skyblue Cock, son of “Zee”. He also won the Western Cape Area Championship Show as well as the Eastern Cape Area Championship Show which also made him the second Supreme Champion Bird which we registered. He also won 5th Best Champion at the National.

Zack is on the right Click for larger image

 

 

At Natal Area Championship Show we did not take Zee and Zack but took Zee’s other son “Ziss” which is a Yellowface Skyblue Spangle Cock. “Ziss” also won Best Any Age on Show at the Eastern Cape Area Championship Show, Best Young Bird on the Free State Show as well as Western Cape Show and at the National Show won Best Any Age on Show. Coincidently “Titan” won Best Young Bird at the Natal Area Championship Show.

 

 

“Lady Lace” is a Lacewing Hen which won 3 Best Opposite Sex on Shows at the Free State, Eastern Cape & Natal Area Championship Shows. “Lady Ice” is a Double Factor Spangle Hen that we entered at four shows she won four Challenge Certificates in 2009 and was in contention at two shows (Eastern Cape & Natal) for opposite sex on show.

Being the year of extremes for us we also registered the first Grand Champion Bird which is a Spangle Grey Green Cock “Mr Mustard”. To become a grand champion the bird need to win 8 Grade A & B Challenge Certificates.

The cherry on the cake were when we heard that we won the Champion of Champions for 2009 for the third consecutive year. All our expectations were exceeded and definitely not planned – as said before it grew from one show to another and sometimes it took a lot of persuasion from Maja to get Pierre to drive to the shows as she was busy with school activities and personal appointments that was already made in advance.

The year 2007 was a good year for showing our birds, but 2009 topped it by far, unexpectedly, which shows that although it was not planned – success is only as far as you would allow it to be. If we did not take any chances we would not have been in the position we are in now. We always preach to others to set goals and go for them, but for us the goals were set week by week and month by month, forever changing.

The year 2010 was again a very good year for us and our birds, We only entered 4 shows and won BIS at all of them. In March we won the Spangle Show (with Titan”) and the best Young Spangle on Show (with ‘Arno”) and also won the Rare show (with “Ghalib”).  In April we attained the BIS at the Eastern Cape Area Show (again with “Titan”). He died shortly after the show.

Then the National came and we thought we did not have a very good chance, but Lady Luck smiled on us and we won with a Yellowface Grey Cinnamon Cock ("Zueler") and we also managed to win Best Any Age Opposite Sex. Sadly the Yellowface died when we arrived home after a 1300km journey. It is still a mystery that our 2 BIS birds died after show. We won the Champion of Champions for 2010 for the fourth consecutive year. For us the goals are set week by week and month by month, forever changing.

" The 2011 show season had a dream kick off, with us making a clean sweep, winning all the major awards, as well as 12 Challenge Certificates at the Eastern Cape Championship Show which was an A-grade show.

 

We attended the Western Cape Championship Show at the end of May and took 14 birds, winning 11 Challenge Certificates as well as Best Young Bird on Show with a Cinnamon Grey Green Easly Clearbody Cock. We held our breath for the upcoming National in July and tried our best to prepare our birds to the best of our ability. On the 16th of July 2011 1003 birds were benched and we achieved one of our main goals - winning the National three times consecutively. On record this has never been done since the establishment of the Budgerigar Society of South Africa in 1936. What made it more special is that the Budgerigar Society of South Africa was established in the Eastern Cape 75 years ago (1936). We also won Best Opposite Sex on Show, Best Young Bird on Show, 2nd, 3rd & 5th Best Bird on Show as well as 9 Challenge Certificates.

 

We are coming closer to our goal of achieving a Champion Bird in each colour by registering four more champion birds and only another four of the 26 are still outstanding. 2011 became the 5th consecutive year for us winning the Champion of Champions medal.

 

See 2011 show results for our latest show wins  View Guest Book or leave a message

     Pierre & Maja

 

 

                                     

 Ziss

 

    

Zee

 

Zack