Rainbow

Hi Charlotte and welcome! It is true that a brown cere on a male could be a sign of a testicular tumor. Has the cere always been dark blue, or was it a lighter blue? In the first picture you posted, a good case could be made for the blue on the cere being of an out of condition hen, as it's not a very dark blue. But that could be because of the flash too. If you are certain you have a male, I think a visit to an avian vet would be in order. Do you have an avian vet near you? A regular vet I don't think would be versed enough in avian medicine to want to do all the bloodwork, etc., but you never know. Has his beak always been overgrown? Do his nails grow too fast also? Nails and beaks that grow too fast is one sign of trouble with the liver, or also due to malnutrition since you say he's only eaten seed up until recently. You should never have to trim the beak of a healthy budgie. Seven is getting up there in age for most budgies, and I think most of them don't make it that far so you are lucky in that respect. I am definitely not a vet, so take this with a grain of salt ( ), but I would lean more toward dietary deficiencies or some other cause because I think tumors tend to grow and spread quickly. But I don't know that for certain. In my experience they have. He really does look like a hen in both pictures. He is a lovely shade of blue, and he looks to still have that sparkle in his eye. I believe you when you say he is happy. He looks like he's smiling in that second closeup of the head.

Oh, England... well okay then... (LOL I'm only kidding - no offense to those in Britain.) I really like him, Daz. But he is also about 2" bigger than our little guys. He seems to have a little extra padding through the chest too. Not nearly as much as Sky though. pavariangoo - they don't get much millet and have never had a honey stick. They only eat organic foods with very little seed, so that isn't the problem. But thanks for the reply.

Name: (front to back) Blossom, Mystery, Skittles Sex: Females Color: Skyblue Other Mutations: Blossom/Mystery - greywing, type 2 yellowface, opaline Skittles - pied, partial clearwing Name: Rainbow Sex: Male Color: Mauve Other Mutations: Dilute, Clearflight, Opaline, Type 2 Goldenface, Pied Name: Sunny Sex: Male Color: Cobalt Other Mutations: Doublefactor Dominant Pied, Clearflight

I didn't see this one, and it was leaving two of my girls out.... Name: Blossom Sex: Female Color: Skyblue Other Mutations: Type 2 Yellowface, Opaline Name: Mystery Sex: Female Color: Skyblue Other Mutations: Type 2 Yellowface, Opaline

Fun! Name: Crystal Color: Skyblue Other Mutations: Pied, Clearwing Name: Patches Color: Cobalt Other Mutations: Pied, Clearflight, Opaline Name: Rainbow Color: Mauve Other Mutations: Pied, Clearflight, Opaline, Type 2 Goldenface

okay, I'll do this right. Name: Rainbow Sex: Male Color: Mauve Other Mutations: Clearflight, Dilute, Opaline, Type 2 Goldenface Name: Skittles Sex: Female Color: Skyblue Other Mutations: Type 2 Yellowface/Goldenface, Clearwing (incomplete dominant) Name: Blueberry Sex: Female Color: Violet Factor Skyblue Other Mutations: Clearflight, Opaline Name: Patches Sex: Female Color: Cobalt Other Mutations: Dilute, Clearflight, Opaline, possible violet factor Name: Sunny Sex: Male Color: Cobalt Other Mutations: Yellowface, Doublefactor Dominant Pied, Clearflight Name: Cloud Sex: Male Color: Skyblue Other Mutations: Doublefactor Dominant Pied, Clearflight Name: Arctic (with Blueberry) Sex: Male Color: Violet Factor Skyblue Other Mutations: None Visible Name: Sky Sex: Female Color: Skyblue Other Mutations: Opaline, Clearflight, Possible violet factor

She is dominant pied, and dilute. As far as clearflight, is her tail white? Clearflights will have white flights and a white tail. If she has white flights and a colored tail, she is whitewing/clearwing. Anything less than normal intensity has some degree of dilution to it, or it would be of normal intensity.

Are we all talking about the same type of bird here? A healthy, smaller-type American budgie will weigh in around 30-34 grams. Daz, I hate to say it, but a 180 gram budgie is unimaginable to me. You are almost talking the weight of Timneh African Greys there! I know the show budgies are a bit heavier, but I thought they were the ones that weighed in at 50 grams. For comparison, one of my hens is very, very much overweight. She has fat pads not only on her chest, but also on her lower abdomen and across the back. She is about 7 1/2 inches long, which is average to slightly above -average length for them, and weighs 52 grams. I have done about everything imaginable to bring her weight down, and have been marginally successful, as she did weigh in at 56 grams at one time. I will post her picture so you will know what I think of when I hear of a 52 gram budgie. And please don't tell me how awful it is that she was allowed to get this big. It was not because she eats too much, and I am not going to go into it. She is a bit fluffy in this picture, but is still definitely a big bird. Can you imagine what she would look like with an extra 100 grams packed on her? Multiply her size already by 3 to get a 150 gram budgie. I think she would explode before she could gain that much. All kidding aside, she would most probably die before she could gain that much weight. She would probably die before she could add even another 15 grams. She certainly wouldn't be able to fly or move around much at all, which thankfully she can still fly amazingly well. She just chooses not to. My other birds look fine, sometimes even thin, but if you palpate their bodies, you can tell they are all carrying some extra weight. You cannot always tell just by looking at a bird whether they are carrying too much weight. But if you can see that "spare tire" around the chest or abdomen, they most certainly are already past the "overweight" stage, no matter what the scale says.

Good luck Nerwen. I'm finding lately that rearranging the cage doesn't work as well anymore. It has just gotten the birds more comfortable with change. **sigh** This is a good thing, I know, but still...... It used to work fine, now it just seems like they all check out the cages, decide where they want to stake territory (ie which toys look best today or which dish has the best looking food in it) and get on with being their little birdie selves.

LOL, yep - "that spot where you are sitting looks better than this one. MOVE!!" Or better still..."this is now my cage. All the rest of you can just leave. NOW!!" Competition for something.

***pppssssttttt...I have some inside budgies...*** When they start that noise, are there any other signs of aggression? Like competition for a toy or perching spot, or fresh food or a treat? Mine will do that only when in competition for something. And yes, competition does include the attention of another bird. Usually it doesn't last very long. If yours are doing it for long periods of time, you might have an unhappy camper who is dissatisfied with something. Has anything around the cage changed?

Maybe so. I know the picture of Mystery is a yellowface type 2. The yellow on her face and mask is the same shade of yellow behind her head. The yellow on Rainbow is much deeper on the face than elsewhere on the body (even the back of his head was lighter than his face), hence my thought of goldenface. Does the bird in the picture you put up have the same shade of yellow behind the head too? It does seem a deeper shade of yellow than Mystery. I would still call it a type 2 though, whether goldenface or yellowface.

You can't really tell with the biting. My males all bite much harder than the females do. The females will occasionally give a little nip, but the males will hang on and grind your flesh to bits without letting go. ouch.

Nerwen, you've lost me...

rainbow most birds in the uk are small the same size as the so called american budgie you mainly see the larger birds from people who show ie exhibtion not english i have never seen a exhibition size budgie in a pet shop im saying you dont get them but they are rare to find so we cant really call them english if it has to do with size Exhibition sized are rare here too, but when we have them they are sold as English budgies. At the birds fairs I go to also, the large ones are sold as English, small ones have no distinction in name - just called budgies. its certainly not to do with size hath, maybe that means you have American budgies over there in your pet stores? :ausb:

I thought the goldenface was a deeper yellow in the face compared to any yellow on the rest of the body...?? So that would make type 1's having yellow face and obviously blue body, with no bleed-through, type 2's having bleed-through, and goldenface (type one or two) having a deeper yellow (hence gold) on the face as opposed to elsewhere. Using my birds as an example, Sunny, Mystery, Blossom, are type 2 yellowfaces, and Rainbow (possibly Skittles too) was a type 2 goldenface. Does everyone find this wrong? type 2 goldenface: Skittles only because the yellow on the front of her face is so much deeper than the yellow on her pied spot and in the wings. Rainbow, because the yellow in his mask was so much deeper than the yellow on the rest of his body: type 2 yellowface: another type 2 yellowface: This one you can see how Skittles face is a deeper yellow than Sunny's, and Sunny is yellow all over. The next shows the difference in yellow between Skittles and Blossom. Am I confused, or does anyone else see possible goldenface vs. yellowface? Daz, this would make 4 types of yellowface. :ausb:

You don't want to breed one of those. :hap: Bea is right, they don't live long, they also can't fly and have many health issues. It is not something you try to breed on purpose.

Daz, that hen looks like my Crystal. What nice pied babies we could get - probably some rainbows too. :ausb: I didn't realize you had so many birds. How many do you have now?

OMG he looks like Crystal!!! What a cutie! I really like the "eating" picture. What he's really saying is "Mine!" And looking cute while doing it, I must add. :ausb:

Well, it makes sense if you think about it. :ausb: Saying that the exhibition birds have been 'bred up' to meet the standard that was chosen and that they have been bred for different purposes is probably accurate. Most of the "American" or 'pet' quality American budgies I see do not have big spots, or big heads, or do not have the straighter stance of the birds I see in pictures of "champion budgies". They are smaller, have less rounded heads, some have dropped tails, small spots, or whatever would disqualify them from the standard, but make perfect pets for those that have no desire to show. I happened to like the comparison about all dogs being of the genus canis but having several hundred varieties. Granted, there are not several hundred varieties of budgies, but I can see the similarities in the comparison.

Hath, I think it's mainly size. The larger budgies, whether pet quality or exhibition quality, are referred to as "English" over here. The smaller version (which is more common here) is what is referred to as "American" budgies. I agree they are all the same bird, and the comparison with canines makes sense to me as far as the differentiation goes. I don't agree with the quote that they are mistakenly called parakeets. They ARE parakeets, which are then subdivided further into the grouping of budgerigar. They are also parrots. shant, if you want "English" budgies, best start off with a pair of "English" budgies.

All green babies, split for blue. :ausb:

Females sing too.

I must not be using it right. I plugged in what I thought Rainbow and Skittles were, but didn't end up with what I actually ended up with ( if that makes sense... )

If one of the green spangles parents was blue.. then you would know for sure that it was split for blue. If one of the green spangles parents are split for blue - they could still pass the blue gene on to some of their babies.. but there would be no way of knowing which babies got it - even if you knew for sure that one of the green spangle's parents was split for blue. Basically, what I'm saying is that the baby green spangle is probably not split for blue.. so yes.. you would get greens if you evenutally bred it with a blue bird. However all of their hypothetical babies would be split for blue because on of the parents would have been blue. Kirby, being split to blue means that the bird is capable of producing blue young even though he or she is visibly green. A blue bird is not split to blue, it is blue. When a bird is split to something, it means when combined with the right genes it will produce whatever it is 'split' to. The split part is recessive, or hidden. For example, let's use the colors blue and green. G is for Green which is dominant, b is for blue, which is recessive to green. A normal green bird is GG, a normal blue bird is bb. If you mate the green to the blue, you get Gb, which is a visually green bird, but carries a gene for blue. If you mate that Gb bird to a blue bird (bb) you will get some birds that are Gb (green) and some that are bb (blue). The bb birds will only produce blue birds when mated with other blue birds, because that recessive b gene is the only color gene they have to give. The green birds which are split to blue have 2 possible color genes to give off. Does that make sense?