The Dakota chief. (Gann Valley, Buffalo County, S.D.) 18??-1913, 1894-02-15
CANARtES BY TIA" THOUSAND
Seven Hundred Families in One German
Town Rear and Educate Singers.

~ Su I1uT I III NJne ulnn
Town Rear and Educate Singers.
in a small town called st. Andreas-
berg, Saxony, some 100 families are
entirely engaged in the task Of rear
ing and educating good canary sing
erS. a great prol ortion of these
singers are sent abroad, far or near-
to London, to Australia and to the
United States, where one single firm
ships 100. 900 birds each year. These
schreir, as they are called in Ger
many, on account OF their notes.
The schreir, says the Popular Science
News, which are bought for from 20
to so cents in the Harz, are sold for
So, So or 81 in America. The best
birds are kept in Germany, where
they are called hohlroller. A good
hOhlroller cannot be had under sS or
$40 lin the Harz), and $40 and S25
are no unusual prices But such birds
are certainly splendid singers. The
Germans have quite a number of
words, each of which applies to a diff
ferent sort of tune. or %intonation;
the heulrolle is in minor key; king
erolle applies to silver tones; koller
to a warbling which reminds of the
muimur OF water, gulchrolle is sim
liar to the n~ightingale's. notes, and
one may say that every detail Of the
canary's song has been named, and
that for every one there is a standard
OF perfection which the expert fancier
knows perfectly we'll. The song of all
canarieS is not exactly similar: each
race has its special points, and while
the n is great on heurolle, for in
stance, 1t is weak On gulchrolle,
while the case is reversed with an
other race.
OF course, singing is a natural fea-
ture with canaries, but the influence
Of the education is considerable.
The educational curriculum begins in
May for the young %canaries, and they
are. as 0 0 as possible, separated
from their parents. Education is all
in this: Keep the young bird from
hearing any but excellent singers.
Some fifteen or twenty young cana
ries are put in one cage with an older
bird, an especially good singer, and
he teaches them the elements; they
try to initiate him, and hence comes
! his beneficial influence. In August
each of the young birds is put in a
small cage and kept in the immedi.
ate vicinity Of he cage of the teacher.
At this time the fauc.er tries to
gather some idea of the progress
achieved and Of the aptitude of the
different birds. The best are put in
the nearest vicinity Of the teacher.
In order to prevent the young birds
from getting disturbed their cages
are wrapped with cloth so as to pre-
vent them from seeing what is going
on around them. and in order to en-
courage singing the cages are gen
orally shaped in form of a dome; this
shape intenSiiies the sound and the
birds are pleased in their own music.
Then comes d period Of great trouble
the mOulting Of the professor birds.
During some ten weeks the latter re-
main entirely silent, and the young
birds are very apt to fall into bad
habits: as soon as the voice of the
professor is regained the training
goes on, of course. Some 250, 600
canaries are trained each year in the
Harz region, and Of these 200, 600 are
sent to the United States, %, 900 are
sent to England, 10, 600 are sent to
Russia and other European
tries, and 10, 600 remain in Germany.
The latter are the upper, 10, 600" of
the canary world, the very 'pick'' of
the best singers. Two firms espe-
cially (Ruhe. sand lteiche Brothess)
make it their business to export GAIA
ries from Germany to America.
There are a number Of varieties of
the canary. Artificial selection has
to account for many Of them, aI,d
while some fancierS have sele ted III
dividualS especially notable for their
song, others have selected birds for
their form, their color, their size.
In Germany the song is the main
point; in England the people seem 80
care only for color or form: in Bel
GUM shape only is considered. So
there are great differences among
canaries ss-xsa