Lizards at Liege 2018

The Liege BPC show is one of those shows that any Lizard canary breeder who wants to compete at the top level should have on their hit list.  Why?  Because you will be up against World Champions.  Win a class here and you can start dreaming of a medal at the World Show.

BPC stands for Belgische Postuurkanarie Club (Belgian Posture Canary Club); a Dutch title but we are in Wallonia, the French speaking part of Belgium.  It makes no difference to the quality of the birds.  The show is dedicated to posture (type) canaries.  Most of the breeds are of British origin, but you will find plenty of continental varieties too.  Their quality is consistently high and you will find plenty of world champions amongst the exhibitors.  One of them, Alain Nottet, a world-class Norwich breeder, was invited to judge the Lizards.  Here is his report:

“As an OMJ judge, it was the first time I had the honour of judging the Lizard canaries at the BPC show in Liege.  I have been breeding Norwich canaries for 30 years now, it is the canary of my heart, but for many years I have had a passion for the Lizard canary, which I consider the most demanding from every point of view.  

I don’t think I have been judging like a blind man!!!  Fortunately when I was a candidate judge I had the opportunity to learn from the best Lizard judges in Belgium and I had the luck to obtain a thorough education in this canary of pattern.

Talking about the judgement, the only negative point was that I had to judge with artificial light, but these are the same conditions as judging at the Mondial (World Show).

The quality of the lizards presented to me was absolutely fantastic and of a very high level.  Here are my highlights:

One lizard that specially took my attention was a blue clear cap hen with perfect spangles from Bart Deckers.

The best silver cock was a bird with a very nice cap and with a very good designed back owned by Fernand Moes.

The best silver was a broken cap silver hen with fantastic rowings from Jules Etienne.

Best in show was a gold clear cap hen with a very good ground colour and perfect rowings and spangles from Jules Etienne.

I thank the show committee for inviting me to judge the lizards , it was a real pleasure for me to judge an exhibition at such a high level.

Alain Nottet.”

Although I was unable to attend, Ronald Wauters was kind enough to take photographs of all the winners.  Photographing Lizards in artificial light is always tricky but only one photo fails to do justice to the winner.  That is Jules’ Best Silver Lizard, a gorgeous bird with outstanding spangles that made a big impression on me at the Lizarddag.  I have taken the liberty of inserting a photo I took of her there.  I think you’ll see why.

I am grateful to Jules for sending me a list of the class winners, which I list below.  The Lizard fancy in Belgium is a small fraternity and he used the Christian names of the exhibitors knowing full well that I knew who they were.  For the record, and in alphabetical order,  Bart = Bart Deckers, Fernand = Fernand Moes, Jean = Jean Degroot and Jules = Jules Etienne.  

Clear cap gold (6 birds): Jules – Best Gold & Best in Show.

Broken cap gold (9 birds): Jules.

Non cap gold (4 birds): Jean.

Gold cocks (7 birds): Fernand.

Clear cap silver (10 birds): Jules.

Broken cap silver (12 birds): Jules – Best Silver.

Non cap silver (3 birds): Bart

Silver cock (9 birds): Fernand.

Blues: Bart

For the Francophones amongst my readers, here is Alain’s original report:

Pour la toute première fois en tant que juge OMJ.J’ai eu l’honneur de pouvoir juger la ” spécial Lizard ” à l’exposition du BPC Liège.Je suis éleveur de Norwich depuis maintenant 30 ans; qui est par dessus tout ma race de cœur.Mais depuis de nombreuses années j’ai toujours été passionné par le Lizard que je considère comme le canari de race le plus exigeant à tout points de vue.

Je ne pense pas avoir jugé comme un aveugle !!!

Car , lorsque j’étais candidat juge j’ai côtoyé les plus grands juges de Lizard en Belgique et j’ai eu  la chance de recevoir une formation sur ce canari à dessin des plus vigoureuse.

Pour en revenir au jugement, le point le plus négatif est d’avoir dû juger à la lumière artificielle mais ce sont effectivement les conditions du jugement lors d’un mondial.

La qualité des Lizard qui m’ont été présenté était absolument fantastique et d’un très bon niveau.

Un Lizard a particulièrement attiré mon attention, une femelle bleu casque complet avec un dessin de dos parfait appartenant à Mr Bart Deckers.

Le Best mâle argenté était aussi un oiseau avec un très beau casque et très bien dessiné cet oiseau appartient à Mr Fernand Mars.

Le Best argenté était une femelle à casque brisé avec un dessin de poitrine fantastique appartenant à Mr Jules Etienne.

Le Best in Show était une femelle dorée casque complet parfaitement dessinée avec une très bonne couleur de fond et un dessin dos et poitrine parfait appartenant à Mr Jules Etienne.

Encore merci pour votre invitation, j’ai eu beaucoup de plaisir de juger une exposition d’un niveau aussi relevé

Alain Nottet

And here is the list of winners from Jules:

Doré casque complet: 6 oiseaux 1) Jules Best in show

Doré casque brisé: 9 oiseaux  1) Jules

Doré non casqué: 4 oiseaux 1) Jean

Tous les mâles dorés: 7 oiseaux 1) Fernand

Argenté casque complet :10 oiseaux 1) Jules

Argenté casque brisé:12 oiseaux1) Best argenté

Argenté non casqué :3 oiseaux 1) Bart

Tous les mâles argentés: 9 oiseaux 1) Fernand

Partout chez les bleus : Bart

My thanks to Ronald for the photographs and to Alain and Jules for their contributions.  Enjoy the gallery.  I hope you can see why I am so enthusiastic about the Liege show.

4 thoughts on “Lizards at Liege 2018

  1. Jules Étienne’s birds are stunning Huw, im hoping one day to visit this show, Birds look fantastic in the pics

    congratulations to the winners

    thanks Huw for sharing on FSS

  2. i have very much missed my visit to Liege/luik these past two yrs but I will be returning this coming season…as you say Huw the standard is very very high and the friendship and hospitality is second to none. Jules, Jean. Bart, Ronald, Fernand and Alain are fantastic bird fanciers and a pleasure to be around…..cant wait.

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