CANARIES 211 



require skilled handling, and the demand for purely fancy 

 breeds is not great, but common singing canaries can be bred 

 by any one possessed of time and patience. Canary breed- 

 ing is an ideal occupation for invalids and other sedentary 

 persons, and could be made remunerative if carried out on 

 a scale sufficiently large. 



There are two systems by v^hich canaries may be bred. 

 One is the bird room, or aviary, in which the birds are 

 given full liberty, and allowed to seek such mates as please 

 them. The other is the more systematic method of the 

 careful breeder, who pairs his birds with discrimination, 

 and keeps them in separate cages. 



A disused room, or a detached structure, with or without 

 open-air flights attached, may be adapted to the purpose. 

 It must be mouse-proof, and of course impervious to rain 

 and wind. Canaries will become hardy and can be kept 

 without heat if well protected, but few breeders care to 

 risk keeping their birds in winter without some artificial 

 warmth. The room should be fitted up with perches, the 

 most suitable being natural branches. Wire nests, wooden 

 traveling cages, small boxes, etc., should be placed in sites 

 suitable for nests, and the usual nesting material — hair, cot- 

 ton, soft hay, etc. — supplied. An equal number of each sex, 

 liberated in such a room, may be expected to turn out a good 

 number of young, although there is likely to be more or less 

 quarreling. Such a method might well be used by persons 

 engaged in producing common canaries on a large scale, 

 but of course selective breeding under these conditions is 

 impossible. 



The most satisfactory system is that by which each pair 



I is kept in a separate cage. This is the only means for con- 

 trolling the suitable mating of the birds and making certain 

 of the parentage of the offspring. The best cage is of the 



