advice !! needed crossbreeding society with zebra finch

[FinchBreederTauranga]

Hi Ya Fellow finch enthusiasts

I'm from new zealand and as far as i'm aware we have no Crested zebra finches and because of our importation laws we can only export birds but can't import i came up with idea i know it will be highly frowned upon but i want advice so please give me your honest opinion ! i thought of crossing a male society finch with a female zebra finch.. and see what happens i am aware it's frowned upon and might not work as over 80% off eggs will be clear- infertile

please note this is a serious forum and needing serious advice it would be awesome to get crested zebras back in nz

[Sally]

Welcome to the forum! My best friend is from New Zealand, beautiful country! You might want to add your general location to your profile, as it helps to know that later on when answering questions.

As far as the hybridizing, yes it is frowned on in most cases, when it is done just for fun, but some breeders do use this method in breeding (canaries for example). It is extremely important that you make sure that any buyers of the babies are aware that they are hybrids and should not be bred. As far as getting a crested that way, I have no idea how successful it be would, genetics is not my strong suit. You can read more about both species at www.finchinfo.com.

[lovezebs]

FinchBreederTauranga

Is it possible to import fertile eggs into the country?

Just out of curiosity, why such strict import laws? Usually countries don't want to export their birds, why are they not allowing imports of pet birds?

[FinchBreederTauranga]

we have strict borders and our borders are closed for incoming birds .. because we have a large number of wild non native birds that are causing havoc

I want to know if anyone has luck crossbreeding the two
finch wise we don't have a lot of mutations .. like crested , Black cheeks etc, I will breed them over the space of a couple years crossing zebra finches with society then their offspring with normal zebs and so forth until im happy with the result

[Sheather]

Zebra finches can breed with society finches. As the crested gene requires only one parent to show up in the young, in theory a hybrid between a zebra and a crested society could be crested. But as far as I know, zebra x society hybrids are sterile.