Voices From Our Past

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Training German Roller By Milo Wells

Milo Wells, American Cage-Bird Magazine, February 1982

Milo Wells: I wanted to get this article in the October issue of ACBM but I've procrastinated again. It may not be too late for some and you can learn from my 35 years experience in training German Rollers.

It is much easier, if you have birds from one breeder who has been establishing his strain over the years. I recall many years ago I had birds from all the top breeders and wasn't doing too good at the shows. I decided a good tutor from a well known Roller man was the way to go. I'd let my young birds from many breeders, hear a good tutor and thus learn his song. I asked Leonard Taylor of Utah to sell me two tutors in August. How dumb of me. Good tutors sing very little during the molt. In the fall when they did sing, their song was so foreign to the mixed up Rollers that I had raised, no way could they express the tours of the Taylor tutors, they only further confused the young. My point is that it is much easier to get good song from birds of one breeder, if he has his own strain established.

Too many of us are advertising the Old German strains, when in truth they are our own strains. I'm sure the German masters would not recognize the song of our Rollers as ever resembling the song of the birds they bred and showed. So we actually have our own strains, like it or not.

I have heard many breeders express anger over the fact that the birds they got from a top breeder or judge at a high price, produced nothing good for them. Here is one reason why! The young you produced from this breeder's birds were raised and trained in the same room as your own rollers, that you hoped to improve or you even crossed them with your own birds, which is a mistake. You have more young birds form your own and they train the young from your new birds. If you bring in birds that you think are better than your own, keep them away from your birds and don't let the new bird's young hear any song but the song of their fathers. In 1977 I won the Chicago-Midwest Show, all with different teams of birds and different strains which I raised and trained separately. I found the two German strains would not cross. So don't blame the top breeders and judges if you don't handle their bird's offspring properly.

Don't put your young males into training cages too early. If you have an established strain the young males can learn from the older males in the flight cages just as well. Another thing, I don't separate my young hens from the young males. Why? Then a young male starts to sing the male beside him will pick at him and he will stop singing and probably fly to another perch. If there are a couple of young hens sitting between the young males they will not disturb the males from singing.

November 1st is soon enough to cage up the males. If you have an early November show, you might have to cage a week early. I'll agree that their song is pretty well established by then. All I cage mine up for is to get them used to the #8 cages and tame them, so I can sit abut four feet from them and they will sing. When they are in the small cages I put their father or an older brother next to the young males. Take them four at a time and listen to them stacked as in the judging room.

I pick our those with the deepest tours and those that have the most hollow tone, with volume, Volume is important. Too many of our Rollers are too weak in volume. It gives the Roller a bad name. Haven't you heard people say, 'Rollers! I don't like them for I can't hear them in the next room!' A Roller song need not be that soft. A weak song doesn't necessarily mean depth. Don't confuse the two. Watch for that hollow tone that can bring out the goose bumps on you.

If I find a bird bringing hollow glucke, I find three more good ones with hollow glucke, to put with the one so they have a chance at the Glucke Special. You all know I'm hard to beat in this tour. Why put a good glucke bird with three others with no glucke? He is lost and sticks out like a sore thumb. Don't put birds of different song patterns in the same team. Many a team will not sing if this is done. One bird with a different song pattern in a team will often times just sit and listen to the others and not sing.

This is how I train by birds for the shows. It seems to work for me. If you have a different method and it works for you, don't change it!

Comments From Linda Hogan:

I loved this article by Milo Wells. Our roller club in Oklahoma is named in his honor. He is truly one of our greats from our past!!

I have a different opinion, however, about the separating of males and females.

  1. Males are more aggressive than some females. In a mixed flight the females may not get enough to eat and this results in their being thin and the road to an unhealthy bird. If I have a bird in a flight that I am unsure of the sex, I can catch it and if its thin it probably a hen.
  2. I believe the hens are a source for faults. And being in the same cage is the most dangerous situation for picking up a fault. Personally, I hate faults.
  3. The way I develop the song, I prefer the young males NOT to sing until I am ready to tutor them. I keep them in subdued light from June till after the shows because I want them to eat and get fat! I cage them up about two weeks before the show and tutor them. When the song develops under the guidance of the tutor, it is less faulty and they copy the better quality sounds. You have to have the breeding first but learning is equally important. Developing the song under the guidance of a tutor starts them out on the right foot. I keep them quiet either in cabinets with doors partially open or my card table trick where I stack them in close proximity to each other maybe four stacks or three or four birds (tops covered) and the tutor sitting on top of one stack. He sings they are quiet. This works great when I have to leave for the weekend right during the time I need to get the birds ready. After they have good basic four tours then they add to it but it is not likely to be junk. I start with hollow roll. The first tutor must have a great hollow roll a day or two with him and then I will change to a bird with strong bass and hollow bell. If he didn't get the flutes from either bird, I run the first tutor back again. If I have it at this point they would hear schockel but has happened in the past is it comes out on its own after these other tours are developed. One day before competition, they hear water. One of my males last year got David Bopp's attention. He remarked that bird has three distinct flutes! Now that not so rare to have some better and some not so good flutes but I was chuckling as I recognized each of his three tutors flutes!
I didn't start out this way. Originally I started out with a more classic approach. Always kept them in subdued lighting from mid June through the show. Use to cage the young males with a tutor in flights. Use to work with them when I was a novice about four weeks and they got thrown back in the flights every week to correct cage weariness. I still tried to develop the tours using the tutor. As time has gone on I have been more busy with judging and I just couldn't do it the old way anymore. Besides some times my birds peaked a week before the show and were over the hill at the competition. So the new method evolved for me about three or four years ago.

The disadvantage of my method is very high stress!! During that last week and a half, I typically have to be gone 4 days work and when home at least a single shift and maybe overtime. Most times the final team is set the day or two before the show! My family and roller friends all hear me say "well this year I really screwed up, I waited too long my birds aren't going to do anything at the show"!! The day before I am correcting or adding water. I always wonder can they learn it that fast. Give a trained singer a new piece and they hum through it once and they got it.

Everything in the song is just variations of the basic tours!! When I get to the show, they surprise even me with how good they sound because I just got a hint of it the day before we left for the show. They are not allowed to sing until the real competition. Sometimes they have brought out a new tour for the first time at the show! I have watched during the judging while another picks it up and they sound better and better as the judging is taking place! But since I started this high stress method the last several years, I have won Grand Champion every year most have been Lou Abbott in Dayton but also Sunshine in Florida and Milo Wells in Oklahoma! Either this works or I am very lucky or a combination of the two! You do have to know the song and be able to quickly admit what you got, so I do not think I could have pulled this off as a novice.

Read about the Lou Abbott Roller Shows for 1997 and 1998 on my web site.

Comments From Billy Richardson:

I think I met Milo back around 1970 or 71. I was very interested in the Roller and he and I became friends right off the bat. He gave me many tips and much advise about how to handle the roller. I think he probably was the most open master breeder of his time. Remember back then a master breeder would not help you once you had won as a novice. He would not sell you good birds for you were his competition. Milo was the reverse of this and I gained much knowledge from him. Now I used his method of letting the young fly together males and females. I found that it worked well. Now for the draw backs I found with it. First if you are trying to break an aviary song which we all have you can't do it using this method. Next and I think most important is the fact that if you have a singing hen she will destroy your young males. The young males will pick up her faulty song and before you catch her singing. I have a problem with singing hens and they always sing faulty glucke. Young birds are like young kids in school. When the boy comes home from his first day at school you ask him what he learned and he will tell you something one of the students told him not what the teacher had told him. Such are the birds and the faulty tours they hear in the flight. I now keep my young males separated from the young hens and if possible I have an old male who is clean of faults and of their same lineage fly with them. With the young males separated you can weed out the undesirable song much easier and if you want you can isolate them and break your aviary song. So after years using the method Milo described I have changed and these are the reasons why I did.

Comments From Art Johnson:

I don't think you can beat that article by Milo Wells. We all operate some where along his statements. The only statement I don't follow is the separation of males and females. All I have read suggests you do separate them, so I never tried to prove it. Again the article is worth following as closely as you like.

The Practical Selection Of Breeding Stock Translated By Raymond Bowman

This article was originally a pamphlet by The Edelroller of Innsbruck Austria published around 1937. The original was written in German and was translated to English by Dr. Raymond Bowman about 20 years ago. The original author is unknown.

Often we read about breeders which tell us their success is based on careful selection of the breeding stock. Details, on how to select and which are the most suitable birds for breeding is still very hard to come by. Today a large part of all breeders are still subject to a hit and miss situation. There must be a way of successful selection for breeding. We know of breeders whom consistently produce first class Canaries. Usually they do not divulge their methods and consider them a form of trade secret.

Attributes such as voice, color and good feeding habits etc. are being passed on from the male and the female bird. Therefore it is wrong to be more concerned about the selection of a male than a female. Because females do not sing it is much more difficult to judge the quality . This article will show how to select a female for quality. Females and males for breeding are equals.

A second fundamental fact is, that for the purpose of passing on certain attributes we can not rely solely on what we see. As one knows, two yellow birds will almost always produce chicks that have some green or are ticked. So we have to consider what we see (yellow) an "outer quality" and what we do not see an "inner quality". Usually you will have to breed 2 - 3 years before a result will become visible. It will be much easier to get results with birds of pure ancestry. Breeders have to stop buying one bird here and another one there . It is basic to stay with your stock. It is very important to know your own stock. To use a bird that is perfect is wrong, because it is rare that he will pass on his "outer qualities" his brother is an excellent prospect for breeding because he will have these attributes as "inner qualities" and will pass them on.

In the past a mistake has been made in the selection of the female. If you produce 2 males and one female and it turns out that the males are more or less mediocre, then the female should be your number one choice for breeding next season. This female should be bred with a male which has good hollow roll but bass and schockel are mediocre, but you have to know that the father of the male had an excellent bass and schockel while his hollow roll was under standard. The chances are good that this will produce a male of high quality. This "perfect" bird is then the end result of your breeding and is suitable only for show purposes. To breed this bird will result in a disappointment, since he will pass only part, not all of his "outer quality". Also the sister and brothers of a top class bird are poor prospects for breeding, unless they do not exhibit a high degree of "outer quality". The praxis has shown that birds with "inner quality" have produced the best "outer quality" crop.

As proof of this here is an actual case. The mating of an inferior cock with a first class hen resulted in 3 cocks, 4 hens. Two of the males were 65 and 70 point birds, the other one was 55. One of the females from this crop was mated with a first class male. They produced only second class birds. The 70 point bird was mated with an average hen produced only average birds. But a middle class male mated with a just above average female produced excellent males. This has been proven to be true in most cases. If you do produce only middle class birds from first class stock breed the females because they are the carriers of the "inner quality" and will pass this on to the male offsprings. Keep enough birds to avoid inbreeding to a minimum.

Produce Your Own Breeding Females By Tell Muhlestein

When should the breeder bred father to daughter and mother to son? American Cage-Bird Magazine December, 1977

It is well for the beginner to purchase the best male he can afford--one with outstanding Basic tours (Hollow Roll and Bass) and should, if possible, obtain females of compatible breeding form the same source. Should there be any faults or degeneration it may take a breeder many generations to eliminate these or correct faults by proper blood infusion (usually a slow and demanding process). Certain faults are not a disqualification, but Hard Water and Bad Glucke are especially difficult to get rid of or to control, and certainly if the young males hear these they are likely to pick them up. Sharp Flutes or High Bells can also be acquired but are not difficult to control in the breeding process and these may actually work for the betterment of a strain since they have tendency to overcome nasalness or lack of charity brought on by breeding birds of this clarity brought on by breeding birds of this sort or breeding "too deep too long". One must have clear clean birds to eliminate nasal ness--even if their song is on the "lighter side".

Since the female carries one X chromosome only (and this she had to inherit from her father) she should be able to pass her father's song characteristics rather strongly to her sons while her daughters are more likely to pass the song qualities of their own father on to their sons. So, when you start, obtain hens from outstanding males or grandsires. And you know the male (or males) you use have excellent song so their daughters should pass along the best of song traits. Selecting a good male is insurance for producing good song, for you can hear this. The female is the unknown quantity, always, especially to the beginner who does not know her background and who must rely on the word of the breeder form whom she is purchased. Even the breeder, himself, cannot be certain of any hen for she may be possessor of the greatest potential for breeding the best or may be a "wastrel" and should she have been able to express song may likely have been his worst singer. Denier always said, "You must try the hens, and several ways, to know what they can produce." This is sound advice.

Of course, no breeder can retain all his females to try them all--he can only retain a certain number for his own use and must part with some. Occasionally one has a small female which he feels cannot produce quality or be a good mother. I had such a one last year--she being full sister to my 1976 Youngstown, Ohio Champion--and the only female I produced from that mating in two years, so I felt I had to retain her to do some line-breeding with her family. She turned out to be one of the best producing hens I had in 1977--giving me 5 in the first nest and 4 in the second. I put her to a very large male and some of her offspring are going to be as large as their sire while 2 green hens are like their mother--on the small side, but you may be sure I shall retain at least one of the green hens.

Years ago I had all green birds from a very fine mating which had been carried through several generations. All were females and all were green. I think for 2 or 3 generations all had been females so I heard nothing of the song-results and was retaining the blood simply on its breeding background. I was about to sell the last of these green hens and I thought: "I must keep one and try one more generation." It happened this hen produced two males (and females). Both of the males were outstanding. I kept one and Leonard Taylor bought the other which turned out to be a great breeder and helped him found a fine sock. Eventually this male was in the pedigree of every bird he bred. My male gave me fine sons with any hen I ever bred him with--related or not. He, like the male Taylor bought, was a dominant producer of quality and such males are "worth their weight in gold" or more!
So, start with the best male you can obtain and keep his daughters. If the line is not too inbred you can breed some of the daughters back to their sire; and, of course, the young males can be bred to the mother. Remember, however, there is a limit to the inbreeding one should attempt--when cripples, bad feathers, infertility or lack of volume appear in the offspring it is well to bring in blood refreshment. Often the original source-breeder will have similar bloodlines to which he has been adding proper and adequate blood refreshment and you can obtain some new blood from him. It is really impossible to obtain bloodlines that would be an "out and out" unrelated cross since all our birds are related to a degree; but one has to avoid bloodlines that have been carelessly handled where Hard Water or Bad Glucke have crept in.

Many breeders make the mistake of keeping bloodlines because they were once famous or came from a successful breeder. you can only judge rollers on what they are doing today--not on their performance 20 years ago for some outstanding exhibitor or breeder.
But do not make the mistake of acquiring stocks from several breeders and expect to cross them and have success; "unsuccess" is more likely to be the result. But, should you know you have a male with fine song, do not be afraid to keep his "crossed" offspring (especially daughters) for it my take several generations of careful line breeding to recover or "set" his fine song in your stocks. Too many novices (and this includes even so-called Master Breeders) quit when they have made an out cross and it has produced mediocre or poor birds (singers)) but the females should have been retained and bred back to each of the strains to see which way the best results can be obtained. It may even take 2 or 3 more generations (up to the 4th generation) to obtain results that would please you. This may take more time and space than the average breeder can handle, but don't give up too soon. Remember "ROME WAS NOT BUILT IN A DAY!'

Comments From Linda Hogan:

I really liked this article by Tell Muhlestein. I didn't know him personally but he has some good points. The hen is equally important as the cock in the breeding pair!

My basic breeding plan is to breed a cock who is strong in bass to a related hen whose father is strong in hollow roll and vice versa and then to keep weaving back and forth using half brother/sister combinations and currently I am breeding in out cross blood at about 1/8th.

I do not pair the father/daughter or mother/son but I think he was talking about using a superior cock to increase his song dominance so that the offspring would throw the desired pattern time and time again. When I was a novice, I started out with the father/daughter mother/son pattern and within two years I had nothing but Hard Water and Junk! I really didn't have quality birds to start with. The song was already weak on hollow roll and breeding more closely took the song further from the balanced song and they were much worse. I am not sure, however, I was capable of ever breeding good out of those birds because I didn't have the ingredients in my aviary and even if I did I probably wouldn't live long enough to accomplish it. I am glad I made those pairing because the problems were now made obvious to me. No more kidding myself that my birds were almost as good as the top birds in the show because they were getting 14 and 15 in hollow roll and only a rare bird in the show got a 17. There is a world of difference in the breeding potential of a bird who gets a 14 and the bird who gets a 17 in hollow roll!!

A break through for me was knowing what was good and what was weak so I actually had a goal in mind and a reasonable approach to the goal. It is not simple because not only do we have the genes on the X sex chromosome but these are regulated (expression controlled) by genes on the autosomes (other chromosomes). It is not just getting the cooperation of the regulator genes to get the tour expressed because not all are codominant (expressed when present) Schockel is an example of a tour which must come from both sides of the pedigree as it is a recessive trait.

Comments From Billy Richardson:

I knew Tell and he was a fine gentleman and a respected judge. I met Tell around 1972. He was judging and I had the opertunity to watch him score birds. I have one comment to make about the article. Read it several times and if you think you understand what he is trying to tell you read it again until you know what he is telling you. Many breeders today think the male is the most important but it takes two. The hen is very important and a male may throw lousy singers so you sell all the hens. If the father was a good bird he may have passed all his song into his hens. Many breeders run hen lines not male lines.

Last modified: January 26, 1999

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