A month by month guide to the breeding and rearing of American Singer Canaries

UK fancier, and Haith's customer, Mike Harrington shares a year in the life of his incredible American singer programme.

In addition to the monthly recommendations it is advisable to conduct an all year round feeding and cleaning programme of:

Diet:

Adlib feed of Haith’s Deluxe Canary Seed
Fresh water with the addition of Avigold
A mix of mineralised grit and oyster shell
Cuttlefish
Broccoli florets

Housing:

Combination of plastic breeding and flight cages housed in an unheated building preferably made of brick.
Natural daylight tube lighting operated with a timer and making regular adjustments to the ‘daylight’ hours throughout the year building up to a maximum of 14 hours ‘daylight in April.

Cleaning:

Wash cages and perches regularly. I use paper on the cage floors to make cleaning easier.
Bath birds weekly.

November to December:

Birds rest in preparation of a build up to the breeding season.

January:

Prepare birds for breeding by giving them a mix of conditioning seed with added rape and Kraker Tonic Grains. A pinch per bird fed in individual feeding pots.
Introduce weekly baths and continue these throughout until the rest period begins in November.

February:

Treat birds for red mite with Ivermectin.
Prepare nesting pans with a jute liner fixed into place with melted carbolic soap which helps to keep any mite etc. at bay.
Select pairings for the current years breeding.

March:

Finalise pairings.
Increase conditioning seed and Kraker Tonic Grains.
Start feeding Nectarblend egg food.
Take cocks and hens from their flights and put single birds into single cages alternating cages with a cock and a hen (a breeding pair in adjoining cages) with a wire partition between the cock and hen of each breeding pair.

April:

Remove wire partitions from the breeding pairs.
Put in prepared nest pans and spray the nest pans with ARDAP which will help to control red mite.
Reduce conditioning seed and Kraker Tonic Grains.
Stop Nectarblend egg food as soon as birds start sitting on eggs.
As eggs are laid remove and replace with pot eggs.
When 4 to 5 eggs have been laid set them all together.


May;

By the beginning of May you should have chicks hatching.
Feed a main diet of Deluxe Canary seed with fresh Nectarblend egg food twice a day.
When chicks are a couple of days old feed with sprouted Easisoak.

When chicks are 7 days old they can be rung with ASC closed rings.

At 22 days the chicks can be weaned making sure the chicks have plenty of Nectar Blend egg food and sprouted Easi Soak. The chicks will not crack a seed at this stage. N.b. before chicks are weaned the hen will lay again so ensure a second prepared nest pan is placed inside the cage.

June:

By the end of May / beginning of June you will have birds sitting on the second round.
Make sure the bird room is not too hot.
Dispose of any stale soft foods on a regular basis.

July:

By the beginning of July you should be weaning your second round of chicks.
Keep spraying ARDAP onto the cage surfaces taking care not to spray the birds.
When the last youngsters are weaned split the adult cocks and hens.

August:

Group together all young birds into large flight cages.

By this time the young birds will be able to crack seed and so conditioning seed can be added to their diet together with broccoli florets.

Ensure young birds get plenty of baths.

September:

Stop feeding soaked seed.

October

Birds will moult during October.
When the young cocks start singing split cocks and hens into separate flights, keeping them separate from the adults.

Written by Mike Harrington