fire bird

Do you have to be a member of a club to go?

I just get 2 tubs for seed, one plain seed and one with the F vite and E powder mixed in. Saves time. I follow the programs with it so plain seed days are easy and vitamin days are easy and I just add a drop or 2 of turbobooster to the dish after pouring the seed it, mix it up a bit with a fork and put it in cage. Simple, and it dosnt go off like oils or soaked seed so it can stay in all day. KD days (the water cleanser are also easy, as the KD auto washes the dish so I dont have to wash and scrub out on those days, the dishes are crystal clear afterwards. I use the KD to wash the veges, perches, dishes etc just mix in a spray bottle and clean the cage bars etc.

I feed the pumpkin raw usually, sweet potato lightly cooked, you could make a mash with both if you wanted. All my birds love pomegranite juice, I get it at coles/bi lo in the vege section, it is 100% juice not rubbish. I put some in finger drawers a few times a week. On Rob's stuff, if you do it right in about a month you should need sunglasses to look at your birds, mine now look glossy all over and the colours are much more vivid. Some of them almost look like they have been smeared with glitter when you see them in the sun. He said chamomile tea is also good for them, especially if they ever get any respiritory problems he recomended it for mine that had some strep throat rather than more antibiotics.

Some baby pics from last year Some of my other birds (sorry for fuzzy shots it was misty)

Yes, fortunately they do not appear to have any problems with megabac if anything most of my birds now are on the 'heavy side' and some are now on a diet lol. I pumped the food into them when they were ill and Dr Rob's turbobooster, what a difference that makes. The ringnecks were gutsing down the E powder. I think a bit too much lol. I spoke to him again, and the current problem is a combination of a little thrush, maybe some strep and just basically they could be feeling a bit irritated or raw in their sinus or throats after such a long course of antibiotics and from having the respiritory trouble, just one of those things that will take a while to go. He just said keep up the health program and good food. No breeding for 7 weeks. I still watch them like a hawk, it is amazing how tame a few of the previously 'wild' budgies have become with my constant fussing, they now sit on me, which helps I look at their faces everynight with a led torch for any stains or wet spots. My family think I am nuts for worrying this much about birds. If they understood the value of the ringneck parrots just for a start they would probably faint, and ANY bird here that gets ill is a risk to the others... to me it is simple to understand.

I look at it now like this, because I learned the hard way. Spend 4-6 weeks quarantining new bird, and all will probably go well. OR spend 4-6 weeks or longer treating the whole flock with all the stress, time, late nights, loss of sleep from worrying yourself sick and cost of vet bills because you didnt quarantine the new bird. I will be going an extra step in the future and also getting the new birds vet checked carefully.

Well it was too good to be true, 5 budgies have runny nose back, moved them downstairs into isolation. they will have to be re tested, it will be a week till I can afford it the vet bill on the weekend took almost my entire pay. It is all starting to get a bit much. To top it off my mother woke up really sick this morning. And do you think she will listen to anyone? NO. Mum... you 'might' have caught chlamidia just go to the doctor and get tested PLEASE! she just says... 'bah' its a cold. 2 vets have told her at the start of all this if you get sick,.. get tested, It might just be a cold... but we KNOW the birds have had psittacosis. I drove my doctor nuts at the start I went 3 times to be checked and mine turned out to be hayfever from the wattle trees comming in flower. But mum has the works... fever, stomach, headache chills. I have put the info sheet on her bed and said if she will not go I will call the hospital. It is another stress I dont need. I do feel for her but we dont get along well at all... she hates the birds and dosnt like me very much and I know if she does have it it will be my fault, the family will blame me and try to make me destroy or get rid of the lot. BUT if I got sick they probably would just scoff and say I had it comming. She works one day a week at a nursing home so she probably caught this there but she has to get checked. She is in the high risk category.

Thanks everyone! Droppings have improved a little today, seeing some smaller tighter ones again. Still a fair bit of dry sneezing but no mucous or wetness so I am not too worries about it, I will often sneeze after I have a cold for a while they look perfectly healthy otherwise, and I realised today a possible cause. I always used to give water in tube drinkers before and during and since treatment now give it in stainless steel bowls and they have been bathing in it a lot and they get theur whole heads in there. If it gets worse or I get worried I will ring Dr Rob again but he seemed very sure they are okay. He said it could be the humidity because we had a very wet winter, or possibly some dry mucous from when they were sick they are still trying to clear from the sinus. My alexandrine hen has always sneezed a lot since she was a baby, my friend hand raised her and she could have inhaled food she is a real pig. I never worried about it she is 3 now and still does it but her nose is always dry. My lorrikeet has sneezing fits when he gets really exited but Dr Rob saw him just this weekend and said he looked magnificent. I do get very paranoid about my birds I am not going to breed the budgies for a while yet, they are getting a nice rest and sunshine. Hopefully when they are ready I will have a good season.

Sorry again for the double post, can't work out how to edit the previous. But I have the results and it is good news. All the tests came back clean as a whistle, he was most impressed. What a relief. They are still a little tired, and a few are still a bit sneezy but he said it will just take some time and TLC and they should make a full recovery. We will continue with his budgie health programe and they will get a nice rest from breeding and plenty of good food. And if the weather will co operate lots of nice spring sunshine out in the garden. I have started re-building all my aviaries from the ground up I cant wait to get everyone back in there!

I can tell you what my avian vet recomends to be fed to budgies daily. Top of his list are carrot, pumpkin especially butternut, soft sweet potato, grapefruit. You dont have to give all those everyday, mix them up and feed different things so they dont get bored. Next are broccoli, brussel sprouts, peas, beans. I also feed boiled rice, soaked and boiled pulse (soup) mix, soft oatmeal, and other fruits and veges, tomato, other citrus, apple, pear, chilli/capsicum, celery, basil, lemon balm, gotu kola, seeding grasses, eucalypt branches with leaves on, lemon verbena, choko, peppino, pomegranet and pomergranet juice (100%) himalayan goji juice when I have it ( I also drink it myself) plus I add Dr Rob Marshalls health products now and cannot recomend them highly enough. The health and appearance, and happniess of my birds has dramatically improved.

Sorry I didn't get on here to update. Been very very busy, very tired. The birds finished their treatment, we have a lot of thrush so they have nilstat. I went back to see Dr Rob yesterday and took my 2 pet lorrikeets and he was very impressed with them. I took droppings from every bird for him to do follow up tests. I get the results tomorrow afternoon, maybe tuesday as he has a lot there to do lol. He seemed confident from photos I sent, descriptions and looking quickly that we have won fingers crossed. It was a massive job. He has every sample in a seperate dish and labeled with who it is from, so if anything does show up I will go to treating individually with injections rather than repeat full flock, they wouldnt stand another course. I have his protector disinfectant to spray everything down with so hopefully all will be okay. We have had some nice warm sunny days I have been putting the cages out on the grass in the sun in the morning and the birds are loving it and their colours are so bright now, so shiny. Overall they look really good. They seem happier and more active than I have ever seen them and they are getting very frisky lol. I did loose some budgies some younger ones and some of my older hens. But most of them came through it well. I lost some silkie chickens, but I have to focus on what lived and keep them on the mend. I will update tomorrow when I get the results.

I had a website link to a small company that makes longer lasting full specs and has a type for birdrooms. Come in edison screw, bayonet and tubes. prices were pretty good. Now do you think I can find the link? I looked and looked, I'll post it when I find it again.

I have them on Dr Rob's Doxy + megamix and he said I can add all his products to the food the mineral powders E powder, F vite the turbo booster. Ive been up at 4 am doing it all, put the fresh meds in at sun up, and replace it again around 2 in the afternoon so its always in there fresh, he said I only have to do it in the morning but I figured re freshing it in the afternoon I bought about 400 grams of doxy and 1 litre megamix so there is tonnes of it. I'm paranoid Ive been loosing sleep over tiny white spots of urates on cage bars that no amount of scraping and soaking seems to get off. I always find those little spots after the cages dry off. I have Virkon, about 8 litres of bleach, dettol, several other varieties of disinfectant, a hand held steam gun and saturday will be getting a seperate vaccume cleaner just for the bird cages and aviaries. There is plastic up everywhere... my mother just looks at me and shakes her head... she thought it might be funny to put bio-hazard stickers up. I didn't laugh...

So if I pop in here and say I am almost 30, single female... reasonable okay looking and given up on finding a soft hearted bloke who loves birds as much as I do... am I going to get dive bombed? LOL I have been single for 6 years... ex hated animals he had to go.... now I am fussy. Although looking after my birds for me if Im sick is a good starting point.

Wow great ideas for cages! Thanks for the pics gives me ideas. I love the converted cupboard! Mind if I ask where you got the cages on the far wall? Ive been looking for some breeding cages for some ringneck pairs, big and long. I can make my own but i like having pull out trays for inside. There is a company I emailed who specialise in full spec lights they have some that can go into regular fittings and take timers. But I wont be using lamps, just the regular ceiling lights and would have to get the timer on the ight switch.