varified

So previously I had my first two birds; my white lacewing hen and grey normal cockbird but since then there's been three additions to the flock! The first is a skyblue opaline cock named Baby belonging to my father, purchased at the Bendigo auction last year. Next are two purchased at the bird sale today, both are mine. The images are too big so I'll link them instead. http://41.media.tumblr.com/20dedb6e0c6505047126873a1f9525d0/tumblr_no29pxcdEd1s61ewyo1_250.jpg http://41.media.tumblr.com/bcba065af4e284cb09af73cfdcc521c5/tumblr_no29pxcdEd1s61ewyo4_1280.jpg http://41.media.tumblr.com/cdec4985e5a83b432312ec56672f885e/tumblr_no29pxcdEd1s61ewyo3_1280.jpg http://41.media.tumblr.com/957ce573f026dd8ba625690f472e065f/tumblr_no29pxcdEd1s61ewyo2_1280.jpg

I'm also no expert but I feel that it's a cock as a hen would have more white around the nostril and really you're looking for a white/tan cere in a hen (even in a recessive pied which effects the colour of a cock's cere rather than the hen's). Can't really be sure of the age other than that it's over four months old having gone through its first moult and lost all its baby bars.

Ooh loving that that cobalt on the end! Four gorgeous birds, congratulations!

That's precisely what I'd thought, we should just get another cage for dad's pair and leave Dany and Edd in this one. Thank you! It's a huge task, a lot of space to deal with but it'll be awesome once it's all done

That's what I thought myself. Thanks

So basically this; is the cage in question. The sizing is; depth 45 cm, width 76 cm, height 90 cm. Currently I only have the two birds but as we would like to get more in the future we were wondering how many birds would this house potentially? Please note that this is the image of the cage from where it was advertised and I purchased it, the set up will be very different and that horrible perch is being replaced by natural eucalyptus branches from our yard. I understand that it will rely on the nature of the birds themselves and not to be creating an imbalances in gender (currently I have a hen and cock bird who get along swimmingly so i'm hesitant to alter that but my father also wants birds of his own). We have two other cages but since one was given to us and was designed for rats it may take some altering to be made good for birds and the other is smaller, probably housing two birds at the maximum - better housing only one. The end game will be the complete conversion of our woodshed into a three flight aviary but for now, how many birds could be housed reasonably in this cage? My instincts say four at the max and no more but I'd like to know what you more experienced handlers think about it. Thanks for any and all advice in advance xx

I checked his tail today and pitch black, I also looked up the shade 'dark slate blue' and that's precisely the colour of his cheek patches, so thank you Finnie, Nick and Trefto for the help! I'm now 99% sure that he's grey - which is what I bought him believing. I'll only be 100% sure when I breed him sometime next year but I'm reasonably confident now that he is indeed what I wanted him to be so that's great! I wouldn't have minded if he were mauve though, he's still a great bird. Ah thank you Finnie, I love them both a lot! I went to a bird sale (where I purchased these two) and I was surprised by the amount of breeders who were selling lacewings and they were no more expensive than any other budgies available. Good luck with your cinnamons and inos I hope you can get some nice markings in them sometime soon

That's what I thought and what I've been calling him since I purchased him my questions came simply from the cheek patches and a book which claims that greys have grey cheek patches and mauves have the blue/violet - but he honestly doesn't show any mauve colour definition whatsoever which still makes me think grey. Thanks for your help! So far it's looking like grey is the most popular opinion

Hello, thank you for the welcome! Haha the laziness is cute, I do worry about him getting overweight but he seems an alright weight range for the moment. Stuffy is such a cute name! My two were named by a friend of mine after Game of Thrones characters so the lacewing is Queen Dany and the grey is Eddard.

Thanks Nick! It seems like the road to becoming an expert is a very long and winding one. Df grey, eh? Honestly I hadn't thought too hard on whether he was single or double factor but you're right, I'll definitely know when I breed him next year. Out of curiosity what makes you think he'd df? What are the visual clues?

Hello so I'm Vari! I'm 19 from Bendigo in Victoria Australia and recently joined the club (though I haven't had a chance to get involved yet). I purchased my first two birds, two young rung birds at the bid bird sale at the showgrounds on the 11th of May. At the moment they're in a cage that I feel is two small but we have a much larger one we're in the process of seting up so it's only temporary. As for my breeding plan I'm living with my parents and my father wants to breed yellow face blues like he remembers them (vivid and bold colouring) from his younger days. At the moment my personal plan is simply for enjoyment, I want to breed a range of colours and patterns that I enjoy and steadily improve with each generation. Maybe one day i'll breed a bird with enough quality to show through this method of steady improvement but for the moment my focus is to simply enjoy myself with them and not on winning any shows. I will not be coloney breeding since I want to steadily improve my birds through good match ups but i'm still learning all the genetics! I'm in love with inos and lacewings and so that's where I think my focus will be but it's certainly not all I hope to breed. My first budgie is a lacewing hen who I've named Queen Dany, she's a wonderful bird with a lot of personality. Though she seems hellbent on picking fights with the wild birds (clinging to the front of the cage and yelling at them whenever she hears them sqkwaking) she's never so much as bitten her companion that i've seen. They flock together and get along wonderfully thus far! The next is my cock bird who is a grey(mauve??? I have a thread asking about that in the mutations queary board!) normal (fairly sure) and he's so darn lazy! Sometimes he plays and he hops from perch to perch trilling excitedly but his favourite pasttime seems to just be stuffing his greedy little beak. So that's me and my current bird-babies!

Alright so meet my first two budgies - the first is pretty simple she's a lacewing hen but my questions come from the cock bird. See, he looks grey but his cheek patches are blue which I've been told means he's actually mauve. He's normal as well is he not?