Sailorwolf

Yar. I don't vet check generally. I think they go through enough stress just settling down in the new home, and then to be taken away to another weird smelling and bright place would be very scary. I only take them if they need it. Like Isis, whom I took to the vet 2 weeks after getting her cause I suspected scaly face (I was right and managed to nip it in the bud too) and I took Arkady along with me for a check up at the same time , because I thought I might as well do two of them at the same time (no extra charge) and he also had runny poos.

I'm sorry to hear. At least she died in the comfort of her family and with love.

Girls get very purple ceres when they are babies. Boys are always pink, like fleshy pink. Girls always have varying shades of cere colour and I have bought confirmed girls budgies with that colour cere before. Girls can be purple, white, tan , or white blue when they are babies, but boys are always flesh pink. Also the boy's cere is always one colour all over whereas the girl's can be varying shades all on the one cere. That's a girl.

Good luck. I hope she will be able to hang on til then. Our thoughts are with her.

No I say girl, Cute

Yes i think we are on the same page because you are saying what i am saying and then you aren't. I think we both confused each other. Secondaries are stable, thus they create the most lift. Primaries are more moveable so are used to steer. Lift isn't just going up though. It is the area of less pressure. Like a golfball can create "lift" from its spin, allthough it doesn't necessarily move up, instead it will move in the direction of less pressure. Lift is a very broad term. Yay isn't it fun to have a physics discussion. In regards to the stability of the wing. The muscles have to do less work if the main lift force is in the secondaries as this is more proximal to the body. This is due to lever systems and vectors.

Sawdust retains a lot of moisture tho. If you do use ny pine or softword shavings etc. make sure you air them first to get rid of nasty toxins.

How cute. ! :dbb1: My chinchilla does that.

Fortunately for us New Zealanders there aint many things that could hurt a budgie, outside in its cage in the countryside, only a magpie or possum (both australian I must say :dbb1:).

Some of what you said is logical, although I do not agree with most of it. I have done university physics and am currently studying veterinary science. It is the tilt of the wing that induces braking. A wing held in a horizontal posistion provides lift directly upwards, inorder for a bird to move forwards its wings are tilted so that the cranial part of the wing is lower than the caudal part. This changes the force towards the front, propelling the bird forwards. When the wing is tilted the other way a force is directed backwards which helps the bird to brake by pointing its lift behind it. The primaries are more moveable than the secondaries. Thus they are moved first to brake and then the bird will tilt its entire wing, that is when the secondaries help to brake. Air planes work differently in that they can't turn their wings (and don't have a moveable wrist with which primaries start from) thus they have to make a surface that is perpendicular to the airflow to create a large amount of friction. Secondaries provide the main lift and gliding power due to their shape. Primaries do not have the curvature of the wing to the same extent as the secondaries so do not create much lift, however they do extend the gliding surface. Thus if you cut all primaries your bird can't really steer or brake properly at all, because secondaries do not steer and you need to beable to steer you wings in order for them to be moved in to breaking position. Also it is best to have the area where the lift force acts upon closer to the body as this is the stronger part of the wing. This is due to levers and is more energy efficient. To produce the main lift on the outer part of the wing (primaries) would mean that the muscles in the wing would have to do more work to keep the wing stable.

I leave my budgies unsupervised outside. I make sure the cage is securely taped up first so that no little budgies try to squeeze their way through seed bowl door. Anna yor right having a cage outside is no different to having an avairy. When I put my budgies outside I just put my cat inside. We live out in the whops so there aren't many cats around. My budgies just love talking to the swallows and fantails.

I was wondering. Is there any kind that is poisonous, cause i have eucalypts in my back yard.

I said "even the first two" because the person who started this thread, said that they didn't know whether to cut the first two primaries. You are wrong on what the primaries and secondaries are used for. Secondaries provide lift and primaries provide breaking and steering.Therefore by cutting the primaries your bird still has lift, so it won't drop like a rock, but it just can't steer and therefore gain height and brake. Leaving the first two primaries unclipped is bad as these two have to take on all the load that ten feathers usually do and so they often snap and break.

Lillie that second picture that you posted is very confusing to someone who doesn't know what primaries and secndaries are. Calvino: if you are worried, show us a picture of your bird's wing and we can help you out. When I clip my birds' wings (which isn't very often as I prefer flighted birds) I clip the primaries even the first two.

This may be more than that though. I think that perhaps you should talk to an avian vet or behaviourist about this as he may have some sort of anxiety.

I love it when they free fall. Bluie looks like he tripped.

They are both boys. Nasal rings don't necessarily mean girl. before I came to this site I never used nasal rings to sex budgies, I don't find them very reliable. One thing that greatly helps is that males always have smooth ceres whereas females have crinkled ones.

Aaaaaaah scary budgie

I would say that it is a dilute grey. His cheek patches are pretty grey.

YF is a dominant gene. You can breed him with any kind of white based budgie to produce another yellowface. However he is also an opaline spangle. You can breed him with any bird that that is white based and you should get spangles and female opalines.

This is a very good brand of food. It is crumbled parrot pellets. No wastage. It is designed specifically for granivores and there is even a specific diet for baby budgies and breeding parents. It tells you how much to feed accompnied with what fruits and how much to feed a day. Very good. has all sorts of essential amino acids and fatty acids. Here is the site: www.wombaroo.com.au Have a look. There re other products available as well. I'm gonna order some in the summer and convert my budgies to it (if I can)

Awe. How cute Daz. Do you ever have any near escapes?

First things first. Don't panic. You guys are being very unrational here. If you look carefully it is only her flight feathers that have been cut, not her bone!!!!. Flight reathers do not start at the wrist, they start at the finger tip of the wing. The reason why it looks like that is because of the way it is being held in the picture. Her wing isn't fully stretched out. Her clip isn't the best I've seen, but it isn't completely bad. She still has parts of her primaries. What I don't understand is that the feathers hae a "fluffy" appearance to them. Perhaps she could have had french moult at birth, or she does not preen herself very well. Definately take her to the vet as her feathers should not have that appearance. Another thing want to mention is you said that her feathers haven't grown. Did you mean they hadn't moulted and fallen out in that time or did you mean they hadn't changed in length in that time? Because (which I'm sure you know anyway) feathers have a set lenght, they do not continuosly grow.

I use a vinegar and water mix. And then leave the branches in the sun untill they are completely dry. Don't throw away your doweling. Keep those perches and mix them in with natural perches. that way they also have variety. I find too that it is good to have more perches than the ones that are already in the cage, that way you can have spares and swap them around every week or so. With regards to number of birds; I found that having 3 budgies, one would always be left out as the other two would pair up. Now that I have 4 budgies everyone is much happier.

Mites is pretty common and alot of petshops have them. My Isis had them. I successfully treated her with mite solution and she is fine now. There are several different places you can inject an animal. It is not always in the same place. A dog for instance has three very good places for injections. Also injecting in exactly the same place does not work as well, because of scar tissue build up.