Bird Clubs & Shows - A Thing of the Past?

[Sally]

SeaChelle I certainly can loan you some cages. Once it gets closer to show time, I'll have everyone give me a final tally of what they need, and I will see that everyone gets at least some cages to show. I want as many newbies as possible to have the experience of showing. When I first joined the Fort Worth Bird Club, I thought I wasn't interested in showing at all, but when I finally went to a show with a few entries, I was hooked.

[Lacybug]

Sally
Great, thanks! It's very nice of you to offer your cages to people.
Can we show pairs, or is it mainly single birds?

[Sally]

It is mostly singles, but there is a class for young pairs and old pairs. Again, young birds are those with NFSS closed bands from this year. Unbanded birds or birds with NFSS bands from prior years all go in the old classes.

When showing pairs, you want them to be pretty evenly matched, as the best of the two will be judged by the lesser of the two, not the other way around. In other words, if you put a really great male with a so-so female, the judge will place them according to how he ranks that female. If pied, you want the pied to be about the same amount on each bird.

There's lots of information about showing at www.nfss.org. Look under the Articles menu, there are several about showing, telling you how to prepare your birds, what to bring, etc.

If I had enough birds to show this year, I wouldn't be able to do this, but I did virtually no breeding last year, and I have very few birds to show. I know that for a newbie, who wants to shell out $50 for a show cage when you don't even know if you will like showing or not. So this way, I can help some newbies get introduced to showing without that expensive outlay.

[finchmix22]

Sally
That is a great price and nice to know those will meet the show criterion too.

[Sally]

For the information of those in the San Antonio area, finchmix22 (Deborah) and I will not be attending that show in Seguin this weekend. Transportation issues came up, so we will have to pass on that one. We will definitely be at the Cleburne (Fort Worth area) show and also at the Houston show in October.

Temple is a great location for a show, because it is central. Close to Austin, but reasonable to drive from Houston or Dallas/FW. They had a large turnout last year, but I may not attend that one. There is a reunion of my old Pan Am friends in Houston the same day (Nov. 1). If anyone wants to borrow cages for the Temple show, I will work out something to get cages to you either before the show or at the show.

[Sally]

finchmix22@Colt@SeaChelle@Lacybug and any others who want to show at the Fort Worth Bird Club show in Cleburne next Saturday (Sep. 27). The show hall will be open Friday night from 5:30pm to 7:30pm. We will be setting up the show benches, etc., and I will be there with my secretary book, taking entries.

You are welcome to stop by the show hall Friday night, pick up your show tags, entry forms, and show cages if you want. Otherwise, the show hall opens at 7:30am Saturday (possibly 7am), and entries will be taken from 7:30am to 8:30am. The show starts at 9am, and no additional entries are allowed once judging begins--actually, once the judge starts his pre-show walk-through.

Some people will be staying at the Best Western in Cleburne Friday night, they are giving us a bird show rate, but you have to ask for it. I will bring the show cages both Friday night and Saturday morning. If you wait till Saturday morning to pick up your show cages, you need to be there no later than 7:30am to allow time to transfer the birds and get your paperwork done.

I can line the cages with my seed, or you can bring your own. The advantage to using your own seed is that your birds will be used to it, and so less likely to spend all their time on the bottom of the cage checking out the new seed. If your seed has those little colored bits in it, you don't want to use that, as they can stain the bird's feathers, and that doesn't look good on a show bird.

Deborah, since you will be going to Houston, you should just keep the show cages till after that show, or Temple if you are showing there. For the others, if you are planning to show at Temple, it might be best to just keep the cages till that show is over. We can work all that out later.

Here is a link to the show info: http://www.fortworthbirdclub.com/bird-show.html

We break for lunch, and the club supplies barbecue beef, beans, potato salad and beverages, plus the members bring side dishes and desserts. Lots of good food! We do ask for a donation if you have lunch with us.

It looks like I will have plenty of cages for everyone, so join in the fun!

[Sally]

The Fort Worth Bird Club annual show was a great success! Four forum members were able to show there. Besides myself, there was finchmix22, Lacybug, and SeaChelle, who are all novices to showing. I hope they had a good time and might think about doing more showing in the future.

We had 138 entries from 11 exhibitors. One of our club members was unable to attend due to her husband's illness--they usually bring 40 entries, so we would have been even bigger! Our judge was working under several handicaps. Not only did he have to judge the parrot division first, but he had attended the state fair the day before with his sister, and he had to stand all day at our show on blistered feet!

Now on to Houston! In talking to some of the exhibitors, it sounds like they will also have a good number of entries. If there are any forum members who would like to show a few birds at the Houston show, please let me know at this time, so I can save a few cages for you.