After
keepingBritish hardbills
for about 15 years I was looking for a new challenge with
thebirds, I had gone
as far as I could with the hardbills and as soon as I becameaware of the softbill side of the
hobby and gained the confidence to give it atry I was quite simply
hooked!
I chose theStonechat as my first softbill
for several reasons; it is a striking bird interms of its attractive
appearance, quiet melodious song and its delightfulmannerisms, it is a relatively
peaceful species, you can keep pairs togetherall year round and it is also
classified as a “beginner” bird as it isreasonably easy to cater for. The
challenge with all birds, is of course tosuccessfully breed them and that
is what I set my stall out to achieve.
The stonechat is
abird full of
character and it is a bird I have grown very fond of. I have
only ever seen one in the wild once
whilst on holiday, so being so close to birdslike these is truly an
honour.
The Stonechat is
arelatively simple
bird to cater for with a basic diet of a good
insectivorous food and some livefood such as
mealworms, you can then just add some smallamounts of grated cheese, fruit
or grated broccoli as variety occasionally. Ialso experiment with my own food
mixes (using such things as dog meal, oxheart, liver, egg etc) – but only
as far as using it another supplement, thebasic diet is always the
universal insectivorous food.
For housing,
thebirds are quite
comfortable in a standard 2M x 1M flight, but obviously if
you can offer a larger enclosure then
this is greatly appreciated by the birds. Anadvantage of softbills over
hardbills is the fact that you can use plantedflights without worry of the
birds stripping the vegetation and so you alsogain attractive garden features!
For each species you can create as naturalenvironment as
possible.
I had obtained mypair of Stonechats in the autumn
of 2005, both birds having current year closed rings on them.
2007 was my 2ndyear attempting the breeding of
the Stonechats, the firswt year was not
very successful, mainly due to the
cock being over amorous and throwing the chicksout! I learned from that, so
this year I was prepared!
I had changed
allmy flights over
winter and set a new one out ready for my pair for the
spring, creating a raised planting bed
and setting it out with some goodsized heathers and some tall
grasses creating a natural environment andalso giving places for the birds
to hide from each other, should courtship becometo much.
Stonechats can bereasonably early nesters, so with
the weather mild, I released the pair from their winter flight into their
new quarters by mid March and carefully watchedtheir progress for the next few
days.
The birds
settleddown and he soon
started singing his quite melodious song and courting her.
His display
shows his huge white patches in his wings, very
attractive.
It was not untilthe middle of April however that
I saw signs of the hen carrying nest material about,
deciding where to build.
I had offered theusual dried grasses (hay borrowed
from the guinea pig does the job), coconut fibre
and fine animal hairs and she took to these readily.
I had put a coupleof open fronted nest boxes at 2
or 3 feet from the floor, as these birds nest on or close to the ground and it
was similar to what she nested in last year. Ifill the boxes with hay just to
help start them off.
To my surprise, sheignored the low-level nest sites
and tried to build behind a couple of bits of artificial Xmas tree up at high
level! There was no-way that the chosen sitewas substantial enough to take a
nest, so I fitted a wicker basket right nextto it, hoping she would choose
that, but after a couple of more days she wasnot going with that and was still
trying to build in the Xmas tree! I thendecided to improvise a bit and
found a wire framed bird bath and hung this upon the aviary wire right next to
where she was trying to build. Stuffed full ofhay and hollowed out a bit, it
gave a nest site and also cover for the wickerbasket. She duly went to nest in
the bird bath, starting to lay eggs andfinally started sitting on 28th
April.
After a week, Icarefully caught the cock bird up
and placed him in a large cage I managed tosit in the flight. He was prone
to throwing chicks out to drive the hen to nestagain and I was not taking any
risks this year!
I also put a trayof mini mealworms on the floor, a
big bowl of buffalo worms and a fruit flyculture all in the flight all in
readiness!
On 11th May therewere eggshells all over the place
from the newly hatched chicks.
In addition to theunlimited mini's and buffalo, I
also had some cultures of nice small sized waxworm, which I started feeding
a dozen or so at a time (these were favouritefood) and also offered defrosted
mini crickets.
On 16th May I wentin and successfully rung all
6 chicks - just the right size, so theywere growing fast. I wrapped a
small piece of elastoplast around each ring tohide it and there was no
problems.
On 26th May theywere all out of the nest – quite
late for Stonechats as they can be early to jump out and hide in the
undergrowth, but it is always best to let birds stayin the nest as long as
possible.
As you can see bythe amount of grasses dropped
onto the top of dad’s temporary cage, the hen soon started carrying again
wanting to go back to nest, she was howevercontinuing to feed the young so
all was well.
I did deliberateover whether to let the cock back
out to help feed the young but was worried he may cause trouble. Perhaps I was
being to cautious, as what is recommended insituations like this is the cock
be allowed to join after about 5 days and thenshould help feed the young
without an issue.
Well, we gotthrough the first few days with
the hen both trying to nest and feeding theyoung and the birds were all soon
self dependant, although I left them in for afew more days just to make
sure.
Ithen moved the youngsters to
their own large flight cage to leave the parentsto round 2.
I got the timing abit wrong, as I discovered the
hen had in fact started laying her next round
as well,
and they were not fertile as the cock was not with her.
Iallowed her to sit these for a
few days, just to check they were clear and alsoto give her a
rest.
Ithen let the cock bird rejoin his
mate and they soon nested again, this time itwas in the wicker basket I had
placed beside the bird bath.
Onceshe was sitting the cock was
removed again, and the third round hatched on 4thJuly
Thistime we had 4 chicks and again
they were well fed and grew fast on their diet of
waxworms, mini and regular mealworms, buffalo worms and
crickets.
Iwould have re-introduced the cock
this time after 5 days, but due to bad timingwe were away for a weeks holiday
and so decided to leave it as my birdcaretaker had enough to do
already!
Thesechicks are still with the hen as
I write, she is now moulting out and the cockbird has been retired to separate
quarters for now – I was worried he may tryand drive the chicks away if
introduced when they had fledged.
Nextyear, if I am successful, the
cock bird will be allowed back in when the
young are
5 days old and hopefully he will help with the rearing!
Ihad found the move across to
softbills to be challenging and yet very rewarding.
To be honest I find the softbills to be easier to cater for than
the hardbills
I used to keep, so would recommend anyone with a few years
bird keeping
experience to give them a try.
BirdFacts
TheStonechat is a striking and
delightful member of the chat and thrush family ofa very similar size to the
Robin.
Itis a UK resident living here all
year round.
Ittends to be found mainly in the
south and the west of the country on heaths,and coastal sites, quite often in
and around gorse, heathers and brambles.
Theycan be seen flitting between low
bushes, sometimes fluttering their wings andbobbing tails whilst making the
clicking noise it takes its name from of 2stones being struck
together.
Thecock is a bright bird, having a
black head, a pure white ”collar” and a russet/ orange breast. The hen is a
duller colour without the black head and just apale smaller
collar.