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My wife and I acquired our first bird - a
normal colored cockatiel we called "Cocky". I had first
heard of cockatiels in the years right after World War II.
In the 1960's, cockatiels were still relatively unknown and hard
to find, which is much different from today where they are
plentiful and commonly known to everyone.
I became fascinated with their physical
beauty, their antics, and their possible ability to talk.
I began a correspondence with Mrs. E. L. Moon, who developed the
first white ones. In those days, there were not all the
books on cage birds like you have today. She was in her
80's then and in failing health, but her enthusiasm and
excitement about these birds was still alive and well.
From her, I came to understand a lot about the cockatiel
species.
Well, from that one bird eventually grew a
huge aviary housed in a building that my father and I built off
of my garage. It housed not only 25 breeding pairs of
cockatiels of all the known colors at the time, but also
included eventually rosellas, lovebirds, red rump and scarlet
chested parakeets, American and English bugerigars, finches, and
my pet Orange Cheeked Amazon parrot.
In the early 1970's, I began to compete with
my best cockatiels and found I enjoyed the shows and the people
who like to do that. Finally, after experiencing a disease
epidemic brought in by some cockatiels imported from Belgium, I
made the decision for a number of other reasons to leave birds
and try my hand at show dogs.
We had acquired our first Shetland Sheepdog in
1971, as I loved the resemblance in appearance that they have to
the full sized Scotch Rough Collies that I was used to on my
grandfather's farm. His dogs were trained to whistles and
hand signals to work the herds of Hampshire sheep he prized on
his farm. But since I felt collies were too large for a
town dweller, we went to the Sheltie breed. When I decided
to go over to Sheltie raising, I acquired a few dogs from show
persons and began learning all that was involved in raising and
keeping Shelties. Firsthand experience is, of course, a
good teacher, but eventually I joined an all Sheltie Club and
two mentors helped me further in acquiring better animals still
and in how to show, groom, train, etc. Finally, when I
retired from teaching in 1998 after thirty years in the field, I
thought I was finally ready to go "big time" into the world of
dog showing. But my health took a turn for the worse, as
first one and the the other of my knees had to be replaced with
artificial ones. When I realized I could no longer run the
show ring and move the animals the correct way to show them
properly, I realized I had started this project too late in life
and made the decision to give up on my hopes of being an
owner-handler.
About this time, I had acquired a couple of
"kitchen" canaries, mixed breed or Hartz as they are now called
in this country, as I had always liked the song of canaries
since I was a little kid. I was quite happy with those
until one day one of my daughters asked me where she could buy a
canary for herself. Instead of going back to where I had
gotten mine, I called the President of the local all cage bird
club that I had helped to start back in the early 1980's,
and I was given the name of Carol Shepard who lived nearby.
When I called, she told us to come right over! Carol
brought four or five males in their individual cages upstairs to
her living room for us to hear. The minute they began to
sing, I was so taken with the superior sound and singing of
these American Singers that I told my daughter that she could
have both of my "kitchen" canaries! I bought two pairs
from Carol and little did I know at the time that her canaries
were of the highest quality in singing ability. Thus began
my canary adventure and resulting canary hobby.
Carol and I stayed in touch as she helped
steer me through the "bumps" in my first breeding season.
In the years that followed, we became good friends. Carol
helped me to understand all that is involved in trying to
produce high quality singing individuals and I owe her a great
deal for all she did for me and for ultimately providing me with
the retirement hobby that is just the right fit for my present
aging speed.
I might further add to my list, just so you
realize how fixated I have been with keeping and raising
animals, I once had quite an array of living things outdoors on
our five acre country property. Those included seven kinds
of ornamental pheasants, three kinds of peacocks, guinea hens, a
small flock of wild turkeys, a small barn full of meat producing
rabbits, and a small flock of brown egg laying chickens.
It makes me now very tired to even think of all the work that
was involved then in keeping and maintaining very well in good
health all of those living things, as well as raising three
children of my own and teaching daily anywhere from 150-200 8th
grade school children. But, having all of the different
species of living things over the years has given me a lot of
firsthand knowledge and an understanding of what's involved in
keeping different living things.
Now it is just my wife and I, and a smaller
home and, of course, the canaries. My life is a lot
simpler now, but very full with three grandchildren, a retired
wife at home, a large vegetable garden in the summer, and a
wonderful canary hobby that keeps me very busy, challenged, on
my feet, and happy twelve months of each year.
I belong to the Cleveland American Singer Club
(Chapter 32), where I have served in the past as the club
treasurer and presently as the club secretary. I am also a
member of the DRAGON (Chapter 22) American Singer Club of
Livonia, Michigan, and the Chapter 6 American Singer Club of
Chicago, Illinois, where I can mingle with other people who
enjoy what I like so much. Of course, I belong to the
American Singer Club of the United States as well. |
