Rainbow

I had to look at all of them. She really gets into her bath, doesn't she? I didn't realize she was that old - that is terrific!

Hello, and welcome to the forum! We are glad you joined, despite your hesitation. Sometimes people clash. If you would let me know which post you found unnerving, I would appreciate it. Unfortunately it sometimes takes a while to get through all the posts, and if it is something that needs the attention of staff we do need to know about it. As a rule though, we are a friendly bunch. Don't hesitate to ask your questions. I know the little logs you are talking about. I have entertained the thought of getting them for my birds, but for the very reason you described, I haven't. There is a good chance the eggs aren't fertilized if you say she rarely likes attention from Sonny. But many people never see their birds mate. If you cover the cage, any mating is probably taking place in the early hours of dawn before you uncover them. You can leave the eggs. She may lay a few more and incubate them, but will realize they won't hatch after a while. You can also candle the eggs after they are 5 or 6 days old to see if they are fertilized. You would know what you are up against a little better that way. If you prefer to remove the eggs to make sure they do not raise a family, you can do that and replace them with fake eggs or marbles if you wish. You can also remove them and not replace them with anything, but if you choose to do that, please also remove the log at the same time. Whatever you choose, I would remove the log at the appropriate time anyway. If they like to chew on it, hang it up instead so she can't sit in it. They also make hanging "balsa" wood toys for the birds to destroy, and that is one of the toys I give mine instead. Your hen is at a prime age for breeding, as she is mature enough both physically and emotionally to properly care for a clutch of babies. But without a good bond with Sonny, it is not likely. Even if the eggs were fertile and did hatch, unless she allows him to feed her and help care for the babies, they would probably not get the proper attention they should. Which would bring up another set of problems. Attempting to transfer the hen to a new nest box normally doesn't work, and also defeats the purpose of not wanting to entice them to start a family. Does Cher allow Sonny to feed her? Does she leave the eggs regularly to eat, drink, defacate, and have a fly around? Again welcome, and I hope have helped a little.

Since you say she does it very quickly, it sounds to me like she is flipping her wings. It is a nervous behavior. Once she gets used to her new home it should stop. Are they caged together? Quarantine is very important when bringing a new bird into the house, both for the new one and the bird you had before.

He is stunning (looks like a he to me) and my first thought was that he was a darkeyed clear with color bleedthrough. His eyes don't look like they are red or plum. My second choice would be DF dominant pied, but I've always seen the base color of a pied on the rump, and yours has no color there...so I am back to dark-eyed clear. Or possible DF spangle.

Very good points. About 20 + years ago, I had 4 budgies, a sun conure, and an orange fronted conure. The conures lived together with no problems. All the birds had seperate out of cage time too. But the sun was incredibly jealous of budgie out of cage times, because that meant he had to stay in. Plus the budgies could fly, and the conures couldn't. The orange front didn't care, he loved everything about life, but the sun was a different story. One day, he got on the budgie cage. Of course, being budgies they tried to bite his toes. In a split second, one of the budgies began screaming, then wouldn't use one of her legs. You guessed it, the sun bit her foot instead. The budgie ended up losing one of her toes. Even if caged seperately, birds must be carefully watched when mixing species.

I love that picture with the pine cones. That looks absolutely great. Did you buy the pine cones somewhere, or do you have access to them in your yard, or what? If you pick them yourself, do you do anything special to disinfect them before you give them to your birds? I decided to wrap up damp broccoli in a white paper towel and hang it in the cage. I also clipped carrots in the normal spots, and gave beak appetit on a dish as usual. All the birds are now on the other side of the room, I'm guessing because of the weird white thing hanging in their cage... But...this is a good thing, because they had to fly to get away from it, LOL, and so got some exercise. Stubborn budgies. I'll give an update as to what happens later. Eventually they will go back to their cage, LOL.

Hello and welcome! It is heartwarming to hear you found this bird and are going to give him a loving home. I would love to see out your window in the mornings! An actual flock of wild budgies is a thing not too many of us will ever see. Do you think you could take a few pictures one day and post them up? I'd love to see them! How many are in the flock that visits your yard?

I have a blue rubber ball just like the red one you have in Poe's cage! I have millet and lattice balls with bells in it now...it was funny to see it in your picture as I just got it out a few days ago to see if the birds would play in it. They go out of their way to poop on it. Again, you had a lot more good ideas! I love to see how the birds react - keep posting more pictures. After the first few days of foraging, Skittles has lost interest, and the other three (who were perfectly willing to let her do all the work to get to the food in the first place) are hard pressed to even look at my new and interesting ways of presenting food to their highnesses. But I will perservere. **sigh** Oh, that thing again....I see it. Please fix it so we can eat. Ho hum...**soft whistling** Let me clean my feet so I won't track muck on my food.....as soon as she fixes it so I can eat....I wish she would hurry up... Good grief, she is such a dim bulb today...but I can do this for a long long time..... It's about time!!!! What is with her lately???...I'd better eat this quick, those other birds are creeping me out with their staring.....

LOL @ "acceptance skills"....what a way to put it! The more noise that is going on, the louder your birds will probably get. Mine love to talk to the tv, the washing machine, the radio...the more noise the happier they are sometimes. If it is quiet for very long they will contact call for me to answer them. It is just the way of the flock. I have found though, that if I can get them before they get too worked up, if I get next to their cage and whisper, they will be quiet as they try to hear what I am saying over the background noise. They look so cute, their little heads tilt to one side and you can just tell they are intently listening. You will eventually get used to it, and won't think it so bad.

Some of my birds don't mind being covered for the car ride, others get mad if they can't watch the scenery go by. :bluebudgie: If you think Luke would be okay without covering him in the cage, then don't cover him. It is really only to keep them calm as it keeps them from seeing what is whizzing by. I usually start with the cage covered as I move them to the car, but once in the car after a few minutes the cover usually gets lifted up so they can see. I think it would be wonderful if you could take him with you for your vacation. I would be particularly careful though, as he will be in a strange place so noises and such he thinks of as normal in his own home may make him jumpy in a new place. I'm guessing his wings are not clipped so be extra vigilant about the goings and comings into the cabin. If he flew out chances of getting him back would be slim as he would be very disoriented. When budgies are like that they fly...straight up. He'd have no frame of reference of where he came from so would most likely fly as high as he could.

I cannot tell you how much I appreciate this post, Terri. My thoughts exactly. No matter what a prospective seller may tell you (the bird must be weaned by the new owner in order to bond...the bird won't become tame unless he is handfed...he needs to learn how to eat birdfood now, don't worry about handfeeding...etc) it is absolutely not true that a budgie must be handfed to become tame. It is also absolutely not true that all birds wean on a schedule (budgies at 6 weeks, cockatiels at 8 weeks, african greys at 16 weeks, etc). I have also been doing a lot of reading about abundance-weaning vs forced-weaning and the emotional ramifications of each. For the larger birds that are as a rule handfed, abundance weaning is by far the better way to go in my opinion. From my own experience with budgies, I can tell you that I did not handfeed baby 1 of the 9 that were bred in my living room. I could pick up any of those babies at will and not be bitten, and they were not afraid. Most of the babies were weaned by 5 weeks, but there was one that was still being parent-fed upon demand at 16 weeks. She could eat on her own, but for some reason still needed that reassurance that on-demand feedings gave her. I would no more have tried to discourage that than I would have expected them to eat on their own at 3 weeks of age. Each bird is different. And if I do say so myself, they were exceptionally tame. I can tell you that Terri has done her homework here. If you are thinking about getting a different breed of bird to add to your flock, please ask the breeder how they were weaned. It is a much more important subject than you think it is. If you don't like the answers, wait and go elsewhere. No matter how much you want that bird.

They are all so lovely! I can tell you for certain that Teahlah is not a green bird. I have a hen that has similar coloring. Here is my humble opinion: Beau: SF dominant pied, skyblue opaline spangle. He is not a greywing. Dekota: type 2 yellowface skyblue spangle. To me Dekota and Teahlah have the same base color. Keely: cobalt opaline spangle. The cheek patches do not look dark enough to have the violet factor. Definitely not mauve - that is a slatey-grey color. Teahlah: type 2 yellowface skyblue. Zanthie: green recessive pied.

You might notice increased chewing behavior...perches, toys, paper, etc. Maybe a little more guarding of the food dishes, LOL. I know estrogen makes me eat more. I had 2 birds that began to get a tan/brown cere at 5 months of age, and the youngest hen from the last clutch still had a whitish-blue cere at 10 months. Hers was not fully brown until she was about a year old. She was surrounded by both sexes, so it wasn't an issue of there being no males around. It was just normal for her to stay a baby for a little longer. The rest were brown around the 6-7 month mark. It very well may be the case your hen is the age you were given.

Shell, usually by 10 months or so. They do not have to be in a breeding situation to have the cere change to brown. What makes the cere brown is the amount of estrogen the bird is producing. Some don't mature until a little later.

The female dilute will have the same cere color changes as all the other mutations. Is it still pink, or is it white?

I'm glad you got some good news, and that the trip to the vet was "uneventful". I know you are glad you took her. She does sound like a really really neat little bird!

I am leaning towards female from your picture. She is cute! The male takes over the feeding duties at about the 3 week mark, so as long as he is with your baby things should be fine. I wouldn't leave her alone in a cage until she has been eating on her own for about 10 days. The baby won't be allowed in the box anymore. If you need to leave her in the cage with mom and dad (if you do not want to temporarily seperate them) then watch carefully so she does not get attacked for trying to go back into the nest box. You may have to seperate mom and dad if this happens, and leave Candy with dad. I'm glad the baby is doing well.

At one time I had 5 males and 6 hens. The only fighting I experienced was between 3 males, and it was not over a female, it was over 1 of the males. If at all possible I would try to keep an even number of birds ( just what you needed, an excuse to get another one right? ) because one bird will invariably get left out or picked on, and not necessarily the odd male (or female). If you must stay with three, I would get 2 males and 1 female, and keep the two males in a cage together and give the female her own space. I have 4 females right now, and can tell you that females really, really need more "personal space". I think 2 females and 1 male would invariably end up with more bickering than you want to listen to.

I am very sorry for your loss. Woopsy was a gorgeous budgie. He may have died from shock. This thread put tears in my eyes as well, but not only for Woopsy and you. Please give your son an extra hug...I don't know how old he is but if old enough to understand Woopsy is not going to wake up I'll bet he feels just awful.

I had to look twice at the wings to check for spangle, as he does look like one at first glance. But to me the wings are edged in yellow like a normal would be and not the other way around. I agree with the opaline, but not sure about the spangle. I think he is green series and not blue. He is lovely!

She does look very dirty. Especially in the last picture, you can see a great contrast between the color of the feathers on her wing and the color of the feathers near her vent. In the first picture the feathers look snow white near the wing, but not on her belly. I'll bet when she lifts her wings over her back for a stretch the ones underneath are bright white. What kind of substrate was in the cages at the pet store? But I don't think I would force a bath on her. For one, if the feathers are stained from the old cage bedding or something like that, it would take a lot of scrubbing to get them clean, and you don't scrub a budgie. At best, I'd offer her some large lettuce leaves in a small dish or on a saucer (or hang them from the cage bars next to her favorite perch) and see if she wants to bathe on her own. If she is not excessively preening I would say the staining doesn't bother her. If you can live with it until her next molt, I would just keep offering opportunities for her to bathe herself, but I would not "bathe" her per se. Her feathers seem to lay fine, and don't look too mussed up. I strongly recommend you finding an avian vet if you don't already have one and taking her in for a "new birdie" checkup during her quarantine. Not only will you hopefully catch any health problems early on, but your vet will have a benchmark of her overall condition should anything happen to her at a later date. It is much easier to get an appointment with a vet who has already seen your bird, rather than with one that hasn't. There isn't so much panic on your part that way either. Her baby bars still appear to be there, so I would guess her age to be somewhere between 8 and 16 weeks. In which case she will begin her baby molt soon and those stained feathers will drop out anyway. She is a pretty girl.

The hen's cere will start to change anywhere from 5-10 months of age. It is dependent upon hormones.

Well, the second day of foraging was most interesting... I only poked two small holes in the paper towel today, and sprinkled a few of the soaked seeds on top of it to remind them what was in there. That was enough for Skittles. I am so proud of her. By the time I got my camera to take pictures, Blossom was thinking about getting into the act. I don't like how the video looks on photobucket, it's pretty jumpy. But you can still see things okay. Blossom commandeered the sprout plate (after Skittles did all the work of course), but Skittles was undaunted in her quest for finding food, so she came back. Blossom half-heartedly tried to guard the food, but foraging was just too much work for her... (Notice Skittles half-hearted 'tail tug' to get Blossom to speed it up and get on out of there. Watch what Blossom does after that. Which is more like Blossom's idea of captive foraging anyway....... ***edit*** Working on a better link... Skittles then took the idea of captive foraging to a whole new level. In her quest for working to get at her food, she was willing to lose her head..... I think I have at least one bird who likes this idea!

I tried putting sprouts in a paper towel today. They were very leery of the folded up white thing, but I set it on a dish and put it where the sprouts usually go. They stared at it for quite some time. And would have none of it. So I put a few small holes in it so they could see the seeds. Still, nothin' doin'. I finally tore open most of the paper towel so practically all the seeds were out in plain site. You guessed it, Skittles made a beeline for the dish. And of course, she can't have all of them, so the rest finally came down and touched, Yes...actually TOUCHED the white thing with the sprouts on it. And proceeded to eat all those soaked seeds. We'll see if I have to make holes in it tomorrow.

All it takes is for one bird to look like they are having a good time with you...then eventually the rest will not be happy with one bird having all the fun. LOL. Good ole' budgie jealousy. I think you will have some success, especially since Sherby is clipped. That really does help in your gaining their trust. They may not all be cuddly, but I have no doubt you can get them all to a level of tameness that you are happy with. It is a wonderful feeling, to be included in the flock. One thing I can recommend though, is to get them used to coming out of the cage on your finger instead of always letting them come out on their own. That has the added benefit of whenever you have to put your hands in the cage, to change food, water, rehang a toy, etc. they won't get upset when your hand is in there, as they will be used to it.