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Trying To Save A Baby Budgie


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Hi - can someone please help me !!!

I'm new at this forum, so I hope I'm doing this in the right area. 8 days ago, one of our budgies died, leaving 3 babies (9-14 days old approx). We brought them inside, visited the local pet shop for advice and started trying to handraise them. Unfortunately we lost the youngest 2, but the oldest seems to have been going great. 4 days ago it was active and if you put it down on the floor it would run around. If I put it on my chest, it would climb up to my shoulder and nibble on my neck/hair. However, it now seems unwell - its crop does not seem to empty between feeds (looks swollen) and it can't move around without falling over (seems to be top heavy). Can someone please give me some help quickly, as I'm scared we are going to lose our little one and I've done some serious bonding with it and would be devastated. As you can guess, we have never had to do this before - this is our first babies.

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Hi Shez,

Sorry you are having some heartbreak. Its very hard to try and raise babies alone like that. It's always a good idea to put several pairs down to breed at the same time, so if anyone goes terribly wrong with the parents then the chicks can be fostered to another nest. Trying to raise babies is a hard task even if you have done it before. So much can go wrong.

My first and best advice I can give you is

NEVER take advice from petshops. They arent qualified to teach you anything really. Another budgie breeder would be a better source of good information and thats why its great you have found us here :rolleyes:

Have you had the chicks in a source of warmth ? Like a hospital cage ?

If so, how warm and how is it set up ?

What are you feeding them and how often ?

 

More to follow as you answer.

Cheers karen

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Thanks Karen. We put the nesting box in a crate and my hubby put a safety light (attached to a regulator) in the crate to provide warmth. I think it's warm enough - I just can't understand why its crop doesn't seem to be emptying the last few days and it constantly topples forward - not the active little thing it was a few days ago. Have we overfed it ?? I'm so confusedWe are feeding it a hand raising formula from the pet shop (with a syringe). We were feeding it about 4-5 times a day, but today we only fed it 3 times as it seems so full !!!

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You may need to check the warmth..they could be dehydrating if too warm. Normal lamp with 25 watt globe is usually enough. Formula...Passwells or Wombaroo might be what you are using. Babies can get all kinds of crop problems with handfeeding. They can also aspirate ( take it into their lungs ) from syringe feeds. I prefer to crop feed with a crop needle but that too, takes practice and experience to get it right. Crop feeding helps in that there is no chance to aspirate where syringe into the beak can.

Temperature of the feeds is important...too cold and it causes problems with slow crop, too hot and you burn the crop.

Apparently if you put a drop of lpineapple juice or true raspberry cordial in the crop feed you can balance out a sour crop problem. You may need some Poly-aid too which is a probiotic formula.

Edited by **KAZ**
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I would PM KathyW and Cindy who may be able to help you with this also. :rolleyes:

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Thanks Kaz. Woke up this morning and it was gone. I knew in my heart when I went to bed last night that it wouldn't survive the night. i guess we can only look at it in the light that we tried. I just wish i hadn't got so attached to the little thing. Thanks for your help - I wish I'd found this site a few days earlier and maybe we could have done something to save it.

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l'm sorry that you lost the little fellow ^_^

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I am also sorry to hear of your loss Shez. It's hard when you loose a bird you've tried so hard to save.

 

For your information and future reference, if only one parent died, the other may have been quite capable of raising the chicks. Especially if you moved the surviving parent and chick(s) into a breeding cage with a nest box. It removes competition (for the nest box) from the other aviary birds and would have provided the surviving parent with plenty of food and water within easy reach.

 

I second KAZ's comment re Petshop staff. Some genuinely mean well but most really do not know and cannot offer competent advice. Your vet should be a reliable source, as are the wonderful and knowledgeable people on this forum.

 

Regards,

KathyW.

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Thanks all for your kind words and help. Hopefully we won't have to go through this again .... although I really was enjoying looking after them!! I'm sure I'll be back for more advice soon.

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I'm sorry to hear about your loss after trying so hard to save them. :dbb1:

I a also agree with Kas and Kathy.

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In future if only one parent dies, if I were you I would have left them with the remaining parent, as often they will keep raising it themselves. Especially if it’s the mother that’s left, a mother is quite capable of raising 3 or 4 by her self. The fathers aren’t quite as good, I have found, but I had one hen that just dropped dead of late & the father raised them, even though they were a little smaller than normal.

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Thanks all for your help. I really appreciate it.

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