Bristol BS plays the team card

NEW INCENTIVES ARE on offer for fanciers who bench show teams of four or six budgerigars at Bristol BS’s gold patronage show in August. In 2012, the club’s show failed to reach the 650 benched entries that are needed to maintain BS gold patronage. Under BS show rules the club is allowed a “year of grace”, so it can keep gold patronage for this year’s show.

Breakthrough for first AI Spix’s chicks

THE WORLD’S FIRST successful artificial insemination (AI) of the Critically Endangered Spix’s macaw has been performed by a Qatari- German partnership. Two out of seven Spix’s macaw (Cyanopsitta spixii) eggs have hatched in a project led by researchers from international conservation group Al Wabra Wildlife Preservation (AWWP) in Qatar and experts from Parrot Reproduction Consulting (PRC) in Germany.

Report highlights decline in UK bird species

A GROUNDBREAKING NEW report on the condition of UK wildlife has revealed that 60 per cent of animal and plant species have declined in the past 50 years. State of Nature, which was launched at the National History Museum in London on May 22, covers 3 , 148 species in the UK and its Over - seas Territories.

Tamworth petshops on alert for rare bullfinch

TWENTY-FOUR VALUABLE FINCHES, including a rare white bullfinch worth an estimated £1,000, have been stolen from a private collection in Staffordshire. The theft of the birds totalling some £8,500 took place in Belgrave, Tamworth, between 9.30pm on May 12 and 8.30am May 13. All birds are identifiable, with the majority closed-ringed. The unusual white bullfinch, which has pink eyes and a white beak, was among a number of birds stolen, including a Siberian pied brown bullfinch with a white beak and white spots; a red and white pied cock; a brown bullfinch hen; and four red split cock Siberian bullfinches.