Green and Spalding chicks

[MinxFox]

I was just on ebay the other day checking what people sell their peafowl eggs for. There was a listing for "pure Java green eggs" there was only one photo and it was of the male and he was spalding because he was blue-green and he had some India Blue barring. Many many people sell these high % spaldings and even low % like you said and label them greens. While I appreciate the amount of breeding people have to do to get high % spaldings, I do think it hurts the green peafowl stock because even if you are the best at keeping good records of which birds are spaldings and which are greens, someone is still going to eventually get a high % spalding from you and want to call it a green because they forgot it was a spalding, it looks too much like a green to not be one, etc. then there might be those that think a spalding bred to a green equals green peachicks, which of course isn't true. A lot of mix ups happen. I would love to ask these people why they are calling their spaldings greens. It would be great to narrow down the confusion, but of course people get defensive if you tell them those are spaldings and not pure greens. There is even a traveling show with peacocks that do tricks and they say they even have "rare Java greens" but the birds are spalding so they travel all around trying to educate people about peafowl and green peafowl when their own green peafowl aren't even pure yet they talk about conserving them, etc. I just want to know how all this confusion started.

 

[AugeredIn]

This is not directed at Reinhold but the pure green versus spaldings argument will continue here in the states until we are all dead and gone. I am sure that it will become more of an argument where you are as well Othman. I have absolutely no problem with the folks that would like to preserve the green birds purity as best they can here in the states. But there are HUGE, ENORMOUS and IMPOSSIBLE to OVERCOME obstacles. First off, the green bird breeder stock here in the states is VERY, VERY, VERY, limited compared to the total population size. Over time, we will lose the wild characteristics of the green birds in the wild. Some of that is due to genetics, some of that is due to feed and some of that is due to the fact the birds are penned. NO one wants to admit it but we already see first and second generation green birds having shorter stature, larger bodies and significant changes to crest structure. Over time the changes will continue. As the imported breeders age and are replaced by second and third and fourth generation birds, the "pure" stock here will look nothing like the wild type birds.

Ironically, 99.99% of the people that scream about keeping the green birds pure have no financial skin in the game relative to actually keeping these birds much less any desire to import new stock.

I, for one, have no problem with the creation of spalding birds primarily because I understand that none of the birds here in the US look like any wild type birds. This includes India Blue birds.

 

[Peafowlssssssss]

This is not directed at Reinhold but the pure green versus spaldings argument will continue here in the states until we are all dead and gone. I am sure that it will become more of an argument where you are as well Othman. I have absolutely no problem with the folks that would like to preserve the green birds purity as best they can here in the states. But there are HUGE, ENORMOUS and IMPOSSIBLE to OVERCOME obstacles. First off, the green bird breeder stock here in the states is VERY, VERY, VERY, limited compared to the total population size. Over time, we will lose the wild characteristics of the green birds in the wild. Some of that is due to genetics, some of that is due to feed and some of that is due to the fact the birds are penned. NO one wants to admit it but we already see first and second generation green birds having shorter stature, larger bodies and significant changes to crest structure. Over time the changes will continue. As the imported breeders age and are replaced by second and third and fourth generation birds, the "pure" stock here will look nothing like the wild type birds.

Ironically, 99.99% of the people that scream about keeping the green birds pure have no financial skin in the game relative to actually keeping these birds much less any desire to import new stock.

I, for one, have no problem with the creation of spalding birds primarily because I understand that none of the birds here in the US look like any wild type birds. This includes India Blue birds.

This what i was thinking about, if we want people to only raise the imported birds or the offspring of these birds not many people will be able to raise them, so we aren't helping green birds in some ways, only few breeders will be able to breed them then.


Btw, i have seen green chicks coming from imported birds and i can easily say they start to change genetically, these chicks are here in my country.

 

[Peafowlssssssss]

I was just on ebay the other day checking what people sell their peafowl eggs for. There was a listing for "pure Java green eggs" there was only one photo and it was of the male and he was spalding because he was blue-green and he had some India Blue barring. Many many people sell these high % spaldings and even low % like you said and label them greens. While I appreciate the amount of breeding people have to do to get high % spaldings, I do think it hurts the green peafowl stock because even if you are the best at keeping good records of which birds are spaldings and which are greens, someone is still going to eventually get a high % spalding from you and want to call it a green because they forgot it was a spalding, it looks too much like a green to not be one, etc. then there might be those that think a spalding bred to a green equals green peachicks, which of course isn't true. A lot of mix ups happen. I would love to ask these people why they are calling their spaldings greens. It would be great to narrow down the confusion, but of course people get defensive if you tell them those are spaldings and not pure greens. There is even a traveling show with peacocks that do tricks and they say they even have "rare Java greens" but the birds are spalding so they travel all around trying to educate people about peafowl and green peafowl when their own green peafowl aren't even pure yet they talk about conserving them, etc. I just want to know how all this confusion started.

The problem is many people know their birds aren't green bird, but they will still tell people they have green birds, even if many experts told them they are not.

I remember i saw someone calling his spalding a green bird, and he is not even 50% spalding!

For me if we agreed that my male isn't pure green i will not sell his chicks as green chicks.

 

[DylansMom]

This is not directed at Reinhold but the pure green versus spaldings argument will continue here in the states until we are all dead and gone. I am sure that it will become more of an argument where you are as well Othman. I have absolutely no problem with the folks that would like to preserve the green birds purity as best they can here in the states. But there are HUGE, ENORMOUS and IMPOSSIBLE to OVERCOME obstacles. First off, the green bird breeder stock here in the states is VERY, VERY, VERY, limited compared to the total population size. Over time, we will lose the wild characteristics of the green birds in the wild. Some of that is due to genetics, some of that is due to feed and some of that is due to the fact the birds are penned. NO one wants to admit it but we already see first and second generation green birds having shorter stature, larger bodies and significant changes to crest structure. Over time the changes will continue. As the imported breeders age and are replaced by second and third and fourth generation birds, the "pure" stock here will look nothing like the wild type birds.

Ironically, 99.99% of the people that scream about keeping the green birds pure have no financial skin in the game relative to actually keeping these birds much less any desire to import new stock.

I, for one, have no problem with the creation of spalding birds primarily because I understand that none of the birds here in the US look like any wild type birds. This includes India Blue birds.

Couldn't agree more!

 

[MinxFox]

Over time, we will lose the wild characteristics of the green birds in the wild. Some of that is due to genetics, some of that is due to feed and some of that is due to the fact the birds are penned. NO one wants to admit it but we already see first and second generation green birds having shorter stature, larger bodies and significant changes to crest structure. Over time the changes will continue. As the imported breeders age and are replaced by second and third and fourth generation birds, the "pure" stock here will look nothing like the wild type birds.

I have noticed that some green peafowl breeders have greens that have good color but they look a little short to me. I was wondering if inbreeding was creating this issue, as well as climate. I didn't realize that first and second generation greens were already having this happen to them. That is no fun.

Read Mountain peafowl recently posted some photos of a wild India Blue peacock and a wild Imperator peacock. I know that the wild India Blues are tall, but this photo really helps show how much just India Blues have changed in captivity:


So maybe we can't always keep green peafowl looking like they do in the wild, but I don't want it to get to the point where if you want a green peafowl you will just have to settle for a spalding. Anyways hopefully I will be getting some green peachicks with Zazouse this year so that I can finally speak from first hand experience on the greens.

Q8peafowl: Do you know the pen # your green peacock was from at Rocking BAB? Some of the American Greens are more colorful than other ones.
Your peacock reminds me of one I saw in a flight aviary in 2013:

In this photo he is the one about to jump down.

 

[Peafowlssssssss]

I have noticed that some green peafowl breeders have greens that have good color but they look a little short to me. I was wondering if inbreeding was creating this issue, as well as climate. I didn't realize that first and second generation greens were already having this happen to them. That is no fun.

Read Mountain peafowl recently posted some photos of a wild India Blue peacock and a wild Imperator peacock. I know that the wild India Blues are tall, but this photo really helps show how much just India Blues have changed in captivity:


So maybe we can't always keep green peafowl looking like they do in the wild, but I don't want it to get to the point where if you want a green peafowl you will just have to settle for a spalding. Anyways hopefully I will be getting some green peachicks with Zazouse this year so that I can finally speak from first hand experience on the greens.

Q8peafowl: Do you know the pen # your green peacock was from at Rocking BAB? Some of the American Greens are more colorful than other ones.
Your peacock reminds me of one I saw in a flight aviary in 2013:

In this photo he is the one about to jump down.

Yes, he is from Rocking BAB, i don't know in which pen he was, but from the pictures which Josh sent me i could tell he was in a big flight pen.

 

[Pfauenfreund]

This is not directed at Reinhold but the pure green versus spaldings argument will continue here in the states until we are all dead and gone. I am sure that it will become more of an argument where you are as well Othman. I have absolutely no problem with the folks that would like to preserve the green birds purity as best they can here in the states. But there are HUGE, ENORMOUS and IMPOSSIBLE to OVERCOME obstacles. First off, the green bird breeder stock here in the states is VERY, VERY, VERY, limited compared to the total population size. Over time, we will lose the wild characteristics of the green birds in the wild. Some of that is due to genetics, some of that is due to feed and some of that is due to the fact the birds are penned. NO one wants to admit it but we already see first and second generation green birds having shorter stature, larger bodies and significant changes to crest structure. Over time the changes will continue. As the imported breeders age and are replaced by second and third and fourth generation birds, the "pure" stock here will look nothing like the wild type birds.

Ironically, 99.99% of the people that scream about keeping the green birds pure have no financial skin in the game relative to actually keeping these birds much less any desire to import new stock.

I, for one, have no problem with the creation of spalding birds primarily because I understand that none of the birds here in the US look like any wild type birds. This includes India Blue birds.

If I look on the economical side, I don’t know how the situation is in US, but here in Europe it would be better to breed any violet, peach or any other colour mutation compared to pure greens. The prices for these peafowl are higher than for any pure green. The people who are interested in pure greens are very limited because you need aviary and heated barn and most people are don’t what to spend money for all these facilities.

What you have mentioned regarding the type change is true, but regarding the reason for it, I have a little bit another few on it. The IB are here since hundreds of years, which means many, many generations, in most cases without any new blood from the wild . Due to this we can say it is now an own captive population which has nothing to do anymore with the wild peafowl in the countries of origin.

For the historical pure green breeding stocks, here in Europe and the birds in US which were imported from here it looks a little bit different. All these birds are coming out of imports, which were made 20 / 30 years ago. There were in most cases (I don’t want to go in details for each so called sub-type) only a hand full birds at the beginning. Due to consequent breeding selection and inbreeding, the birds are looking like they do today. As soon as you do this, you will have the problem, that you will change the type and the character of the population. Inbreeding will cause too that the birds will get after two three generations shorter legs.

One sub-species for example are going back to just one female and one male. The problem is the inbreeding and the human selection over many generations. Too many breeders don’t make any blood refreshment as long as the birds still reproduce and it is possible to sell the offspring (the commercial aspect wins).

If we have a good blood base for a population and we mix the birds if ever possible non related, we can preserve the typical type over several Generations.

I know in many cases it is impossible to do a blood refreshment and I don’t want to blame somebody.

 

[Dany12]

American 3 subspecies of Muticus :
http://rockingbabranch.com/peafowl/

 

[Peafowlssssssss]

Reinhold could you please check your Email, want to see your opinion about some birds.