Leanne

Hi everyone Just thought I'd let you know how I went with my cranky Charlie-girl yesterday. First of all I took the nesting box off the cage, and as we expected, Charlie was very distressed. BUT, I distracted her by taking the cage downstairs into the garden and giving them a much needed spray. They all loved it, and since I had some work to do in the yard and was around to keep an eye on things I decided to give Charlie "supervised visitation rights" before I put her in solitary. She was such a good girl, and even nibbled my fingers gently for the first time ever (instead of trying to tear the flesh from my bones!). Here she is, my soggy Charlie: So all 3 were happily in the cage together all day, and the only time there was even a hint of aggression was if Gracy dared to nibble on the grass seeds I'd put in the cage for them, but she does that to Flash all the time and it wasn't more than a quick peck so I wasn't overly concerned. Gracy was eating seed on her own, and Flash would feed her as well. Here's the happy family (yesterday) Gracy-Lou, Charlie, Flash I naively thought that in her new surroundings and outlook on life (they've now moved in to the loungeroom with us) Charlie might've forgotten about her urge to hurt the baby. I can see you all shaking your heads at me in disbelief, but I really thought she might be okay! All it took was Gracy showing how clever she was this morning by climbing and flying to the top perch, and Charlie was there, leaning down trying to push her off the cage wall or off the perch when she finally made it all the way up. I watched them for a few minutes and Charlie was being truly evil. Poor GracyLou looked like such a gumby, still figuring out how her wings worked, and there was Mum, ready to make sure she fell at every opportunity. So I braced myself, found a pillowcase for protection, and went in. I came out with only a minor bite, and now Poor Charlie is looking all forlorn in the cage next to Flash and Gracy-Lou. I guess I'll leave it for a few weeks then reunite Flash and Charlie and fitout Gracy-Lou in her new cage. Here's something else though ... yesterday Flash tried to mount Gracy-Lou a few times - ewww - is that normal?!! I shoo'd him away from her so he started on Charlie instead. Geez, its bad enough she's got a psycho mum but it turns out she's got a desperately h*rny dad as well!

How lovely, thank you! That's so sweet I have a good sized cage spare so Gracy will have a home of her own, or very possibly, share with either her half-brother or half-sister, depending on who behaves the best! Given Petey's "amorous" behaviour towards anyone or anything that will let him, I'm thinking it'll be best to keep the girls in one or perhaps leave Petey and Cinnamon Princess together and leave Gracy-Lou "untouched"! I like to let them all out and decide for themselves who sleeps where, but this hasn't always ended well - at one point I had 5 budgies in a cage designed to fit 2, and they don't like it when I decide to break up the little slumber party! I'll let you all know how I go with Miss Cranky Pants (Charlie) tomorrow cheers

Will do. I have to admit, I didn't consider removing the trouble-maker, I was just trying to make sure I could care for the baby properly. So, as much as it will pain me to disappoint her, Charlie will be evicted tomorrow morning (band-aids and dettol on stand-by!). Does anyone have any advice for a fretting (human) mother?

Well, after being so excited to introduce my lovely GracyLou to you all last night, and being so proud that she's out on her own and thinking she's so clever, I came home tonight to find that things aren't quite as rosy as I thought. My "mature mumma" Charlie is now hellbent on world domination and has ditched her offspring in an attempt to make some more. I'm not interested in that, but in the meantime, look what she's done to her baby! She's got blood on her wing and has a chunk of feathers missing from above her eye. Charlie has always been an aggressive bird (the only one I've met that can draw blood!), but she'd softened when little GracyLou came along. Until Gracy started showing some independence, so now she's out. My question is, if I decide to remove Gracy from her parent's cage because of the violence towards her, how do I go about making sure she's well fed and watered? She hatched on February 13th, so is only just over a month old. She's still being fed by Dad, but Mum's lost interest and I'm worried if I take the nesting box off (because I don't want her to lay again) she'll be even more aggressive towards the little one. Any ideas? I'll be happy to hand feed her, but I've never had to before so I'm really not sure on what to feed her or how often, or if she's okay to start to learn on her own. Looking forward to any helpful suggestions thanks!

Hi Bea! No, these aren't the same parents - same Dad though. It was a very strange thing; when Flash (the greys' dad) and Paris (the greys' late mum) were busy making those beautiful babies, Charlie and Maverick , my other two adults (who were cage partners of 4 years or so), went a little bit silly. Charlie just went nuts, getting very distressed, pacing and carrying on when she heard the other babies. So I put a nesting box on just to keep them happy but nothing ever came of it. Mavvy was 7 years old so I really didn't expect anything, but they seemed happy to "play house' and Charlie was certainly less distressed. Fast forward 18 months or so and I'd unfortunately lost both Maverick and Paris, at different times and probably six months or so apart. After Mavvy died Charlie was really distressed (as you'd expect), and I kept her separate from the babies for a while until she got back to her normal self. Over the following months after Paris died unexpectedly, Charlie and Flash gradually became 'quite close'. I know its not recommended to breed older birds, but I felt so sorry for ol' Charlie girl that when they really started getting smoochy I thought I'd give her one last chance to fulfil her budgie destiny! To be honest I was about to clear the nesting box and get rid of the eggs when GracyLou finally hatched! Unfortunately today I've discovered another problem with my "mature mother" but I'll put that in a new post ...

She's gorgeous isn't she! The trouble I had was that Charlie's getting along a bit now (she must be around 7 years old) and I told her this was her last chance! I think she was so excited that an egg finally hatched that she neglected all the others. She didn't sit on them much and just focussed on the baby instead! So this was the only chick that hatched, but that's okay, it makes it easier to talk hubby into keeping her Not that its hard these days; he's certainly relaxed his view on how many budgies is too many.

Here is my latest addition to my feathered family. 5 1/2 years after my Charlie laid me her first of many dud eggs, she finally came through with this little beauty. Here's a cute close up from 10 days ago: And yesterday, when she had her first unassisted outing from the nesting box. She's a little terror and quite bitey like her mum. http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m314/ho...MarchMedium.jpg She's lost her lovely 'baby bars' though - I love their stripy little heads but this one seems to have grown out of hers early. Here are the proud parents:

My Charlie-Girl is around 7 years old (I've had her 5 1/2 years and she was around 2 when I got her), and her very first chick hatched last week - how's that for an old girl!

My four LOVE snow peas - they demolish it as soon as I put it in their cages. Sometimes I think they like the crunchy sound it makes more than the taste, going by the amount they get all over the walls!

Jeez they're funny critters aren't they! Thanks guys, now I know my boy isn't a weirdo, he's just a randy teenager like the rest of them But for now I think I'll spare poor Cinnamon Princess the harrassment and let him hump his toys instead

Thanks Feathers, will do. I've been watching him for the past hour and he seems to have forgotten all about her and is trying his best to impress his bell, so I'm not feeling as bad about separating him anymore. I just never expected them to behave like this if I wasn't providing them with a breeding environment (i.e. a nest box). Silly little buggers.

Very funny! Its the idea of him doing it on my hand that disturbs me the most! As much as I love to be part of their feathered family, that's just taking things too far!

First, a bit of background: I have 4 budgies, 2 male, 2 female. The oldest female Charlie is around 6-7 years, the oldest male Flash is 3, then there's the babies: Petey (10 months) and CP Shazza ( 8 months). I normally keep them in 2 different cages (3 at the moment, but we'll get to that), and three of them are related (Flash is the father to both Petey and Shazza, but from different clutches). They get along reasonably well, although the older ones don't have much patience for the noisy younger ones (that's just life though isn't it!). Anyway, I've been noticing some changes in my boy Petey's behaviour recently. He's been getting a little more frisky with his toys and more "assertively chatty" to my other budgies, but I just figured it was 'budgie adolescence' or something like that. The past few times I've let them all out, when it was time for bed they ended up pairing up with 2 boys in one cage and 2 girls in another. Seemed odd, but I'm happy to let them choose where they sleep. The girls seemed happy enough with that arrangement, but Petey was getting overly aggressive towards his dad, Flash. Flash is a gentle old soul so I kept an eye on them and when it wasn't easing up after a week I split them up and put the oldest male and female together, and put Petey in a cage with his younger sister. I thought they'd have fun playing together, and originally she was the one I thought would be the meany, because for such a young bird, until now she's 'ruled the roost' so to speak. Well, tonight I was trying to play with them (Petey was doing his best to ignore me and impress CP Shazza), and to my horror, Petey started mounting her WHILE SHE WAS ON MY FINGER!! I couldn't believe he was trying to mate for one, but while I had my hand in there ?!! I was shocked to say the least, and she wasn't too impressed with him either, so I put him in the spare cage for now. He was a bit miffed - until he saw that I'd put in his first love: his dangly bell toy. Now he's happy(ish), but still putting on a bit of a song and dance. Meanwhile she's doing something odd in her seed tray ... So, over to you guys, my amazing resource of breeding and pet-ownership experts; a few questions: 1) Is this normal??! (I thought about posting this anonymously as a guest; its that weird to me! I'll be very embarrassed if it turns out he was just preening her in a whole new way ) 2) Aren't they *far* too young to be thinking about this kind of thing? 3) I think I know the answer to this one, but it seems that birds don't recognise family members the way people do? Will he mate with anything as long as it'll let him? (By The Way, I have no intention of breeding these birds, but we'd rather not see them trying while having our dinner [as hubby said earlier tonight!]) 3) My birds don't like to be on their own (sometimes they all squeeze into one cage just to be together) so I'm feeling a bit bad that he's all on his lonesome at the moment - should I just ignore the humping and let them be? 4) Please tell me this has happened to you! Do I release Petey from his solitary confinement and let him play grown ups with his sister because budgies don't know any better? At least my older birds are doing just fine, they're behaving the way normal budgies should: being destructive, making a mess, chirping louder than Desparate Housewives ...

I got a pitiful 4/10, which just proves that I'm more interested in my cat's "loveability" than her breeding; same goes for my budgies :sad:

Glad to hear they're in okay shape for winter and I'm not on the way to killing my birds with kindness :sad: Now if only I could justify my own "winter conditioning" !