FINCHforum

There are so many varieties of finches that can be crossed with canaries to make mules and hybrids that make super songsters!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCj_4nVU ... ata_player

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DLZQWWV ... ata_player

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBgTUwZx ... ata_player

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmT0pTbB ... ata_player

My GS sing beautifully like those, but they're real GS. I think they sing more like canaries because they grew up living around canaries for their first year of life and I continued to play recordings of canaries once I brought them home. Interesting that people would cross breed, when they can learn the singing well. See my youtube link in another post.

I only know of the goldfinch species, and grey & green singers. I think canaries are a species of finch, if I am wrong somebody correct me. But they are beautiful song!! Jerry, can you breed a siskin to a canary??

DanteD716 wrote:Jerry, can you breed a siskin to a canary??

Yes, and that is exactly why they are endangered and protected. The were responsible for creating the red factor canaries. If you have red siskins please breed them with eachother and help this struggling bird!

Woah, so red factors are from red siskins?? Great to know!!! So they were hybridized with canaries to much?

DanteD716 wrote: Jerry, can you breed a siskin to a canary??

Yes you can!
My friend and fellow breeder that I buy my Waterslagers from has some from last years pairings.
He has a male Siskin that is with three canary hens at all times, and in spring he breeds with them.
He is trying to locate a male for me for this years breeding season.

Jery

wellingtoncdm wrote:

DanteD716 wrote:Jerry, can you breed a siskin to a canary??

Yes, and that is exactly why they are endangered and protected. The were responsible for creating the red factor canaries. If you have red siskins please breed them with eachother and help this struggling bird!

These little birds don't help themselves much!
You look at them the wrong way, they die!
They are so sensitive and hard to breed.
A friend of mine has three pairs and has yet to have them breed!
At $400 a pair, they are way too risky to try to breed!

Jerry

You look at them and they die. same with caged goldfinches! Maybe siskins aren't a good caged species

DanteD716 wrote:So they were hybridized with canaries to much?

http://home.earthlink.net/~redsiskinproject/

thanks for the link Charlie

http://home.earthlink.net/~redsiskinproject/
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Charlie

One single known flock of red siskins left in the wild, and they are still being trapped not even for themselves, but to be used to hybridize with canaries? A species goes extinct because red canaries are pretty, and anyway their survival skills in cages don't seem to measure up to our standards???

Sad. We have enough choices of finches and singing birds without causing the extinction of a species for a color of canary. JMHO.

Well as a siskin fancier and breeder I think that cross breeding them to be a waste of a bird( my opinion). I breed both red and yellows and don't seem to have many issues except on the reds at around day 9 of hatching when the hen stops sitting. I have found siskins to be quite tough and robust actually and breed form late spring to early winter. I'm sorry that you keep loseing your siskins and at $400 a pair would be frustrating. I'm just sad that if cross breeding continues then the fate of the siskin as we know will be lost forever.

I am confused....isnt there enough red factors around to breed without the use of the siskin ? When I went to the bird show I saw tons of red factors. I sure hope someone can help to make the siskin number increase.

finchmix22 wrote:Sad. We have enough choices of finches and singing birds without causing the extinction of a species for a color of canary. JMHO.

I agree!!!