Breeding and Exhibiting Dark Mules by Terry McCracken

Fanciers who wish to breed exhibition Dark Mules capable of winning at Major specialist shows, should follow two GOLDEN RULES.

1. Use only Yellow Birds, yellow finch to Yellow canary or vice verse.

2. Use Norwich type canaries with plenty of feather and size.  I do not mind using smaller Norwich providing they are bred off birds of good size.

If you use Buff birds in your pairing you will be very lucky to breed any yellow mules. Experienced breeders and exhibitors know that good yellow mules will nearly always beat buff birds because they are so much more difficult to breed, there are creations these usually being the rare Canary x Bullfinch.  Even when using yellow to yellow pairings you will be lucky to produce 50% yellow chicks, then half of these could be hen bird, which one not renowned for winning on the show bench.

The aim is to produce large yellow cock birds with good colour, shape and deportment  there must be thousands of mules bred each year, but "ALL BRITISH" winners are few and far between. A few years ago I bred 17 Twite mules, out of all these there was only 2 yellow cocks, another fancier I know bred only 5 but he had 3 yellow cocks.  Last year from 7 linnet mules I had 3 yellow cocks, this year from 5 linnet mules there are no yellow cocks.  Very often your best mules do not come off the best pairs, and I am afraid there is a lot of luck involved. Some of the best mules have been produced by Novice fanciers so everyone has an equal chance of success.

The easiest mules to breed are from the Goldfinch and linnet, then from the Siskin and Twite, next from the Greenfinch and Redpoll although neither are easy to produce. Many fanciers now use the Large Mealy Redpoll but not many yellows mules have been produced from this pairing, but you must provence and hope you will be lucky.

When breeding Greenfinch mules many fanciers including myself use a Norwich canary cock paired to a Greenfinch hen, this pairing usually gives you a better mule as the youngsters tend to take after the Norwich cock producing a larger and better shaped bird. I have bred quite a few over the years from a Greenfinch cock, but the results have been discordantly. The rare and beautiful Canary x Bullfinch has only be produced one way, by pairing a Canary cock to a Bullfinch Hen.

Over the last 50 years there have been a number of claims by fanciers that they produced a mule or hybrid from a Bullfinch cock, but none have been substantial or have reached the show bench.  Surely a cross usinga Bullfinch cock during the last 100 years would have been produced if it was possible? Canary x Bullfinches are only produced in small numbers each year but it still must be a good bird to take Major Honours. Finally in the majority of cases, fanciers use feeder canaries to rear their mules and they are fed in the same way as breeding canaries.