Outlook for captive-breeding of shamas in Malaysia

[Letter from Mohd Anuar to DDS dated 26 Dec 2013]

Dear Sir,

I am a Malaysian and my hobby is the shama. I would like to visit you sir at Singapore to learn more about shama breeding.

Here in Malaysia I am in the fruits and honey business. I have a papaya plantation of about 5 acres on which I make my living.

I am serious about breeding the shama.  I have bought 4 males and 2 females at a total cost of Rm16 K.  I have also invested in building a compound of 20 x 40 ft in which I have an initial 4 (5 x 6 x 6 ) breeding compartments.

Here in Malaysia, I can’t get much information about breeding the shama and I need some expert to help me with my program.

I first got involved in the shama in Sept 2013 when I bought my first shama at a cost of RM1,800.  I received advice from some people that I should not get involved in the shama hobby because the Malaysian government requires the owner of a shama to have a permit to keep it.  Because of this, I tried to sell the shama with 9” tails that had been caught in July through the Singapore shama group website. However, I then did not know the rule that we Malaysians can’t easily sell birds to Singapore without proper document. I therefore decided to keep the bird and to apply for a permit to do so.  I have visited Jabatan Perhilitan (Wildlife and National Parks Department) and I have managed to acquire 3 permits to keep shamas.

Now that I have the permits, there is no need for me to give up the hobby and I am very interested in going deeply into shama breeding.

I have an ongoing discussion with Perhilitan regarding breeding shamas.  Its officers have visited my area and they acknowledge that I have 6 shamas for this purpose.  My understanding is that the officers are in favor of approving a breeding permit for my program.

I give thanks to god that, based on the information on your blog, I have been able to convince Jabatan Perhilitan that the shama can be bred.

Thanks again to you sir for successfully breeding the shama and making the information available for reference on your blog.  I can assure you that without your efforts, the shama hobby is a dead end in Malaysia because to acquire a permit depends on luck (only 100 permits are given a year for each state) and as a hobby we cannot depend on luck to fulfil our desire. 

Lastly but not least many of my friends and relatives ask me a question, “Why Mohd do you get involved in this hobby, which is very difficult to maintain and requires a lot of time to be spent? The answer from me is that the hobby gives me natural peace for my inner self. My heart is far from world gimmicks where people get crazy with clubbing, drinking sexing, etc etc and I get self-peace from bird-keeping.

Still as a shama lover, I am very sad deep in my heart that I have been selfish for my happiness, that I have bought and caged this beautiful wild bird. This beautiful god gifted animal is the first animal in heven to inspire prophet Adam for a life partner as a lover.

Therefore I have set my mind not to buy much more wild-caught shama and this led me, as a bird lover, to breed captive birds in future.

Please reply and thanks

Truly Sincere

Mohd Anuar Amin

Hi Mohd,

You need to be aware that I don't have a bird farm.  I am just a hobbyist with a few birds for my own enjoyment.  Much of what I have to say about shamas is already on my blog so there may be limited usefulness in visiting me.  If you nevertheless think that it may be useful to meet and exchange ideas, you are welcome to visit.

Your email is very informative. May I have your permission to to publish it on my blog.

Best regards,

David

To David

Dear Sir,

A very thank you for the reply. Regarding my email, you have my permission to publish it on your beautiful blog and I am so happy for our friends out there.

Yes I have been through your blog and its very informative.  As mentioned in my earlier email to you, without the information of your experience which has been put into your shama blog, it would have been so difficult for me to convince Jabatan Perhilatan that the shama can be bred successfully.  I did mention to pengarah (director) myself about your best efforts for shama lovers out there.

But let me tell you this sir. I felt seriously unhappy and guilty in my heart using all your information without asking permission from you and that's why I need to meet you and thank you.

Sir you have been a teacher to all shama lovers and we must respect you as a teacher. To meet you in person even without exchanging a single word means a lot in my heart.

We, as shama lovers have benefitted from your loss (afford time money thinking etc).

For that I Thank You Teacher.

Truly from my Heart 

Mohd Anuar Amin

Letter from Portugal, incubators and brooders

Paulo Jorge Pereira	Dec 2 (2 days ago)
December 2, 2013, Dear David,

I never had the chance to thank you for your introduction to Sjef. I already spoke 

with him over skipe and might pay him a visit in my next travel to Holland. 

Thank you.

I just read your last article on breeding shamas with the help of an incubator. Is there

a special brand you recommend. I'n about to go for a small one, probably an 

RCOM but could use some of your advise.

My male shama just finished the molt and is improving his singing with your Rave, 

as I play him back and forth on Youtube when around. Thanks

Paulo

Portugal

Hi Paulo,

December 2, 2013

I was more than happy to assist.

I use the Brinsea brand of incubators and brooders which I have found to be 

reliable.  The model of the incubator that I use is the Brinsea Octagon 20.  

This is their smallest incubator but it will probably be too large for you if you

only intend to incubate shama eggs.

I have friends who have used the small RCOM incubators and I think they 
should be alright.  I would not use the large RCOM brooder as they seem 
to be intended more for parrots which do not require a relative humidity
higher than 65.
  

The RCOM is very high tech and the relative humidity (RH) cannot be set 

higher than 65 which is too dry for shama chicks. 

I set the relative humidity (RH) for shama chicks at about 80 - 85 which
seems to be just right.

Best regards,

David

Visitor from Holland

Visiting David de Souza,

In March this year, Sjef van den Branden, who is from Holland, was kind enough to visit my home.  He knows my dear friend, Axel Voltz, and I was happy to spend some time with him in the company of my very good friends, William and Jeffrey.

Following the visit, Sjef wrote an article for his club magazine.  I requested for a translation for my blog and he very kindly took the trouble to translate the article into English.  Below is the article.  It has been lightly edited by me. My comments are in [    ].

If you've ever searched for information about the copsychus malabaricus you'll probably know [David De Souza]. An encounter was arranged because we have a mutual friend ,  something what I thought to be very hard, because David told me he gets a lot of requests from all around the world. Usually he doesn't reply to those requests, however I did get invited to meet him at his home and two of his best schamafriends.

The selection

David picked me up at the hotel and once we arrived at David's house, I saw his  shamas and trust me: the tails are even longer in real life. I can also tell you that his schama's don't have tiny bodies, they are beautiful average sized schamas. David and his friends select on shape and length of the tail, the figure, the singing and how a bird presents itself.

How did they achieve that goal?

First of all by searching for the most beautiful birds with the longest tails in surrounding countries and islands like Thailand and Vietnam. Smaller birds appeared to be less suitable to show their bigger tails, so they need to have a reasonable posture. Then the best imitators were selected which already had quite good singing skills. They became even greater singers by listening to other sounds of birds.

David suggested the European Schamakeepers to do the same, if they want to have better and more beautiful birds. He understands that we don't have the same possibilities here when it comes to selection, that they had. A goal that they could achieve in let's say [a few years], the same goal would take us [much longer], but now with the export stop it's almost impossible to achieve.

Way of breeding

The way of breeding is quite different than our manner. You would expect that they breed their birds in aviaries full of plants. However there was no green to be found in the cages and there wasn't any contact with the ground. There were only newspapers at the bottom. [I prefer newspapers as it is easier to clean]

Supply and demand

David and his friends asked me what an average shama costs in Europe and I told them that the price would be about 200, 300 or even 500 euros for the most beautiful birds. Then I asked them how much they would ask for one of their birds.  They don't sell their birds that often, but if they do, they sell them for an amount of money that I don't dare to mention.  [It's all a question of rarity and supply and demand.  In recent years, there has been an upsurge in the popularity of the shama in South East Asia and especially in Thailand.   The most beautiful long-tailed shamas are rare and therefore command high prices for serious hobbyists and breeders.  The highest price paid for a shama in Singapore was S$16,000.00 (about 8,000 Euros). Another was sold in Malaysia for S$14,000.00 and resold in Thailand for S$18,000.00.  For those who wish to start with juvenile shamas because of cost or other reasons, a juvenile with great potential may fetch from S$4,500.00 to twice this amount]

Then there was a moment of silence and I thought: This is incredible. My amazement got even bigger when they told me that the amount of money for a champion of the zebradove was even higher. They let me hear one of those champions. They judged those zebradoves a bit like how we judge a European finch (Fringilla coelebs) here in Holland. At schools in Thailand you have even special classes where you learn how to judge the singing quality of those birds.

Just before I left they told me that there are practically no schama's living in the wild [in Singapore]. As a real Schama fan this was a wonderful day. I'm very happy with the schamas I own, because breeding those kind of schamas takes me too much time and is a mission impossible.

Thank you David, William and Jeffrey for  this visit.

Sjef van den Branden (Holland)

Letter from Holland

sjef van den Branden	3:00 AM (6 hours ago)
to David

Breeding with the Hwamei is going very well this season - 10 young on stock, from two unrelated pairs.

My shama breeding was also ok.  From my old bird (almost 20 years old ) with a new hen 4 young ( 1 female and 3 males, with a beautiful big hen.

Next year I will use another hen, half stricklandii/half lampung. I already have young from this male with three different hens.  I'am building a shama collection around this old male.  He is the best singer I have and beautiful to see, pretty big and good size tail, European size.

On 23 november there will be a Shama chai here in Holland, I personaly don't think its possible, most birds are just ready with molting and the winter is beginning but i'll join with one bird, not one off my best birds, but I support the trying.

One question this little Hwamei you spoke off, is there only one kind off. In two weeks somebody will sell 4 pairs. I think I will buy one pair, but like off all species their could be good singers and bad singers depending from which region they come ?

Witbuik-jungle-Timalia - Spot-throated Babbler - Latin Name: "Pellorneum albiventre".  "Tieu Mi"

Kind regards Sjef

Also greet Jeffrey and William for me

David De Souza	10:22 AM (0 minutes ago)
to sjef

Hi Sjef,

Congratulations on your successful breeding of the Hwamei.  I kept this species a long time ago but I found the song to be too loud for me.  

I am not too familiar with the Spot-throated Babbler. I kept 3 that were good singers but I have just given up the last one that I had.  I keep songbirds, other than the shama, from time to time.  I bring them to top form to see their display and hear their songs  but I tend to lose interest after in them after awhile.  The only species that I have been perpetually interested in is the shama.

If you have not already done so, may I suggest that you visit Youtube and type "tieu mi".  There you will see the videos of the various sub-species and familiarise yourself with their songs.

Best regards,

David

Vitamin B Complex (3)

 Tue, Sep 20, 2011 at 11:47 AM

Hi David

I think there is some problems with my shama. I noticed that the feather under the body is turning to white colour instead of brown.

It also became very still and spend most of the day on the ground of the cage. Can you please advise me

Thank you

Regards

Allan

Hi Allan,

The feathers turning white is probably due a deficiency in minerals.  My experience has been that as a shama gets old, some of its feathers (usually the black tails) are unable, during molt, to absorb certain of the minerals that are required for pigmentation.  The result is the white colour.  The condition seems to be permanent as I have never seen feathers that have turned white revert to their original colour.  Apart from the change in colour, the bird is fine.

The cause of the bird being still and spending most of the day on the floor of the cage probably has nothing to do with the lack of minerals that cause the white feathers.  The most likely cause is a deficiency of Vitamin B Complex.  This vitamin is needed for the digestion of protein and also for the nerves to function properly.  A deficiency of this vitamin will result in the bird eating less.  Where the deficiency is great, the bird will get fits from which it may not survive.  Please check my blog on this topic.

Best regards,

David

Letter from Greece

2011/9/4 Manos Venianakis <venianakism@yahoo.gr>

Dear Mr. De Souza,

My name is Manos Venianakis and I'm writing from Greece.

I'm an avian culturist currently breeding common canaries,saffron finches and a variety of australian

finches.

I recently acquired a pair of shamas.The birds I believe are of the copsychus malabaricus indicus subspecies.could you please verify this?

I was in search of a pair for some time but finding them in Greece was impossible.In the end I had to import the birds 

from Germany and a breeder that was willing to sell a pair after the end of the last breeding season.They're about two years old.
My pair are the only shamas in Greece..I hope that this will soon change and other enthusiasts will follow.

While waiting for the birds the past few months, I had the time to do some research and was lucky enough to come across
 your blog which has become my "bible" regarding shamas.Trully an excellent job there,so please accept my sincere congratulations.

It has been a week now that I have the birds.The male has been into molt since then,which I believe is due to the change of their
environment and the difference in temperature.In Germany,the temps were around 18 celcious,while here in Greece and the isle of
Crete in particular,are currently around 30+ celcious.The birds are kept outdoors.

Strangely, the female does not show any signs of molt.

The former owner kept the pair together all year round and insisted that I did the same in order to avoid future problems in breeding season.

He advised to place a box in the flight for them to sleep in when weather gets colder,the way he kept them in Germany.He also suggested a nest
and nesting material should be placed.

I did that but unfortunatelly, although they're a true pair that have raised chicks,the male twice attacked the female the first couple of days and had to
seperate them.I left the female by herself in the flight to dominate the space and placed the male close to her in a large cage.

By doing this I also had the chance to approach the male in order to make him accept food from hand.The previous owner had never done that but I knew
it was possible with shamas.At the beginning he was wild,attacking the cage bars, wings wide open.Slowly and gently I had him taking the mealworms
from pinches, after 5 days of trials.

He got the message and to my surprise,the bird only yesterday came and sat on my hand which was a delightful treat for me...
The female still is very reluctant but always excited in the presence of live food.

I offer my shamas a variety of live food every morning and afternoon.Mealworms,crickets,grasshoppers,waxworms and guppies.The only live food they were
offered by the previous owner, were mealworms and crickets.They accepted the fish as if they'd always been in their diet,which was very pleasing.

Please note that I breed my own mealworms ,waxworms and guppies.I have also started a programme of breeding my own acquatic frogs,african clawed ones in particular.
The other insects are collected from nature and safe areas not sprayed with insecticides.They've even tried cicadas!

The dry food I offer them is a mixture that I prepare and consists of  the following..

Nutribird pellets,Unikomplet and C19.

Orlux insect patee.

Orlux tropic patee

Claus Green TYPE 2

They are also offered chopped apple and grapes which they seem to like very much.Again note that no fresh fruit had ever been offered to them in Germany!
B complex and multivitamins  along with calcium is on their diet as well.

I send you videos with the birds.I'd appreciate any comments and advice that you may have.Especially on how to handle the agression that occured and how to get the pair together again.
Please feel free to "correct" me if you think I do something wrong.I always seek the best for my birds and shamas are a "new territory" for me..I'd also like to know your opinion regarding the quality
of my pair.

I love my birds and in order to honour you for the valuable knowledge you offer to all us shama enthusiasts, I have named my birds with malayan names..Malik for my boy and Noor for my girl...

Thank you very much for your time,I look forward to hearing from you.
Best regards,
Manos

David De Souza via gmail.com to Manos

show details Sep 5 (2 days ago)

Hi Manos,

I found your email most interesting.  I hope you don't mind me giving my views in point form.

1.  A pair that has been separated for even a short while will treat each other like strangers.

2.  Birds that are strangers to each other should only be released into the same aviary when they are both in breeding condition.  Otherwise, the male will attack the female.

3.  A female in breeding condition will sing and display to the male in an adjoining cage.  If she squats and quivers her wings she is over-ready.  This means that if she is placed in the same aviary as the male and she rapidly builds a nest, at least the first few eggs will be infertile.

4.  A male in breeding condition will display and sing softly to the female which is nearby.  A male that visits a nest-box in the aviary is in breeding condition.  A male that is not in breeding condition will not visit the nest-box.

5.  The male will come into full breeding condition about 1 1/2 months after it completes the molt.  The female, about 1 month.

6.  A sudden change in temperature may cause a "false" molt.  That's why birds that are usually kept indoors should not be transferred outdoors.

7.  Changes in temperature affect birds differently.  Some molt and some don't.  I suppose that's why the female did not molt.

8.  The food that you offer looks fine.  Shamas that have live food readily available may not willingly eat dry food.  For this reason, I feed my non-breeding birds dry food until early evening before offering live food.

9. The most important vitamin for shamas is B complex.  In addition, I also feed a mult-vitamin.

Best regards,

David

Breeding

Sat, May 14, 2011

Subject: Re: Questions from Penang Shama Lover

Hi David

I studied and learnt from your blog and web since 2006, I would like to thank you as this is the most resourceful web regarding shama

In the past, I have kept 3 females but not success in breeding program.

In 2009, a friend gave me one hand-fed female. I paired her with one wild catch male 7’ tail, below are the results

·         1^st nest in 2009 June, 4 eggs, one fertile, 3 unfertile, none of them hatched

·         2nd nest in 2010 Jan, built nest, but did not lay egg

·         3rd nest in 2010 Apr, built nest, but did not lay egg. In June, to simulate her, I ask one quail egg from pet shop, I put the quail egg in her nest, she sit and it hatched, my daughter is keeping the white color quail now

Introduced the same female with wild catch male 8.5”tail

·         4th nest in 2010 Oct 2nd, built nest 2^nd day, laid one egg in Nov, unfertile

·         5^th nest in 2011 Feb, built nest, seen the male courting, sit for 6 days, stop. The pair still in the outdoor aviary, stay peacefully, till to date, the nest still in the nest box. I have given them multi vitamin 3-4 times a week, daily with worms, crickets, 2-3 grass hopper, they did not like guppy

May I know should I separate them or let them continue in the aviary?

Is there anything else I can do?

Thanks in advance

NWK

Reply: Monday, May 16, 2011 8:58 AM
Subject: Re: Questions from Penang Shama Lover

If the pair  build their nest and there is then no eggs, it is likely that they may have destroyed and/or consumed the eggs.  The cause is stress caused by disturbance.  You need to see if this is so and take corrective action.

Infertile eggs is probably due to the male not being sufficiently fertile.  I feed my breeding birds a multi-vitamin 3 times a week, B-complex 4 times a week and an oil vitamin of A, D3 and E three times a week.

If there is a shortage of aviaries, I do not separate the pair after the breeding season.  Otherwise, I prefer to separate them.

Best regards,

David

Thu, Jun 23, 2011

Hi David

Updates:

I have visited several pharmacies unfortunately they don’t sell B complex in liquid form

On 27^th May, bought one liquid B complex, however, the hen start sitting on 26^th May, no chance to give her before she laid egg

I continue giving the pairs multi vitamins, B-complex every alternate day, no vitamin on every Monday

Egg did not hatch after 12 – 13 days, she stop sitting in day 23 (17 June). I have taken out the nest and found one egg. The egg was not in the middle of the nest, it was at the corner of the wooden nest.

I broke the egg, there was something inside, brown color, I believe chick died during sitting period

I have decided to change nest material. My worry is broom material too soft, egg might be pushed out from nest to the corner of the wooden box cause chick died during sitting period.

On 22^nd June, I put nest material in aviary, the hen starts build nest. Nest was built around 15% due to she had selected soft nest material (broom), she had rejected the harder material (minor nest material).

23^rd June, I found one egg on the ground near the nest material; I have moved the egg into the nest. I have put lot of soft nest material (broom), hope she continues to build the nest and start sitting tomorrow.

Regards

Reply 

Fri, Jun 24, 2011

Nowadays I get most of my vitamins and supplements from iherb.com.  This is an internet retailer that carries hundreds of brands.  I and my friends have found it to be very reliable.  When ordering, the buyer has the option of choosing a fixed shipping method which allows him to pay only US$4.00 for air shipment of up to 3 lbs in weight.  The parcel will take about 2 weeks to arrive.  I usually choose faster delivery of about 3 days and pay approximately US$12.00 for about 3 lbs in weight.  

I think any of the liquid B vitamins will do.  I prefer Twinlab because it is viscous and sticks more easily to the insects.

I occasionally have problems with the eggs being laid in a small depression in the nest cavity or not in the main cavity itself.  This is more the fault of the female in the way she builds the nest than the nesting material.

An egg on the ground suggests that one of the parents removed it from the nest and is not a good sign.  The pair should be disturbed as little as possible.

Best regards,

David