Due to the length of “Part 4: the origins of the Scots Fancy canary”, I divided the article into two parts.  Part 4b adds three postscripts.  The footnotes follow the same numbering sequence as Part 4a.

Postscript 1:  The decline of the Scots Fancy canary

The Scots Fancy declined both in popularity and quality towards the end of the 19th century.   A significant factor was the cost of good birds.  A good pair of Scots Fancies would cost the equivalent of at least a month’s wages, and the top birds the equivalent of three months pay or more (20). The other major factor was the continued crossing of the Scots Fancy with the Belgian canary, so that in the words of C.A. House “so like did some of the Scots Fancies become to the Belgian that it was a difficult matter sometimes to tell one from t’other”  (21).  

The Scottish breeders couldn’t agree amongst themselves what constituted a ‘good’ Scots Fancy.  It became the subject of a debate that raged in Canary and Cage Bird Life in 1906.  Fourteen correspondents submitted their own ideas of what the ideal Scots Fancy should look like, but only one of them looked anything like a bird o’circle.  The matter was eventually settled at a meeting of the Scotch Fancy National Derby Canary Association, with the entry of its President, Mr Robert Wright, being selected as the official model (22):

The canary renowned for its graceful curves and vivacity had officially become angular and stiff.  No wonder one correspondent concluded that “The outlook numerically for the Scotch Fancy for 1906 is not as bright as in years gone by” (23).

It was left to a concerted effort by Tom Auchterlonie, Will Cummings, Brian Toghill and many other dedicated fanciers of the 20th Century to restore the Scots Fancy to its former glory.  This story is documented by the late Will Cummings in his book on the Scots Fancy. (24)

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Postscript 2: the Brussels canary

There is one source that I have omitted from the main body of this article, but which I include here for the sake of completeness.  It is the colour plate from Karl Russ’ Der Kanarienvogel (1901) which depicts a bird that looks identical to the Scots Fancy, but which he named Der Brusseler Kanarienvogel (the Brussels canary) (25).  It implies that the foundation stock of the Scots Fancy originated in the Brabant region of Belgium, and that the breed had survived up to the the end of the 19th century.  It is a very attractive notion, but I excluded it because I have several doubts about its reliability:  

The first is that Russ, a German aviculturist, was the only writer to call canaries with a fully curved profile the ‘Brussels canary’.  His Dutch contemporary, C.L. Noorduyn, also described and illustrated circled canaries but named them correctly as Scots Fancies.  Of course Russ might have known something that other authors didn’t, but he provided no evidence of it (26).

The second is the accumulation of errors in the illustration itself.  Note how the tail of the Brusseler Kanarienvogel canary is unrealistic, suggesting it was not drawn from life; how the Belgian canary is not the triangular shaped postuurvogel, but the English type; and how the Pariser Trompeter (Parisian Trumpeter) is not the Parisian Frill, but what we now call the North Dutch Frill (27).

The third is that Russ does not seem to have been aware of the existence of the Scots Fancy canary.  His knowledge of British breeds was based on two exhibitions of canaries sent from London to Berlin in the 1870s.  Bear in mind that the Scots Fancy was almost unknown in London at this time (the Scots did not make an appearance at the Crystal Palace show until 1869); it seems there were none present in Berlin because Russ gave detailed descriptions of all the English varieties, but there was no mention of the Scots (28).

While it is tempting to believe that the ‘Brussels canaries’ were the last survivors of an ancient breed, I think it is more likely that they were Scots Fancies exported to Brussels towards the end of the century, and that Russ didn’t realise what they were.

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Postscript 3: the Scots Fancy show cage

I cannot leave the history of the Scots Fancy without mentioning the show cage.  The cage is bow-topped wire cage somewhat similar to the Border show cage, but with a unique characteristic: customisation and ornamentation is not only permitted but encouraged.  In any other branch of the canary fancy they would be disqualified as ‘marked cages’. The ornamentation is seen in the wooden base of the cage.  No black paint here but inlays of exotic hardwoods of various colours arranged in intricate patterns.

The earliest show announcement I have found was published in 1846 in the Glasgow Courier, but it tells us little about the birds.  However in 1850 there was not only a full show report but also a special mention of the cages: “Some of the finest cages we have yet seen was [sic] exhibited, made and designed by Mr. Chas. Gordon, who was universally applauded for his fine taste”. (29)

This is the first of only two occasions that I have seen a show report make a special mention of the cages for any variety of canary (30).  It implies that Mr. Gordon could have been the instigator of the ornamental Scots Fancy show cage.  If so, shouldn’t the cages be named after him in the same spirit as the Border show cage was named after Mr. Dewar?

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Footnotes to Postscript 1:

20. A correspondent under the nom de plume ‘St. Andrew’, “Hints on Scotch Fancy Canaries”, Canary and Cage Bird Life, 20 July 1906.  “You should be able to get a really good pair of stock birds from £7 10s to £10” and that “Up to about £20 is no uncommon price for a good Scotch Fancy, although much higher has been paid”.  By comparison, a Scottish miner was earning 5s 6d a day in 1906, hence the relative costs given in the article. ( http://www.scottishmining.co.uk/383.html )
21. C.A. House, “Our Canaries”, 1st edition, 1923 (p134).  House blamed the Scots fanciers for the decline of the Belgian canary because of their ‘craze’ for Belgians “not to breed as Belgians but to cross with the Scots Fancies . . . not only was England denuded of its best Belgians, but the Continent also”.
22. Canary and Cage Bird Life 6 July 1906.  The fact that Mr. Wright was the President of the SFNDCA doesn’t seem to have raised any concerns about the impartiality of the selection process.
23. ‘St. Andrew’ op. cit.
24. Will Cummings, ’Glasgow’s Famous Canary’, 1993.  A recommended read for all fanciers interested in the Scots Fancy.
    

Footnotes to Postscript 2:

25. Reproduced by kind permission of Thomas Müller and Uwe Feiter, authors of Faszination Positurkanarien: eine landschaft für’s Leben’ (20XX) which Michael Monthofer kindly sent me.  Russ was a great German aviculturist: the author of several bird books (some of which were translated into English); the founding editor of Die Gefiederte Welt (The Feathered World) magazine; and a great collector and breeder of birds (almost 150 species in total, of which he successfully bred over 60).  He died in Berlin in 1899 and it is likely that Der Kanarienvogel was published posthumously by his son, also named Karl.
26. C.L.W. Noorduyn, De Kanarie in zijne Verschillende Rassen (The canary in its various breeds), 1899.  It contains colour plates of the classic Scots Fancy and the Scots x Belgian cross which became fashionable towards the end of the 19th century.  He makes no mention of a ‘Brussel’s canary’.
27. Russ explains that “The feathers of the mantle are lengthened to such a degree that they curl downwards over the upper part of the wings, hence they are called ‘epaulets’; it is from the latter mark, and not from their song, that the name ‘Trumpeter’ is derived”.
28. Karl Russ, ’Canary birds – how to breed for profit or pleasure’, London, Dean and Son (1891).  13 birds had been sent by Mr. A.F. Wiener of London in 1877, and 60 birds by Messrs Clark & Co, also of London, in 1879.

Footnotes to Postscript 3:

29. Glasgow Gazette, 16 November 1850.
30. The second was Fred Snelling’s reference to the ‘famous blue and black’ Lizard show cages that I discussed here.

 

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