South Hampshire December 2015

Well it’s December fun night again, if you can remember back to this time last year, the Social and Xmas raffle at Wellow was a great success and this year it has excelled again with a turnout of 42 members / guests! (Apologies were received from John Burton, Kevin Burnett and Clive Mayers).

With everyone there with a drink in hand we started with the first round of skittles before the meal, which was being served at 8.15pm.

After the meal we had part one of the Christmas draw (77 Prizes) followed by the second round of skittles. This was played with some hilarious moments to say the least, with Andrew McKendrick the main winner with 23 points & Barbara Watts with 20 points winning the ladies prize.

We then had part 2 of the draw until the conclusion of the evening, when Mick Freeborn, our President thanked Peter Merritt and his family for all the hard work they had put in to make the evening a success, especially Pete’s grandsons for picking up and replacing the skittles etc.  He also thanked everyone for coming and the staff for the quality food and service they provided. He said what a good atmosphere there was in our club these days, which would stand us in good stead for the future.

He also mentioned about the superb program for next year and that we need to support the club when we have top speakers, as the club is slowly but surely growing in support with thanks to Tony Cash for all his efforts promoting the club.  With that said he wished everyone a good breeding season and a merry Christmas and on that note we finished the evening and wished everyone a safe journey home.

South Hampshire November 2015

Bill Farr, our Chairman, opened the meeting and welcomed all there (34). Apologies were read out from Ray Nichols, Gwen French, John Burton and Mark Edwards. We also welcomed 2 new guests / members, Heidi Patient & Jane Cooper.

With all the 10 birds benched and ready for the fun Judging, Bill mentioned about the London & Southern Counties BS Inter Club competition held last Sunday afternoon and read out the results in which our club came 2nd again with 43 points, only beaten by Hastings BS on 46 points. Bill thanked all the members that supported it by entering their birds as part of the team of 12 classes!

Bill then said that John Burton had donated £55 to club funds from his seed sales, which was thanked by all!

He then handed over to Tony Cash to say a few words about our last meeting, which was the Members Show with our judge, Roy Powell, who did a good job.

With that I explained the format for the evening, with the paperwork I had printed off to be filled in by the members; they had to assume it was their stud of birds and select 3 birds they would keep and 1 that would be sold. 

They were asked to keep the paper work on them until part 2 of the evening!

After lots of lively discussion and sharing ideas between the members it was time for a tea break. Once the break was over I asked Dee Boscoe to take Part 2, in which she asked various members to come up with their selection and give their reasons for keeping / selling one bird, which was very entertaining as most members had a go.

As the evening was drawing to a close it was evident that most members chose the same bird to sell, with the same 3 chosen to keep out of 4 birds. 

Dee then went on to say which birds she would pair together and the reasons why, which was very interesting, especially with a few comments from the floor as well! It was an enjoyable evening with most members participating, which is what club meetings are all about.

After the raffle Bill, our Chairman, thanked all of the members for bringing their birds.  He then closed the meeting and wished everyone a safe journey home.

South Hampshire October 2015
Photos by By Neil Cawley

Bill Farr, our Chairman, opened the meeting and welcomed all there. Apologies were read out from John Burton and Steve Bailey.

With all the birds benched and ready (62), he then handed over to our judge for the evening, Roy Powell, who had travelled along from Worthing.

Whilst the main judging was being carried out we dealt with club business and general matters regarding the sponsors of our Open Show and the need to keep them and see if we could add others to that list! We also hadn’t collected monies for the adverts in the schedule as most members had contributed to the costs anyway. (This to be discussed at next committee meeting) with a copy of the show accounts available for all there (32) showing a profit of £100.80 on the Open Show.

I also issued a completed 2016 program to members, with some lively discussion regarding the events and speakers for the year and then it was time for a tea break.

In part two we had a question & answer session on various subjects and talked about the BS club show / birds / judges, which was very interesting to say the least.

Our congratulations to the main winners of the evening:

·       Best in Show                             Jim Lawrie       Cin Sky cock 9-1

·       Best Young Bird in Show          Jim Lawrie       Grey Green cock 101-1

·       Best Opp Sex Young Bird         Martin Terry       Sky Hen   104-1

·       Best Opp Sex AA                       Martin Terry      Grey Spangle Hen 16-1

·       Best Champion                           Jim Lawrie         9-1

·       Best Intermediate                       Peter Merritt       106-1

·       Best Novice                                Neil Cawley        302-1

·       Best Beginner                            Thompson & Boscoe 316-1

·       Best Junior                                 Aidan Bird (New Member) 801-3

Results Sheet Click Here

Our thanks to Steve Cox, our chief steward for the evening, who did a great job working along side Roy Powell (Thank you Roy)!

After the raffle Bill, our Chairman, thanked Roy for adjudicating and not accepting any ‘expenses’ and all of the members for bringing their birds.  He then closed the meeting and wished everyone a safe journey home.

South Hampshire September 2015

Bill Farr welcomed all there (29) at the BBQ at Peter Merritt’s house, which started from 6.30pm.

Apologies were received from Mark Edwards and John Burton.

Tables, chairs & gazeboes were set up in the garden with extra lighting, as the evenings close-in a lot earlier now.

Peter & Chris were well prepared / organised this year, with pre-cooked food brought out to finish off on the Barbie including mouth watering sausages, burgers and chicken.

Peter & Chris provided various dishes to go with the meals, including coleslaw, rice, potato salad and a mixed salad of tomatoes, lettuce, etc. The desert was equally mouth watering!  Everyone sat down together for a lovely social evening (including the free drinks) all out of club funds, as we are trying to give back something to the members!

The raffle and Christmas Draw were put on hold at this event! (We will get you all next time)

Mick Freeborn, our President, said thanks to Chris & Peter for all their work in cooking / preparing the food and thank you to all members that attended the evening - it was great!

The BBQ finished at approx 8.45pm, with members starting to drift off and all were wished a safe journey home.

South Hampshire August 2015

Tony Cash opened the meeting as Bill Farr, our Chairman was on holiday and welcomed all there (26) for our pre-show meeting, which started at 8.15pm.  We also welcomed David Cummings as a new paid up member!

Apologies were received from Mark Edwards, John Burton, Brian Bailey, Bill Farr, Pam Freemantle and Andy Thorpe.

With all the unshowable competition birds benched (12) and ready for discussion later on, we started on how we were going to run / organise the Open Show.

After lots of lively discussion re procedures regarding the Open Show & team duties it was time for a tea break with more discussions in various groups.

The main items that we discussed to be in place for the show were:

• Steve Cox & Steve Bailey / John Mullen booking in. (They will also do the “CC” colours later)
• Shaun Thompson on Bio-Security.
• Dee Boscoe to hand out the rewards money as they enter the birds. 
• Bird Auction to start at 3pm.
• Doors /Gates for setting up Sunday open at 6.30 am.
• Booking out Sunday, as last year, with Champions& Intermediates’ through main doors and Novice & beginners at side doors.
• Bag of seed, bottle of malt whiskey, bottle of wine & box of biscuits for main raffle

We looked at the birds during the break. As there were some birds with bad faults there to talk about, we got Mick Freeborn, backed with Steve Cox, as panel judges to talk about the faults and how the long flights/tails are affecting the judges at open shows.

Mick said it was taking a lot longer to get the judging done as, when a long tail /flight bird was suspected, the judge took the bird to other judges for confirmation before disqualifying it. Even then some birds were still winning a “CC”, which was not sending out the correct message to breeders that show.

We talked about why some top breeders / judges are still showing them and hoping to win when they should know they won’t after all the publicity and photos on the BS web site / magazine!

After that we had the raffle and then I thanked the members for bringing their birds and closed the meeting, wishing everyone a safe journey home.

South Hampshire July 2015

Bill Farr, our Chairman, opened the meeting and welcomed all there (27) for Paul Tiller’s Power Point presentation, which started at 8.15pm.

Apologies were received from Derek Ham, Peter Merritt, John Burton, Paul Gover, David Cummings, Andy Thorpe, Chris & Kerrie Bellows, Steve Cox, Steve Bailey, Mick Freeborn, Neil Johnson and Gwen French. (13) Although Mick FreeBo came and did the Christmas draw before leaving to go to Leicester ready to Judge their show in the morning!

With all the green series competition birds benched (18) and ready, I asked John Mullen to be the Judge tonight (assisted by David Rice) whilst we dealt with club business regarding the next meeting & show schedule, which was handed out to all present.

With that Paul Tiller was set up and ready to go! (Almost an IT expert) He started with a history of himself from boy to retirement, which included his working background and the amount of years he spent living and working abroad.

Below are the main bullet points of the presentation which we discussed in full:

•        I grew up in Liverpool, where we had a garden shed that could be used to keep budgies

•        At about 13 I started keeping budgies

•        I turned it into a profitable business

•        I cycled to Wigan to buy my first significant bird for £5

•        Then girls, exams and university came along and I gave up

•        Fear of retiring and not enough to do made me rethink

•        I remembered fondly my time keeping birds as a teenager

•        I Moved house to have a bigger garden

•        I visited lots of aviaries, including those of Ghalib Al- Nasser/ Gerald Binks/Ron Pearce and various others

•        I decided exactly where in the garden to build and found a shed I liked.

•        I needed planning permission, but was told it was no problem

•        I purchased my first birds from Mick Mapston from Leatherhead , about 50 in all

•        That got me started. I would advise newcomers not to spend a lot at first, to learn with what you have

•        Try to find a buddy who can help and advise

•        In my case having Richard Tessier, David Harmer and Ghalib Al- Nasser around was extremely useful. Later I got to know Fred Wright who is also a source of great knowledge.

•        I joined Croydon BS club and L&SC BS area society and went to the shows, always willing to help and thus to learn.

•        I still enjoy stewarding and chatting to the judges, watching them judge and trying to learn myself

•        Last year I visited Jac Cuyten again and bought 4 birds; so far it does not look good as 2 have died and the other pair has given me 2 clear rounds. However, before the cock died he did fill one egg so I do have one chick from my investment so far.

•        I also brought in 2 nice Sky blues from Steve Bailey, with some success.

•        I have to say that I have an excess of Cinnamons in my stud as well as lots of yellow/golden faces. It all goes back to the Cuyten birds which came in 2010.

•        I am now only interested in bringing in normal outcrosses, but it is hard to make the change.

•        I rejoined the hobby full of ambition. Gradually that has reduced and I am happy to just make progress.

•        Generally I show about 5 or 6 times, which is about the average apparently

•        I really like to go to the BS show in Doncaster; I think it is a great event and fun to be around so many dedicated Budgie people. I always show if I can. Even when I was in hospital in 2012, I persuaded John Isles and David Harmer to take 4 birds for me

•        Usually I select about 10 to 15 birds after the breeding season, to be my show team. I continuously find other better birds and juggle around the team, but hold them in a 3 cage flight in the hope they do not get into fights and lose key things like tails and flights

•        I am not really very good at show preparation, and only slowly improving. It is key and I need to improve at despoting particularly

•        Every nook and cranny was filled with Red Mite, it got into the perch holders and around the plastic nest boxes.

•        I found the only way was to stop breeding and clean up every corner of the bird room.

•        Currently I have painted everything with a product called Mil Ban from Germany, recommended by Tony Cash.

•        Then I treated all the birds with Ivemectin.

•        Maybe I have solved the problem, but frankly without disassembling the whole building (which is wood), I live in fear that it will return.

My thoughts on the hobby:

•        First, it is a hobby so we should enjoy it.

•        Mainly older people in it, so a worry for the long term

•        It is up to us to make it good and look for positives (glass half full)

•        I think it is a friendly hobby, but there seems to be a lot of “politics”.  I just try to stay away from that.

•        I think the show system is very good in general and there is encouragement for all.

After lots of lively discussion during the presentation and sharing ideas, it was time for a tea break. We looked at the birds during the break, with some super birds there to talk about and John Mullen had done a good job on the placing of the birds.  It is only by asking different members to judge on these evenings that their confidence grows and they will come forward in future to help. We continued with Paul taking questions / answers for the rest of the evening, with some amusing comments and sharing of information.

After that we had the raffle and then Bill Farr, our Chairman, thanked Paul Tiller for an interesting evening and for not taking any expenses.  He also thanked the members for bringing their birds and then closed the meeting and wished everyone a safe journey home.

South Hampshire June 2015

Steve Bailey, the Vice Chairman, opened the evening and welcomed all there (23) for our fun judging / keeping competition, which started at 7.55pm.

Apologies were received from Gwen French, John Burton, Bill Farr, Paul Gover, Andy Thorpe, Ray Nichols, Mark Edwards, Rick Watts and John Mullen. (9)

We also welcomed another new member - David Cummings - who is coming back into the hobby after being out of it for 50 years!

With all the birds benched (21) and ready, we dealt with club business regarding the show schedule & the last meeting which was the Members Show with our judge, Andy Thorpe, who did a grand job.

With that I explained the format for the evening with the paperwork I had printed off to be filled in by the members; they had to assume it was their stud of birds and select 3 birds they would keep and 2 that would be sold.  They were asked to keep the paper work on them until part 2 of the evening!

After lots of lively discussion and sharing ideas it was time for a tea break. Once the break was over I asked Mick Freeborn to take part 2, in which he put up his selection and explained why he had chosen them in detail.  He then asked various members to come up with their selection and give their reasons for keeping / selling birds, which was very entertaining.

As the evening was drawing to a close it was evident that 99% of the members chose the same birds to keep & sell.

Mick then went on to say which birds he would pair together and the reasons why, which was very interesting, especially with a few comments from the floor as well! It was an enjoyable evening with most members participating, which is what club meetings are all about.

After that we had the raffle and then Steve Bailey, our Vice Chairman, thanked all the members for bringing their birds.

He then closed the meeting and wished everyone a safe journey home.

South Hampshire May 2015

Bill Farr, our Chairman, opened the meeting and welcomed all there. Apologies were read out from John Burton, Derrick Ham, David Rice and John Mullen.  (30 Members Attended with 55 Birds)

We also welcomed 3 new members’ tonight; Ricky Watts, Clive Mayers and Janet Halborsen.

With the birds benched, Andy Thorpe started judging at 8.15.  Peter Merritt acted as chief steward (with Neil Cawley helping in the background), whilst we dealt with club business and used our new sound system as a test for later.

Bill then handed over to me to give a brief of the format for the evening, which was asking Andy to choose Best Young Bird overall, Best Opposite Sex and Best Barhead, as well as section winners.  

I also mentioned that our web site still had a member’s profile section and if members sent me their pictures and a brief of themselves I would add them on to the web site as well.

I read out the minutes of the last meeting when we had held a Pairs competition, with Mick Freeborn judging 4/5 pairs. There were no comments and the minutes were taken as a true account of the meeting.  We then went on to watch as Andy did his judging, with odd comments from the floor.  

Andy had almost finished his judging by the break, so after refreshments he selected the main winners of the night.  He gave a detailed assessment of the birds he had chosen, with a Cin Grey Cock up as Best Bird, saying it had some growing to do to become a super budgie!

Andy then started to give comments regarding the quality of the birds benched and the faults and good features that were in front of him.  He also gave the reason why he had chosen the Grey Dominate Pied hen as Best Opposite Sex.   

With each bird commented on, along with comments from various members, he then took questions from the floor.  There were lots of positive and interesting comments, so ‘well done’ to all the winners.

The winners on the evening were:

• Best Young Bird: Ricky Watts with a Cin Grey Cock (Best Champion)                
• Best Opp. Sex Young Bird: Tony Cash  with a  Grey Dominate Pied  Hen  
• Best Intermediate Bird: Peter Merritt  
• Best Novice Young Bird: Mick Small  
• Best Beginner Bird: Shaun & Dee
• Best Barhead: Peter Merrit

Best In Show

Tony Cash

Best Opposite Sex

Well done to Andy for his Judging and to all who brought birds on the evening!

The meeting finished at 9.50 with the raffle. Bill thanked all members and closed the meeting, wishing all a safe journey home.