CaspersRose

I had two budgies called Bert and Ernie when I was a kid... they were both lovely green boys and both lived beyond ten years! Welcome to the forum, you'll learn a lot here!

well i got carrot and i made it into a short perch........but my budgies never touch it Hehe... good idea.. Smokey does like his calcium perch, and a carrot would be roughly the same thickness and colour... I wonder if he'd notice?!

I will keep that in mind... thanks. He won't be getting it every day anyway. Today, while he was playing on his playgym on the other side of the room, I took out the munched on spinach stalks and replaced it with a branch of broccoli in the hope that he will just go back to the same spot and much without noticing I've changed the veggies! Hehe... gotta ba cunning to get the kids to eat their veggies! Next item on the cunning vegetable menu will be carrot. I am thinking of just using the peeler to get it into thin slivers and pegging it in the veggie spot... besides grating are there any other handy ways people serve carrot?!

Ah, I will give that a go too! Thanks!

My boy has just developed an appreciation for baby spinach leaves. He is also fed broccoli and a vairety of sporouts - snow pea sprouts seem to be his favourite, but I've also tried mung beans and alfalfa. Looking at your list I noticed lettuce was there. I believe lettuce can cause problems like diarrhoea due to its high water content and should be used very sparingly if at all.

I have been attempting to get Smokey eating his veggies since I got him. I've mainly been sticking with one type of vegetable for a week or so at a time and so far all he'll touch has been the grasses I bring home from my walks and even then, he only eats the stalks within an hour or so pulls them out of their bunch, throwing them onto the floor of his cage and inevitably pooing all over them! I've gone through so many carrots and broccoli trees, all to no avail! Anyway, last night we had a salad for dinner, the base of which was baby spinach, so this morning I pegged a little bunch of the spinach leaves into his cage and I have just noticed that he is actually eating them! Yay! I will stick with this for a week or so before tyring to intorduce something new, but hopefully htis marks the beginning of an interest in things other than seeds for Smokey! It seems that this is co-insiding with a newfound appreciation of water and bathing, so maybe he is just growing up a bit and is a bit more willing to try new things... Here's a bit of photographic evidence... it's not a great shot, but I had to be sneaky and try to get it while he wasn't looking otherwise he would dash off and pretend he didn't like veggies!

That's awsome!

gorgeous... Love his name!!

Very cool! Name suggention: Spike and Milligan!

18

Surely there are going to be some things that cannot take those energy saver bulbs, like the lights in ovens, and those IXL bathroom fans etc. Would any of these types of bulbs work in a hospital box?

Those pics are really helpful, Pearce... even for a non-breeder who's just curious!

Definitely!

isn't it amazing the size difference in just a day or two!

We just did it for the savage ones... the ones hard enough that you pretty involuntarily pull your hand back! I think our budgie who had biting problems had two different bites... the affectionate/curious nibble and the savage "I want to hurt you" bite. We just responded to these nasty ones. He quickly learnt what degree of nibbling was acceptable. As long as you're pretty consistent with which bites get punished and which don't he will hopefully learn soon enough. If the blowing is awkward, a little shake of the hand he's sitting on can also work... just enough for him to lose his balance a little, not fall off completely! The idea is to create an unpleasant experience immediately following the unwanted behaviour. So it is a two-part thing 1) unpleasant experience immediately after the bite (blow or shake) so he doesn't want to do it again, followed by 2) removal from the fun activity (interaction with you) to teach him that you don't want to play with him when he's like that. Once he associates these with his biting you should start to notice a reduction. Good luck!

Hi and welcome! I certainly agree with you in the great website department. Everyone here is really helpful and friendly... I am not particularly knowlegdeable when it comes to colours and mutations, but I can offer a tip for the nibbling. I had a budgie when I was a kid who was a biter. He was happy to be handled, but would just get a bit rough. We used to just say a firm "no", blow a little puff or air at him them (just enough that it made him blink... not blow him off our fingers!) put him straight back into his cage with the door shut for a fw minutes (like using time out for naughty kids!). Within a few weeks we just needed to say "no" with a little puff, then after that he responded to a sharp "no" quite well. There are probably many things which use the same principle of training the bird to respond to certian verbal cues to control behaviour. You might find something that works better for your family, and I am sure there are plenty of people here who have also managed to curb a biting budgie!

Oh AV, i really hope things look up for you soon. You are being very brave :hi:

I'm so sorry to hear you news...

Thanks Pearce!

Questions from a member who knows little about hatching eggs... You mentioned a double yolker... 1) are double yolkers common? 2) are they ever/often fertile? 3) if fertile is it likely either or both chicks survive? 4) if both chicks survive, would they technically be considered twins?

Here, I got a photo of Cosmo's weird eating habit: It's nowhere near as funny as Maxie though! I think it's a good thing that I don't have Maxie- she would develop a complex because I would be laughing hysterically at her every time I saw her eating! Haha... Smokey is similar with his oats... I find that the corner of his cage below his seed bowl is always piled with his oat hulls... but not the husks of any of the other seeds! I wonder what it is about the oats?

If you don't want to test it out on your own budgie, someone has already done it for you! Check this out:

He looks like he's wearing army camouflage! You could have named him Commando!

yellow? hehe sorry, I couldn't help myself... I know nothing about genetics! Someone more knowledgeable will be able to give you a serious answer!