Damages of domestication!

[connerhills]

Importing peafowl from India is not too legal and takes a lot of money and connections to do this. I think a few have been brought in some years back but I don't know what happen to them .The Greens come from Germany or Belgium , It looks like they may be some from a member of this forum if he chooses to import them. Point is you just cant go get some wild type blues as they are India's national ..bird and they don't want them sent away anymore . I have photos on my web site of India blues in the wild in India taken by a friend on one of his trips to India. I would be nice to have fresh stock but if some get into the USA your not going to tell everyone if you have any .. But I don't...

Not to many will pay the big bucks to get them until the price goes down . connerhills

 

[Pavomuticus]

Hi
There are two reasons why wild Indian Blues are not going to be imported (and why if they are they won't last more than ten years)

1. Popularity, one of the reasons Indians are so common and popular is they are domesticated, let them out and they live happily in your garden. Wild type would be like Greens let them out and watch them head for the horizon (those beautiful long legs are made for walking, and those wings... current blues have been bred to be short and stumpy, keeps them from wandering too far)...... why have anything so wild if you can have something that looks virtually the same and is much tamer..(and cheaper....for so many people cost is the main thing- 100% pure Golden Pheasnts, generational pedigrees, independent oversight etc etc, $15 dollars a pair dearer to cover extra rings and paperwork you explain why they are $15 dearer....Ummm do you have any of the cheaper ones! )
Besides I've seen it done with Guinea fowl someone brings in some wild pearl Guineas, they sell them for big money to the collections who want authentic wild stock, as long as only a couple are bred its fine, someone breeds a couple of hundred, price dives so hard they are sold for meat and no bothers to breed them again and the rest are absorbed(?) into the general domesticated population, where the wild genes are quickly culled "I bought ten, let them out and they were gone......."

2. Peacock is the National Bird of India, and Indian lets nothing out! I understand it goes back to the 1960 /70 when some heritage cereal seeds where taken out, some multi-national got hold and manged to produce a few billion dollar crop strains, ****** Indian off so they basically said no indigenous plants/animals legally leaves without a lot of oversight . I also understand in that it is illegal to own and keep Peafowl in Indian (this is what a few Indian nationals have said so please correct if wrong). Basically unless you have a incredible amount of influence you'll get nothing and if you've ever tried dealing with the government wildlife departments of Pakistan, India or Bangladesh you really need to be a citizen or a saint to get anywhere.


All that said its a shame that the Zoo aren't a bit keener to establish themselves with some wild type as they would have far more conservation merit, however it comes down to the behavioral wildness of the birds. What Zoo is going to build a large expensive pen (how else would you keep them pure wild stock) to keep wild Blue in that are classified Least Concern when they can for less cost and hassle source some Endangered Green Peafowl for the same pen....... for zoos the more endangered the more money an animal gets.

 

[cluckcluckluke]

Quote:
Well yours are just lucky

.

 

[new 2 pfowl]

You may be surprised to find that many peapeople here (and their peas) have had snake encounters!

Perhaps of interest along these lines:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/635038/peafowl-nutrition-101

*eta:
You will find a lot of interesting reading on the subject of peafowl in the wild vs. domestication, etc. in Resolution's posts.

 

[frenchblackcopper]

I have never bred my birds to be more tame,or specifically so they are shorter in size. Maybe I'm missing something but if two groups of peafowl are raised,one group is handled daily,the owner tames them and the other group just sees the caretaker once a day for feed and watering,how does these diffrences change the genetics to shorter size? And does the offspring from the tamed group hatch peachicks that has no fear of a human from day one? Breeding in captivity does change birds by selective choices the breeder makes. But I as one breeder do not purposely breed the shortest birds together,nor breed the tamest birds together. These has not been a priority of mine nor do I see a reason for them ever to be. Am I missing something here tho? Midget Peas? Or Peafowl that will stay on my arm much like a falcon does under their handler in falconry? Will fly to me at my signal?

 

[DylansMom]

I don't think this pertains to individual breeders today, but more to breeders over the centuries. We don't generally breed our peas to be eaten by people, however a couple hundred years ago most were being bred as a food source. Did anyone know that Peacock was served as part of the Holiday meal at Mt. Vernon? With that in mind I can certainly see breeders favoring traits such as calmness, tameness, tolerance of people. Lets face it, our Peas come with a wide range of personalities, as I'm sure Mr. Wild Thang has demonstrated quite adeptly. I definitely favor my calmer birds over my psychotic ones. Therefore I will probably concentrate more time and effort on them even if it is subconsciously done. I would think the same thing applies to the territoriality, those that stick around breed and multiply, those that take off get eaten by foxes. Consider this going on for however long the Peacock has been domesticated, 1000 years or more? I think it's kind of surprising we don't see more differences, look at dogs and wolves. Just sayin!

 

[MinxFox]

Importing peafowl from India is not too legal and takes a lot of money and connections to do this. I think a few have been brought in some years back but I don't know what happen to them .The Greens come from Germany or Belgium , It looks like they may be some from a member of this forum if he chooses to import them. Point is you just cant go get some wild type blues as they are India's national ..bird and they don't want them sent away anymore . I have photos on my web site of India blues in the wild in India taken by a friend on one of his trips to India. I would be nice to have fresh stock but if some get into the USA your not going to tell everyone if you have any .. But I don't...

Not to many will pay the big bucks to get them until the price goes down . connerhills

I see what you mean. Why get an expensive imported India Blue when farmer Joe has a domestic one for $75.00 or less.

Hi
There are two reasons why wild Indian Blues are not going to be imported (and why if they are they won't last more than ten years)

1. Popularity, one of the reasons Indians are so common and popular is they are domesticated, let them out and they live happily in your garden. Wild type would be like Greens let them out and watch them head for the horizon (those beautiful long legs are made for walking, and those wings... current blues have been bred to be short and stumpy, keeps them from wandering too far)...... why have anything so wild if you can have something that looks virtually the same and is much tamer..(and cheaper....for so many people cost is the main thing- 100% pure Golden Pheasnts, generational pedigrees, independent oversight etc etc, $15 dollars a pair dearer to cover extra rings and paperwork you explain why they are $15 dearer....Ummm do you have any of the cheaper ones! )
Besides I've seen it done with Guinea fowl someone brings in some wild pearl Guineas, they sell them for big money to the collections who want authentic wild stock, as long as only a couple are bred its fine, someone breeds a couple of hundred, price dives so hard they are sold for meat and no bothers to breed them again and the rest are absorbed(?) into the general domesticated population, where the wild genes are quickly culled "I bought ten, let them out and they were gone......."

2. Peacock is the National Bird of India, and Indian lets nothing out! I understand it goes back to the 1960 /70 when some heritage cereal seeds where taken out, some multi-national got hold and manged to produce a few billion dollar crop strains, ****** Indian off so they basically said no indigenous plants/animals legally leaves without a lot of oversight . I also understand in that it is illegal to own and keep Peafowl in Indian (this is what a few Indian nationals have said so please correct if wrong). Basically unless you have a incredible amount of influence you'll get nothing and if you've ever tried dealing with the government wildlife departments of Pakistan, India or Bangladesh you really need to be a citizen or a saint to get anywhere.


All that said its a shame that the Zoo aren't a bit keener to establish themselves with some wild type as they would have far more conservation merit, however it comes down to the behavioral wildness of the birds. What Zoo is going to build a large expensive pen (how else would you keep them pure wild stock) to keep wild Blue in that are classified Least Concern when they can for less cost and hassle source some Endangered Green Peafowl for the same pen....... for zoos the more endangered the more money an animal gets.

I started thinking that they probably would be wild acting! That is a good point about shorter legs = Less walking!

That sounds right about India not allowing people there to keep peafowl as pets. On a different forum someone from India thought I was from India and was asking me how I had peafowl since it was illegal.

You are right about the new blood being mixed so much or lost quickly...With so many India blue peafowl already in the US, imported India blues would be bound to be mixed with the domestic ones. A good example is what is going on with pure green peafowl being mixed with India blues and spaldings. Some Spaldings are almost just like a green.

I just thought of an interesting idea - If you bred a wild type India blue to a pure green peafowl. I wonder how tall the offspring would be?

You made lots of great points.

I don't think this pertains to individual breeders today, but more to breeders over the centuries. We don't generally breed our peas to be eaten by people, however a couple hundred years ago most were being bred as a food source. Did anyone know that Peacock was served as part of the Holiday meal at Mt. Vernon? With that in mind I can certainly see breeders favoring traits such as calmness, tameness, tolerance of people. Lets face it, our Peas come with a wide range of personalities, as I'm sure Mr. Wild Thang has demonstrated quite adeptly. I definitely favor my calmer birds over my psychotic ones. Therefore I will probably concentrate more time and effort on them even if it is subconsciously done. I would think the same thing applies to the territoriality, those that stick around breed and multiply, those that take off get eaten by foxes. Consider this going on for however long the Peacock has been domesticated, 1000 years or more? I think it's kind of surprising we don't see more differences, look at dogs and wolves. Just sayin!

Yes I agree this was something that has happened over a long time. Since you mentioned that the peafowl were first bred as a food source, that could explain why domestic ones look like they are bigger bodied than the wild ones.

I agree that I prefer tame birds over skittish wild ones. In fact I even wish Peep was tamer. I would love to have a peacock just stand on my shoulder while I walk around. When I was around a bunch of green peafowl, some of the peahens were so freaked out that they were flying into the side of the pen and I was not even that close to them nor was I in the pen with them. Although several people have tame green peafowl and Read Mountain Peafowl lets a few of their good green peafowl out to free-range for a bit under supervision.

Domestic peafowl can fly pretty well, although when given the chance they will be lazy and hop from branch to branch instead of just flying to the very top. I have accidently spooked a white peahen before though, and she really took off flying! She was up very high in no time. Luckily she was back waiting to get into the pen the next day, but from what Josh has told me, if you have a green peafowl and it does that, it WON'T come back. So really, I can see why you would rather have the domestic version of the India blue because they are cheaper, tamer, and more likely to stay. I do love really love the looks of the wild type though.

 

[Rosa moschata]

I have a few thoughts.

First, remember that peafowl are native to warm lands, but were brought to colder Europe over the centuries. Those which managed to survive the change were the ones which continued to breed. Additionally, those which remained "close to home" were less likely to be killed by predators. There is an evolutionary tendency for individuals within species (or across closely related species) to be more rounded, or stockier, the further from the equator the population exists. This has to do with heat loss from the surface area to body mass ratio -- long and lean favors heat loss, while short and stubby favors heat retention, and thus "short and stubby" would be selectively favored in a colder climate. It's probably a reason why the more "Green" a Spaulding is, the less cold-hardy it is -- not because the wild Greens are less cold-hardy than the wild Blues, but because they are more long and lean. Spauldings from wild IB X Greens would probably be no more cold-hardy than a pure Green.

Secondly, there's the issue of inbreeding. I see over and over on this forum that "it's ok to inbreed for a generation or two". I think this is because many peafowl keepers come from a livestock (rather than zookeeper) background. Aviculturists keeping other species try to avoid any and all inbreeding. If an aviculturist seeks to reproduce a new mutation, some inbreeding occurs to increase numbers, but that's immediately followed by outcrossing. Livestock keepers, on the other hand, frequently use inbreeding to "fix" certain traits, eliminate others, and aim toward producing cookie-cutter animals (after lots of culling). That's fine if your parent stock has exceptional qualities you wish to reproduce. But often on this forum, I see people posting about inbreeding simply to avoid buying more birds (i.e. saving money).

OK, so inbreeding for one generation might not be terrible. But then you sell the inbred offspring, and people purchase inbred siblings from the same clutch. Then they come here and say "I know they're brother and sister, but would it be OK if I let them breed?" and people here say "it's OK to inbreed for one generation". Meanwhile, what isn't known is that the siblings were already produced from inbreeding (and for who knows how many generations). Then chicks from that pair are sold to someone else, who again asks "Is it OK if I let the brother and sister breed?" I think you see my point. Over time and generations of haphazard inbreeding, the birds in captivity will start looking different (beyond simple individual color mutations) from their wild cousins through genetic drift and bottle-necking (forms of evolutionary change), as well as the natural selection mentioned previously. Now, if your goal is to domesticate the peafowl (like how the chicken developed from wild jungle fowl), then so be it. But don't be surprised that while you're following that path, the domesticated peafowl will drift further away in appearance from the wild peafowl.

Aviculturists working with other species (parrots, toucans, barbets, corvids, etc.) will seek to set up their pairs by using birds from different sources to avoid inbreeding because they don't want the domestic populations to drift from their wild cousins. Their goal is to reproduce the wild species, changed as little as possible, in captivity. To avoid drift, pairs are put together by choosing birds as unrelated as possible. The goal is that even several generations down the road, a captive reared bird will look the same as those in the wild. Some aviculturists take this further and eschew color mutations. Most also are highly against hybridization (that certainly violates their goal of maintaining a pure captive sample of a wild species).

One isn't necessarily "more right" or "better" than the other -- each approach has different goals. But lamenting about the loss of beauty found among wild India Blue peafowl among domesticated examples would be like saying "why can't my chickens look like the wild jungle fowl?" In both cases, they weren't bred with that intention in mind.

 

[TheAstronaut]

I agree that I prefer tame birds over skittish wild ones. In fact I even wish Peep was tamer. I would love to have a peacock just stand on my shoulder while I walk around. When I was around a bunch of green peafowl, some of the peahens were so freaked out that they were flying into the side of the pen and I was not even that close to them nor was I in the pen with them. Although several people have tame green peafowl and Read Mountain Peafowl lets a few of their good green peafowl out to free-range for a bit under supervision.

My girlfriend hatched her peahen from an egg last summer and the bird has been exposed to people from day one. She loves to ride around on mommas shoulder, and the bird goes lots of places with her. Below is the post recent picture I have of the two of them.

 

[Dany12]

As we can see .... peacock are eating snakes !

As we can see .... peacock are eating snakes !

Poor snake .... no chance to survive ! ... A MYTH ... 3D