new finch guy

[redbeak]

Hello there, been lurking for several months now, ever since I got a few zebra finches from my neighbor who didnt want them anymore.

To make a long story short, I have a lot of "hookbills", and Im really new to finches.
Ive already been thru a successful,if not unintended, breeding season with my original 6 birds which are now a healthy flock of 17....

Anyway, my interest has been stirred by my little finches, I just love their sounds and their roundness and the way they hop around everywhere...

I decided I wanted to get some mutations birds, as all i have are regular greys and one pair has white wings.

Last weekend was the West Coast Zebra Finch Show, so I went and checked it out...
Ended up coming home with some nice birds!
I had no idea that Zebras come in the "english" size just like my budgies....!

I got a pair of florida fancy silvers, and a black face male...
All are just gorgeous big beautiful birds

Problem is, I was planning on breeding a couple clutches of the florida fancies for my aviary, but they have the same leg bands on the same same legs, which leads me to believe they are bro/sis from the same clutch.

So as disappointed as I am, i guess I need to put my black face male with my florida fancy silver female, if I want to keep the "english" size, which I do want very much ;)

Any idea whats going to happen with this pairing?
From what I understand from reading efinch, is that the blackface adds black to the birds but the florida fancy takes the black away, in effect canceling the black face out....leaving me with florida fancies....???
Am I correct in this thinking?

I am very disappointed that the breeder did that to me, I told her I wanted a pair of floridas to breed....
Anyways, i waited for so long for the show to come so i could find these big beautiful birds, and some little Petsmart pipsqueak aint gonna fit the bill if i need to find an unrelated one...

[Sally]

I can't help you with Zebra genetics, but there are other members who will be able to. I just wanted to welcome you to the forum! There's lots of good reading at the Finch Information Center, linked at left, where you will find many articles on housing, diet, breeding, and the Zebra finch. If you put your general location in your profile, it helps when answering locale-specific questions later on.

Are those closed bands with markings on the two birds with similar bands? If they are stamped NFS, you will be able to find out who bred them. Or did you happen to get the name of the breeder who sold you the two birds with the same bands, so you can contact her?

[redbeak]

Thanks for the welcome, this seems like the best finch forum on the net

They are closed plastic bands on the birds..
I know exactly who the breeder is, I have her card right here...
But what can i do.... I must share the blame for not being more diligent and not paying attention to details....

All I can do is move forward....
So my question stands for those that know....
Do i still have potential to get my floridas from a black face male and a florida silver female?

Here is my ff male, I cant get a good pic of the female yet, she a little flighty, but she lloks just like this but the female version


and this obviously is my black face male, he is really cute and has a very loud song compared to my other zebras



And this is the reason why I had to get these show birds.... 2x the size of regular finches!!

[MiaCarter]

As Sally implied above, it may be wise to contact the breeder to see what she has to say. It's possible they aren't related. Or if they're the same color with different numbers, she may use just one color and use the numbers for ID purposes.

It's also possible she may be local so you could trade one with her, perhaps? Most breeders are easy to work with, especially if you had asked for a breeding pair but got relateds.

Welcome, by the way! Sounds like you got bitten by the finch bug! LOL

[Corkysgirl]

redbeak Welcome! I hope everything works out for you to be able to follow through on your breeding plan. You got good advice from Sally and Mia. I can't really add to what they said but just wanted to welcome you and tell you your birds are beautiful! I'm sure when you work out all the logistics, there will be some amazing offspring coming in the near future!

[Lacybug]

Wow I didn't know there were bigger sized zebras either! How awesome is that!

My genetics calculator is saying that when black faced zebras are paired with FF, you will get black face zebras 50% of the time, and normal greys the other 50%, unfortunately. All will just be split to FF.

These are great pages to check out, which I always look at when in doubt! ...And I just rhymed ahaha.
Here's what it says: "The Black Face mutation does conflict with the Florida Fancy mutation in that the BF extends the black areas while the Florida Fancy mutation is suppressing the black. They are still often combined because once these two mutation are then combined with the Orange Breasted mutation, the results are a striking bird with lots of orange on a white base."
Also, "a combination with the Black Face mutation alone has no effect on the results of the Florida Fancy and can even be difficult to identify." This makes me think my calculator could be wrong? Confusing in any case.
http://www.efinch.com/species/bfzeb.htm
http://www.efinch.com/species/ffzeb.htm

[MariusStegmann]

Welcome to the forum. I know that I will catch flack for what I am about to say, but here it goes anyway. I have bred Zebra siblings several times, mostly inadvertently, when my flock got too big to manage. On a couple of occasions I bred them on purpose to bring out a certain trait. For instance, I had 2 siblings that had almost white feathers, but every feather had an orange edge. I bred them together to see if the orange will get brighter in the offspring. When the resultant chicks were not better coloured that the parents, I tried father daughter and mother son pairing to see what it would give me. All the chicks were ok. In my opinion it is not good practice to breed related birds, but if the parents stock is healthy (without genetic defects), you won't have problems with the offspring. The different colour mutations only exist because related birds were bred together to bring out a certain trait.

[redbeak]

Thanks again for the welcome, I have definitely been bit by the finch bug

There are no numbers on the bands.
Both FFs have red bands on their right legs and orange bands on their left legs.
The BF has only a blue band on his left leg.

You guys are absolutely right, I will contact the breeder and ask them what this all means....
They are not local(~400miles away) but i have a biz card with email and phone#, and the few reviews I found online were good and very positive.

I dont want anybody to think this post was about trashing a breeder.... its as much, if not more, my fault because I didnt look :/

And I definitely do not want to be breeding birds that are so closely related, I am a bit familiar with in/line breeding to get the desired mutations, but my experience was more with reptiles and my budgies.
Parent to offspring is one thing, but bro to sis is never really a good idea in any breeding program.
And I really have no idea how "inbred" these birds already are...
Which is why i am concerned about this situation.

I do want an aviary full of FFs, but it is not so important to me that I will risk inbreeding to get there.
I have a nice big finch aviary in the yard now, it isnt full and it isnt going anywhere, I have lots of time

[redbeak]

Here's what it says: "The Black Face mutation does conflict with the Florida Fancy mutation in that the BF extends the black areas while the Florida Fancy mutation is suppressing the black. They are still often combined because once these two mutation are then combined with the Orange Breasted mutation, the results are a striking bird with lots of orange on a white base."

Also,
"a combination with the Black Face mutation alone has no effect on the results of the Florida Fancy and can even be difficult to identify."

This makes me think my calculator could be wrong? Confusing in any case.
http://www.efinch.com/species/bfzeb.htm
http://www.efinch.com/species/ffzeb.htm

Yes, Ive read both those passages on efinch, they seem to conflict each other, no??

The guy Garrie from efinch was the judge of the show I got these birds at... Lol, had I known my dliema, I could have asked him to clarify...

[redbeak]

"The Florida Fancy can be combined with the Black Face mutation, but by itself has no effect on the appearance of the male or female. "

Also from Efinch, but what does that statement say exactly??
has no effect on the male or female what, FF or BF?

There is alot of conflicting information there for combining these two mutations...

[KarenB]

All this genetics stuff makes my head spin.

Welcome to the forum, redbeak!

[Corkysgirl]

KarenB it's so good to hear that I'm not the only one. I have a good grasp on three languages...know a little of a couple more. I can fill a thimble with what I know of genetics. I think I'm not even going to try. Just going to say..."Oh what a pretty zebra finch!" Of that much I am sure! I only know species..and sometimes gender.

[redbeak]

man o man...
If i would have only thought to ask the breeder first, Ida saved myself a few days of frustration and worry...
The breeder just got back to me and broke it all down for me

The left leg band colors indicate month of hatching, the right red leg band indicates the "English" size.
So my FFs were both hatched in May, and the BF was hatched in March

And they heartily encouraged me to pair up my beautiful FF silvers, and told me exactly what to expect from them
They even gave me some advice on what to look for in a mate for my BF, to get some other cool mutations.

They said they keep their birds in big aviaries and that I shouldnt worry about them being related as the chances of that are slim, there are many many many breeding pairs and they dont really keep alot of their offspring(hence the colored leg bands) around long enough to breed....

So anyways, they were very nice and encouraging and informative and Im glad I asked about it instead of just posting on the internet about it... (but you guys were right ;) )

Tho I am no expert by any means, i have much more experience with my english budgies and my ringnecks and have a much better understanding of what combines with what and what doesnt... but with finches I am back to the beginning

[Corkysgirl]

redbeak It's great to hear that you got some clarification. Though you had to go through a process to get to the end results you also learned some thing along the way, and passed along some of that knowledge to all who read this post. We're all always learning. Hopefully you can get on with the real joy of learning through hands on with your new birds. Can't wait to see what comes of the breeding of these beautiful birds you've acquired.