The show was organised by ZOOCVIT and took place at the House of Nature in Kiev, the capital city of Ukraine (Kiev is situated in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River).

Approximately 80 birds were benched from 5 regions in Ukraine.

Results

The major results were as follows:

• Best Any Age & Best in Show – Sergiy Ustenko
• Best Young Bird in Show – Vladimir Karpenko
• Best Opposite Sex Young Bird – Aleksandr Danyliuk
• Best Opposite Sex Any Age – Sergiy Ustenko

Judges

The judge was:

• Gerd Bleicher (Germany)

Photographs

All photographs below were taken by (TBA) & kindly supplied to us by Terry Tuxford.

Click on any image to enlarge it.

Best in Show & Best Any Age
S Ustenko

Best Young Bird
V Karpenko

Best Any Age Opposite Sex
A Danyliuk

Best Young Bird Opposite Sex
S Ustenko

Here are the results and photos.

The winners were as follows:

Any Age

• Lutino – Ian Fordham
• Yellow-wing – Guppy & Barnes
• White Wing – Guppy & Barnes
• Crest – Mick Widdowson
• Green Spangle – Jerry Donovan
• Dominant Pied – G & J Al-Nasser
• Recessive Pied – G&P Norris

Young Bird

• Yellowface – Jerry Donovan
• Crest – Mick Widdowson
• Dominant Pied – Rick Watts
• Lutino – Ian Fordham
• Albino – M & M Chapman
• Yellow Wing – Guppy & Barnes

Rares

• Best English Fallow – Mick Anzara
• Best Texas Clearbody – T Sadler
• Best Slate – Mick Widdowson
• Best Rare Young Bird – Texas Clearbody – T Sadler
• Best Easley Clearbody – Mrs J A Hill
• Best Rainbow – Findlay & Flavell

Judges

The judges were:

• Alan Adams
• Ian Ainley
• Ian Clarke
• John Cosby
• Jac Cuyten
• Mick Freakley

Photographs

All photographs below were taken by and kindly supplied to us by: Terry Tuxford

Gallery – Any Age

Click on any image to enlarge it.

Any Age Lutino – Ian Fordham

Any Age Green Spangle – Jerry Donovan

Any Age Dominant Pied – G & J Al-Nasser

Any Age Recessive Pied - G&P Norris

Any Age Yellow-wing – Guppy & Barnes

Any Age White Wing - Guppy & Barnes

Any Age Crest – Mick Widdowson

Gallery – Young Bird

Click on any image to enlarge it.

Young Bird Lutino – Ian Fordham

Young Bird Albino - M & M Chapman

Young Bird Yellow Wing – Guppy & Barnes

Young Bird Crest – Mick Widdowson

Young Bird Dominant Pied – Rick Watts

Young Bird Yellowface – Jerry Donovan

Gallery – Rares

Click on any image to enlarge it.

Best Slate – Mick Widdowson

Best Rare Young Bird – Texas Clearbody – T Sadler

Best Easley Clearbody – Mrs J A Hill

Best English Fallow - Mick Anzara

Best Texas Clearbody – T Sadler

Best Rainbow – Findlay & Flavell

Others, and that includes champions, cannot achieve that level for a variety of reasons, so that their “super” birds have obviously not had the attention so necessary – and even occasionally, such fanciers have taken their entries straight from the breeding cage, de-spotted and that is that!

That is no way to proceed – and the chances of being rejected by the judges on the day is heightened greatly, if for no other excuse, for appearing in poor condition.

So, how does the professional approach the task of preparing the team, often for many consecutive weeks?

Should hens be shown and how many times should they be benched – for instance, on an annual basis?

These and other suggestions are discussed below….

Catching The Team

This is not the time to discuss the “Ideal Budgerigar”, which is anyway different in all countries by and large.

The breeder knows which are his/her best birds and it is up to him/her to make decisions reading which cocks and hens he/she selects will be included in the possibles and probables that could, for the show season, be hooked out of the flights, including current year birds.

You will ask “How many days before the first show should the team be re-sited in the stock cages?” The answer is three weeks and they should be fed additionally on lots of soaked oats to put on weight in that time. “A big one will always beat a little one” is a common saying.

Hens should be very carefully considered for show – in a typical season we do not advise that they are shown more than three times each for reasons of their importance for breeding.

The Hallams

In UK in the 1980′s, a Lancashire couple, Sylvia and Gordon Hallam and their son Peter Hallam, had the “knack” in bucket loads. Their show teams were prepared so well, that their birds, which even if slightly inferior to better birds, were still placed ahead of such superior exhibits. Not necessarily winning the class, but you take the point being made. So what exactly were their techniques? We will itemise them.

The Hallams owned a printing works. So both with their adults and especially their young possibles, they were taken in show cages, by car, on a regular basis to their firm, where they were left for a few hours before another car journey home. Obviously, this process accustomed them swiftly to avoiding travel nerves – often seen as a green discharge from the vent which is not enteritis, but plain nerves on a first outing. It tells you that before, say, a national show, this should be the practice to follow and perhaps common sense if your potential “Best in Show” is to have a great chance.

Young birds are often highly fractious and scatty. They need special attention. “With what?”, you ask?

The answer is hot water and glycerine!

Fill your sprayer with very hot water and add 5mls of plain glycerine to it. Adjust the nozzle to a fine spray and test it is not too hot on your hand — we are not responsible if you scald yourself ! Better you than your birds! Then, fully armed, spray the birds really heavily the first time in a morning to the point they look like drowned rats. They have the day to recover their normal look as well as having their underdown feathers dry by the evening.

By then you will see the first results. Calmer birds, better feathers on their bodies – any tails still ragged and spots need attention later. Nevertheless a big change — but a few will still be scatty. This process is then continued, but a bit less dense each day until you see a sheen appearing on them. As the days progress, the birds become calm and you can always add a clip on show cage for them to receive extra steadiness, if not placed there permanently.

Other ideas include a lot of handling with the young birds. Place them in a “dummy” show cage – two per cage — overnight. That helps, and when it comes to the big day they are accustomed to change and familiar with the show cage restrictions and perches.

Two Weeks Later

Now come the tricky parts.

Some will not be fully feathered for this first event of the season. Examine the flights and tails and see their growth situation. Short primaries or missing ones and only one tail fully down, and he /she is left for a later event. Broken shafts should have been pulled earlier, bearing in mind that a primary flight takes four weeks to re-grow and a tail eight weeks. Spots also take four weeks to re-appear, but can be quicker if you spray the spot shafts regularly and keep them soft.

Cracked Shafts and De-spotting

Suddenly you spot a cracked tail feather on a top bird.

Catch it up and examine the shaft carefully. Is it actually bent, chewed a bit or cracked right through?

If it’s the last item — pull out the stump, but if the other tail feather is intact – still show the bird.

Many judges miss spotting there is only one tail!

If both are cracked only, get a lighted cigarette and hold it very close to the damage. You will see the tail straighten fast and all is back to normal. The same happens if you dip the shaft(s) in boiling water.

Whatever you do – do not use glue! That will result in a ban on showing, as bad as painting spots and finally losing permanent credibility. Such actions result in another species of bird involvement. The “albatross around the neck syndrome”! Same with plucking out flecking. It is banned and if spotted you will be in trouble.

De–Spotting

This is an art that needs good eyesight and practice – but is dead easy in experienced hands.

In short, you are aiming to reveal the six main spots clearly without the myriad of the, sometimes, masses of minor small spots and underspots which are paler than the majors.

A quality pair of bull-nosed, flat-faced tweezers have to be bought for this purpose. Pointed tweezers, as used by the “fairer sex”, are useless as you often take out the centre of the offending feather instead of taking it out completely in one movement. No harm is done, unless you are too fast and out comes a major spot — then you are dead for the show.

Now a word of warning on this subject. When de-spotting, do not leave it to the last minute and attack the complete job in one go. Close to the skin of each major spot are the empty feather follicles of the surplus spots you have removed. The area directly around that big important spot gets bruised. You then spray the bird and the water makes that big spot heavy – and out it falls within minutes or hours. Spread the process over several days and this will not happen.

Judging Sticks

Obviously all judges use judging sticks, or now becoming popular, a two inch (5cm) broad “paddle” which is placed through the middle bars to allow and encourage a nervous bird to perch for a second or two – so it can be assessed for placing. If not, then a judge risks the bird getting tired after a few hours and it perches and looks “out of this world”, with predictable comments from the exhibition viewers.

The Day of the Show

By this time, you should have stopped the last final fine spraying three days earlier and the final team look fabulous.

Cage up. Add the correct labels as supplied from the show secretary – please note the word “correct”. Do not reverse a young bird light green label entry, with an adult entry of the same colour. It is a trap that happens so often when in a hurry.

Now double check all is correct and then cross check each label corresponds to the entry form copy you have made.

Finally

Once the birds are taken and benched, it is up to the judges.

You have done all you can – your team is in sparkling white cages – or should be – and in a few hours you will nervously see how you have done.

In nearly all cases you do better than you think you would and have, in your early days, pushed out other birds further down the line because you have prepared yours so well.

You might not win the first time, but you may the next week.

Make a note of the judges – some very good, others have not a clue because they have not bred such a quality in their own aviaries and really do not know how to be decisive in their actions.

There are some brilliant judges around of course who know exactly what they are seeing “To the millimetre”.
They are up with the quality being bred and the times. They move fast initially and make swift judgements and then get them in a rough order before dealing with the finer points and minor place adjustments. A last check and it is “job done”.

Others can stand there, faced with, say, fifteen light green cocks and look bemused and start to sweat – especially at national level.

One actually, years ago, reached for the whisky hip flask at the UK Budgerigar Society World Championship.

Such judges are rare, but if, at national level, one of these “amateurs” is appointed from a national list of “qualified judges” – then I find that unforgivable to those exhibitors who have strived all year to win this or that class.

Make a note of those who have no ability.

Lastly, you will lose more than you win but whatever you do, if you have not won, make it your first job to congratulate the winner. Your personal prestige will then soar — even if you are not aware of it. We cannot all win!

Good luck and one day everyone will shake your hand. It’s a great feeling.

The event is to be staged at the Leisure Centre, Woking, Surrey on the weekend of 6th, 7th & 8th May with the Society’s AGM to be held on the 7th May.

Overseas visitors are most welcome to attend.

Situated just over 20 miles (32 km) from London, Woking is located in the west of Surrey, England. The town is approximately a 20 minute drive from London’s Heathrow airport and 40 minutes from London Gatwick. Woking is also just 25 minutes by train from London Waterloo.

For full details, please click on the image above.

John did an initial simplistic presentation specifically for the Australian National Budgerigar Council to show where the Yellow Faced should sit within the Australian Matrix, just below the Normal blue series. Nigel expanded this presentation, inclusive of photos, percentages, examples and had John review to ensure that he was okay with the changes.

Each country MAY have the Yellow Faced variety ‘mixed’ with a particular variety, when we would argue that the Yellow Faced ‘Normal’ should be shown as the Yellow Faced in a class of its own and all others with a Yellow Face be exhibited within the variety.

I use as one example, the Albino. In Australia this is shown in the Yellow Faced class, we would argue that it is an Albino first, with a Yellow Face – thus should be shown as an Albino. This example could be used for all varieties in the blue series.

I trust fanciers enjoy the presentation and consider the reasons behind it.

To view the presentation, please click on the slide below (left).

The show was held at the public school in Würenlos in northern Switzerland.

Results

• Best Bird & Best Young Bird – Daniel Lütolf
• Best Opposite Sex & Best Opposite Sex Young Bird – Daniel Lütolf
• Best Any Age – Daniel Lütolf
• Best Opposite Sex Any Age – Giger & Waser

Judges

The judges were:

• Geoffrey Tuplin, Great Britain
• Michael Chapman, Great Britain

Photos

Photographs of the champion birds can be viewed here: Swiss BS National Show 2010 – Photographs

The above can be viewed as follows:

• BS Club Show 2010 – Photographs by Mick Freakley

Challenge Certificates – Colour line up

Young Bird

Click on any of these links to skip directly to a particular colour:

Light Green , Dark Green , Skyblue , Dark Blue, Grey Green, Grey, Opaline Green, Opaline Grey Green, Opaline Blue, Opaline Grey, Cinnamon Green, Cinnamon Blue, Opaline Cinnamon Green, Opaline Cinnamon Blue, Lutino, Albino, Yellow-wing, White-wing, Crest, Spangle Green, Spangle Blue, Dominant Pied, Recessive Pied, Yellow Face, Rare, Any Other Colour

Challenge Certificates – Colour line up

Any Age

Click on any of these links to skip directly to a particular colour:

Light Green , Dark Green , Skyblue , Dark Blue , Grey Green , Grey , Opaline Green , Opaline Grey Green , Opaline Blue , Opaline Grey , Cinnamon Green , Cinnamon Blue , Opaline Cinnamon Green , Opaline Cinnamon Blue , Lutino , Albino , Yellow Wing , White Wing , Crest , Spangle Green , Spangle Blue , Dominant Pied , Recessive Pied , Yellow Face , Rare , Any Other Colour

It is for this reason that fanciers from all over the world make it a habit to attend this unique show.

This year was no exception when fanciers traveled from as far afield as Australia, Canada, Pakistan, USA and, from mainland Europe, Belgium, France, Germany, Holland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal & Switzerland to witness for themselves the quality of the birds benched.

Attractions

Apart from the quality budgerigars at the show there is the seminar staged on the Saturday morning, always popular with many fanciers attending and this year one of our top breeders and exhibitors, Brian Sweeting, was the guest speaker.

There are also all the Budgerigar Society, area & specialist societies stands that give members the opportunity to pay for their following year’s subscriptions plus, of course, the array of trade stands and products that are available to fanciers to stock up for the breeding season.

One other important factor of this unique show is the social side, the friendships that are made, new and old, and the opportunity over the two days to meet and catch up with fellow fanciers that one only sees once a year. This is further enhanced by the dinner/dance on the Saturday evening.

The popular Auction of Promises on Sunday afternoon is followed by the grand finale of the two days when the President of the Society presents the wonderful array of 91 trophies to the winning exhibitors. Each part contributes to making this unique event a weekend not to be missed.

Behind the Scenes

A show of this magnitude doesn’t just happen!

The result is thanks to tremendous teamwork by a great many helpers.

It starts with the erecting of staging on Friday morning and ends when the last bit of staging is put away and everyone has gone home.

The people to thank are too numerous to mention but include the staging erectors and dismantlers, the managerial and secretarial staff, the club show committee, security, trophy, catering, seminar, tombola, door staff, stand co-ordinator, sales staff, stewards, in fact everyone who helped in any way.

Stands

Each year there is a competition for Best Trade Stand and Best Area or Specialist Society Stand.

The winning Trade Stands were as follows:

• 1st – Calcivet (The Birdcare Company)
• 2nd – Aviary Hygiene (David W Van De Peer MBICSc)
• 3rd – EMP (Donald Cooke Ltd)

The winning Best Areas or Specialist Society Stands were as follows:

• 1st – South Midlands Budgerigar Society
• 2nd – LABS (Lutino & Albino Breeders Society)
• 3rd – CBBA (Clearwing Budgerigar Breeders’ Association)

This was the third successive year that the South Midlands BS won – they received £25 and a lovely engraved glass plaque.

Judges were the Society President Dave Herring, Chairman George Booth and overseas judge Dave Collier.

Judging

The task in hand for this year’s show fell upon a team of 15 judges which included the Budgerigar Society President, Dave Herring.

The remaining 14 judges were:

• Alan Adams
• Ghalib Al-Nasser
• Jeff Attwood
• Lyn Bancroft
• Nigel Beevers
• Jerry Donovan
• Colin Lamb
• Jim McGeehan
• Geoff Moore
• Norma Phillips
• Tony Pope
• Cy Thorne
• Mick Widdowson

Every year the society invites an overseas judge and this year was no exception. However, although Dave Collier currently resides in the USA, he is actually a B.S. Judge, so it was meeting up with old friends for him at the weekend.

Accepting birds on the Saturday morning and starting judging a bit later proved to be quite popular with many exhibitors – and providing four extra judges to judge the sections while the colour judging was in progress worked extremely well this year.

The four extra judges were:

• Dominic Avo
• Ron Payne
• Ray Steele
• Terry Tuxford

These four have already been invited to judge the colours next year.

There were super quality budgerigars on display at this show and having gone through the selection by the colour judges, the 26 best of colour winners and their respective opposite sexes came forward to the final selection for the major awards.

The Budgerigar Society celebrated its 85th Anniversary this year, and each exhibitor benching 8 or more birds received a specially commissioned clock to mark the occasion, this was most appreciated by the exhibitors.

Best in Show

Les Martin ensured that his name be added to that long list in the Hall of Fame for winning the supreme award at this show when his Grey Green cock was initially judged Best Any Age in Show and went a step further by beating the young bird for the Supreme Best in Show.

Soon after Les was declared the winner, the crowd realised that the bird was that which won Best Young Bird at last year’s show.

It was a popular win as Les is a staunch supporter of the Budgerigar Society Club Show and his worthy winner was a bird that excelled in width of head and depth of mask with wonderful frontal rise and directional feathering, staged in immaculate condition.

Best Young Bird & Best Opposite Sex in Show

The Norwood Stud (Tony & Sandra) benched a wonderful Grey hen to capture the next prestigious award of Best Young Bird & Best Opposite Sex in Show.

This bird excelled in quality of width of face and shoulder with good length and staged in good condition.

Best Any Age Opposite Sex in Show

The partnership of Mick Freakley & Ian Ainley have featured regularly among the major winners’ listing since 2007.

This year they did it again when their adult Grey hen won Best Any Age Opposite Sex in Show. This was a massive hen with a wide head but was spoilt by a short tail.

Best Opposite Sex Young Bird

Last year’s Club Show winners, Paul & Dennis Spruce, teamed up with Keith Moorhouse to form the partnership of Moorhouse & Spruce and they won the Best Opposite Sex Young Bird with a lovely stylish and powerful Cinnamon Skyblue cock.

Champion Any Age

The Champion Any Age section was headed by the Best in Show and Les Martin captured the second spot with his Skyblue cock of similar quality as the supreme winner.

The Freakley & Ainley partnership was third with their massive Spangle Cinnamon Grey cock, large and bold shown in good feather condition.

The Grey hen of Freakley & Ainley was the Best Opposite Sex in this section.

Champion Young Bird

The first two places in the Champion Young Bird were occupied by hens of super quality.

First was the Norwood Stud’s Grey hen which was Best Young Bird in Show, followed By Richard & Michael Miller’s Yellowface hen of style with good depth of mask and colour.

Brian Sweeting benched an excellent Cobalt cock of good length in third place.

Intermediate Any Age

It was partnerships that occupied the first ten places in the Intermediate Any Age section and the Bowker family of Richard, John & Wayne headed that section with a Grey cock of good frontal rise followed by the Moorhouse & Spruce partnership with a Grey Green cock which was last year’s supreme winner. A massive bird with good frontal rise but was not in the condition that took him to the supreme last year.

The Brian Newton & Gary Shepherdson partnership was third with a Light Green cock of good head quality and large spots.

There were no hens placed in the top ten in this section.

Intermediate Young Bird

The Cinnamon Skyblue cock that was placed Best Young Bird Opposite Sex headed the Intermediate young Bird section for Moorhouse & Spruce followed by their Yellowface Cinnamon Grey cock of good style and size with lovely top end.

R & J & W Bowker were third with their challenge certificate winner, a Grey Green hen with exceptional head quality showing the “buffalo effect” and benched in good condition.

Novice Any Age

A Skyblue cock of Dave Brick headed the Novice Any Age section, a lovely bird with good face and staged in good condition.

Simon Roberts was second with a quality Grey Green cock followed by Richard Hooper’s Spangle Cinnamon Grey Green hen in third place. A good hen with good width of face and shoulder.

Novice Young Bird

Albert Jennings headed the Novice Young Bird section with a nice long Violet cock followed by Dave Brick’s powerful Cinnamon Grey cock in second place.

A Light Green cock of quality from Philip Pearce & Connor Pears was third.

A Grey hen from Liam & Simon Devaney was the best opposite sex in this section.

Beginner Any Age

The only exhibitors who managed to win both sections were Jim & Carol Huxley in the beginner section who had a good team to win many awards. Their any age winner was a Grey cock of good top end and mask staged in good condition. Their Spangle Blue cock was placed third best.

Separating the two was a nice Grey hen benched by Terry Price.

Beginner Young Bird

Jim & Carol Huxley headed the beginner young bird section with a lovely Spangle Blue hen of good width and size. This was followed by Ian Ward & Michelle Rogers Cinnamon Grey Green cock of good width and blow of cap spoiled only by one shadow spot.

James Theobald had a Yellowface cock in third place.

Best Junior in Show & Junior Any Age

It is always good to see competition in the junior section, the future of our hobby.

Connor Spruce won the any age section with a nice Grey Green cock and Best Junior in Show – while Gary Cameron won the next two places with a Spangle Blue cock and a Grey cock.

Junior Young Bird

The junior young bird section was won by Jack Hickton-Cragg with a Dominant Pied Blue cock.

This was followed by Erin Newall’s Grey Green cock.

Jordan Butcher was third with a Cinnamon Blue cock.

Teams

There was a total of 6 Teams benched in the team classes of 4 and 6 birds and Geoff Bowley won both classes and Best Team in Show with a team of six Albinos.

Any Age Challenge Certificate

Winners were:

• K. Leedham – light green, cinnamon green
• Norwood Stud – dark/olive green, rare variety
• L. Martin – skyblue, grey green
• B. Sweeting – cobalt/mauve/violet
• P. Greenwood – grey
• C. Bowman – opaline green
• Main & Jenkins – opaline grey green
• Moorhouse & Spruce – opaline blue
• M & S Banks – opaline grey
• J. Stainforth – cinnamon blue
• T & A Luke – opaline cinnamon green, opaline cinnamon blue, any other colour
• I. Fordham – lutino
• D. Bowley – albino
• R. Day – yellow-wing
• R. Docherty – whitewing
• Cheatley & Alcorn – crest
• J. Grubb – spangle green
• Freakley & Ainley – spangle blue
• A & D Woan – dominant pied
• C & D Jones – recessive pied
• J. Nevin – yellowface

Certificates of Merit:

• D. Brick – Novice
• J & C Huxley – Beginner
• C. Spruce – Junior

Young Bird Challenge Certificate

Winners were:

• R. Allen – light green
• P. White – dark/olive green
• C & M Snell – skyblue
• B. Sweeting – cobalt/mauve/violet, opaline blue, spangle blue
• R & J & W Bowker – grey green
• Norwood Stud – grey
• M & T Rodgers – opaline green, opaline grey
• Main & Jenkins – opaline grey green
• Ward & Rogers – cinnamon green
• Moorhouse & Spruce – cinnamon blue, yellowface
• D. McKeown – opaline cinnamon green
• T & A Luke – opaline cinnamon blue, any other colour
• I. Fordham – lutino
• A. Kelly – albino
• Guppy & Barnes – yellow-wing
• R. Day – whitewing
• A. Brown – crest
• J & C Huxley – spangle green
• P. Hodgkins – dominant pied
• M & M Chapman – recessive pied
• Swain & Ford – rare variety

Certificates of Merit:

• A. Jennings – Novice
• J & C Huxley – Beginner
• J. Hickton-Cragg – Junior