Smudgie

Mine have done that too. Just laying eggs on the floor. It's a shame you have received some "rolling eye" responses. It makes me not want to ask questions when I think I might get an eyeroll response. Because I truly want the information!There was only ONE rolling eye response...........and the rest very valid answers. Thanks - true. I just happened to have been browsing the forum and caught a lot of eye rolls over various different threads and they kind of merged into one! Just ETA though - Whenever I see an 'eyeroll' at a question I would have asked myself - it truly DOES make me think twice before asking a question. I may be the only one - or there may be others who also decide not to bother asking a possibly "obvious" or dare I say "silly" question in case they are dismissed. I come here to learn and to find ways of best caring for my birds (well - my son's birds) and most of the time people are fantastic but a few times I have had unpleasant responses. But anyway... as I said - most of the time people are great!

What a beautiful bird. I am so sorry to hear that he died.

Mine have done that too. Just laying eggs on the floor. It's a shame you have received some "rolling eye" responses. It makes me not want to ask questions when I think I might get an eyeroll response. Because I truly want the information!

I'm so sorry about your budgie. That swelling looks exactly like the tumour my son's budgie had. http://forums.budgiebreeders.asn.au/index....1&hl=fizzer I was absolutely shocked at how fast it appeared and with no warning signs!

Some people here know all about my son's lovely little budgie Fizzer, who passed away last year during surgery to remove a tumour on his wing. The Lort Smith animal hospital was absolutely magnificent and they treated little Fizzer like he was gold. They were also wonderful with my son and the lovely chaplain phoned him to offer support and condolences. http://forums.budgiebreeders.asn.au/index....1&hl=fizzer Our family received a lovely letter from Lort Smith last week inviting us to a Memorial Service for all people who have lost their pets during the past year. I thought of this forum and how many people in Melbourne might want to remember their beloved bird (or other pet) The service is to be held at Lort Smith Animal Hospital North Melbourne at 10am on Saturday 2nd May. People are invited to bring a photograph of their pet. Friends are welcome but they do want people to call and RSVP. If you would like to attend please call the chaplain Barbara Allen on 9321 7216 by Friday 1 May.

Wow that flooding is terrible! We've only ever had minor damage to our home from flooding but it was so destructive and it required a lot of work to clean up. those poor people! I used to live in Canada. I hate snow!

I'd never heard of a Quaker parrot until I read this post the other day, then just today I read - on a forum that has absolutely nothing to do with birds - about a Quaker parrot who saved a child from choking by alerting its owner. What a nice coincidence!

What a great story! http://www.theage.com.au/world/hero-willie...90325-9ajr.html

No sorry I didn't go into detail about that because it was in the article. But Lort Smith didn't actually make anything out of the incident as they were only compensated for the cost of euthanasia. My son has had one of his budgies euthanased there and they charge a lot less than a local vet AND they have a couple of absolutely awesome vets who have avian specialisation. It's only *my* personal opinion, but I think since they are the organisation that treated the injured bird and they are a struggling charity, it would have been more appropriate to order that the $500 went to them. JMHO

Vale Sue and Bob The owners of Diamond Creek Pet Shop who perished in the Feb 7 Bushfires Sue was a great lover of animals. In testimony to her passion for animal welfare, she did not ever sell kittens or puppies and wouldn't accept unwanted litters. They specialised in fish and aquarium supplies, reptiles and small birds. She only ever kept a very small stock of budgies and canaries and made sure their cages were never overcrowded. They had a lovely selection of bird treats and pet supplies and stocked HUGE flight cages which they sold at a cheap enough price that it encouraged people to buy a massive cage for only a couple of birds. Once my son went to purchase a budgie (she had three in stock at the time) and when he brought it home he realised it would be lonely in quarantine until he could put it in with his other budgies - so he went back and bought another of their budgies. Then he realised that the remaining budgie would be lonely on its own in the shop so he went back to buy it too! Sue was so touched by his thoughtfulness that she gave him the budgie for half price and a huge 5 kilo bag of seed for his new family. Sue was always happy to put up "lost and found" notices and was responsible for many happy reunions between pets and their families. On more than one occasion, she reunited my son with a lost budgie. She was a bright and bubbly person who adored animals and was always concerned with their care. She was knowledgeable about all the animals she worked with and was always happy to offer advice and never afraid to say "I don't know, we need to check with the vet" We went to Sue and Bob's Memorial Service today. They will be sadly missed.

It's disgusting that people can be allowed to get away with such terrible acts. I do believe things are changing though and animal cruelty is being treated more seriously. Maybe society is becoming more aware of the link (which you pointed out) between animal cruelty and cruelty to other humans as well. You may not have seen this story since you are not in Melbourne, but I was glad to see that even though someone was under severe stress at the time of harming an animal, they were still held to account for their actions. http://www.theage.com.au/national/pigeon-p...81009-4xbp.html The one thing that annoys me in the outcome of the story is that the animal was treated at the Lort Smith Hospital but the judge sentenced him to make a donation to the RSPCA. Lort Smith is an absolutely wonderful animal charity and is terribly overlooked. I can't understand why he was not made to donate to Lort Smith instead.

Oh I totally agree! I think that the wild lorikeets probably just "put up with" Oliver rather than actually befriend him because he wasn't competing for the same food and he was no threat. Even though they can be quite vicious if they set their minds to it, I think it's more of a defence mechanism rather than an attack response. In the end, the person who found Oliver actually rescued him from the beak of an attacking magpie. All his Rainbow Lorikeet "friends" had nicked off when the magpie came and he immediately targeted the odd one out. Just lucky the man came home at that exact moment and was able to save the little budgie. Oliver went on to live another 4 years! As much as I love the Rainbow Lorikeets for helping shield a little blue budgie from predators for so long, I still wouldn't trust them!

You're right! Quite a lot of people ran for cover when the rain started at the MCG but thousands of others opened their arms and danced in the rain! It was lovely to see (although I was glad to be in an undercover seat just the same!)

Nevermind Dr Nat, I won't bother :sad: LILBABYBUDGIES it's great that you are trying to help an orphaned animal.

Oh GREAT idea! That's so cute and such an easy thing to do.

He's a great boy GB. I am very proud of him. The memorial service for Sue from the Diamond Creek Pet Shop will be held next Tuesday and my son wants to go. He said he's going to bring a couple of his budgies as well, in their travelling cage because he knows Sue would have loved to have pets there at her service. I just don't know how I'm going to face it. I'm tearing up right now just thinking about it. I have two funerals to attend this weekend as well

Unfortunately, a lot of people DON'T "instinctively know what to do" when it comes for caring for animals. An example of this appears in this very topic where the OP asks if it is okay to put budgies and ducklings together. My son volunteers at the Donkey Shelter. They are always rescuing donkeys from situations of neglect or poor management because people don't know what to do and don't know how to care for their animals properly. A classic example is people feeding bread to their animals. A lot of people think it's okay to feed bread to animals when it is not. People think it's okay to put different types of animals together when it is not. People think if an animal is cuddly and affectionate it has been tamed when in fact it could just be very sick. During the recent heatwave a tiny ringtail possum walked right down out of a tree and approached my son who had some watermelon. This was a wild animal in a desperate situation, however it's "friendliness" shouldn't be mistaken for "tameness", however other people who were around believed the animal to be "tame and affectionate" when it was not. Just because people mean well, doesn't mean they have an instinctive ability to care for other species. You yourself said that even some humans have difficulty caring for their OWN young!

We "babysat" a friend's rainbow lorikeets when they evacuated due to the fires. They have beaks like razor blades! She showed me a scar where one of her birds "playfully" bit her finger right down to the bone. There's no way we would have had them near the budgies if they were close enough to bite. On the other hand, when one of our budgies escaped, he was found by someone who said the budgie seemed to have befriended the lorikeets and was hanging around with a flock of rainbows. We did recapture the budgie but he had caught some disease when he was on the loose. I wouldn't take the chance of putting them in together.

I was at the Sound Relief Concert when the rain bucketed down. It was ironic that it had to be on THAT particular day, but it was so wonderful. Just what we needed to extinguish the last of the fires.

I'm sure it is! In Diamond Creek we normally have thousands of short beaked corellas but in the fortnight after the fires they all but completely disappeared! And we were seeing a lot of birds that are normally seen further up towards St Andrews - many black cockatoos and some other birds that I didn't recognise (I must find my bird book to remember what they are) A friend in Strathewen said that virtually all the birds had disappeared in the first week after the fire. She also said that they actually saw birds literally dropping out of the sky as the fire came closer and the radiant heat was too much for the smaller animals. The birds are starting to return to their home bases now that shoots are reappearing. Also as soon as they were allowed to return to their areas, many locals started scattering seed and putting out water to encourage the birds to return.

Hi Shawna. I had no idea about all you had gone through. I came to the forums relatively recently and only get an occasional chance to stop by. I just read Lucas' story from your first post and I can't imagine what you have been through. Your courage (all of you) is so inspiring. I totally agree with you about the wonderful work done by the Childrens' Hospitals, wherever they may be. My little one was in BC Children's Hospital when we lived in Vancouver I totally credit them with saving his life and my sanity! I still wipe away a tear whenever I think of how heartwrenching it is to have a child in hospital with a serious illness. I will keep you all in my thoughts and send a secular prayer that your sweet boy has a long, happy and healthy life.

Really? I never knew that. Thanks for the warning!

We lost all the fish in our pond on that 47 degree day. But thanks to my son's sheer dedication and determination, all his 10 budgies survived. One was easy to look after because he was in quarantine in a small cage so we just brought him inside but the other 9 were in an aviary outside. We don't have aircon so the house was still hot but it was at least a bit easier to manage away from the searing hot winds. My son got a wool blanket and soaked it in cold water then hung it on the side of the aviary to catch the wind. The blanket was dry within 5 minutes so he kept up this procedure for hours until he was almost dropping with heat exhaustion. The aviary is just the exact size of out back door and it can be moved if necessary so in the end we actually removed the door from its hinges and manhandled the aviary into the laundry, through the house to the coolest part of the house (which was "only" about 40 degrees) and we were able to set up a fan and some dripping water in a plastic container with tiny holes poked in it. The budgies were so happy! I'm really proud of my son - he worked so hard to look after his budgies. (I helped of course but he was the real hero!)

Hey MB I think I saw you when I was working at the relief centre! I work for the YMCA and I normally teach out of DCCC so I was working there every day, helping with whatever was needed.

I haven't logged on here for ages but since today is one of my first quiet days in a long time... I am also in Diamond Creek. My son was devastated at the death of Sue, the lovely woman who owned and ran the Diamond Creek Pet Shop, where he stopped by every Friday on his way home from school to buy his bird seed and budgie supplies. On that horrifically hot Saturday, my 12 year old son spent the whole day working at keeping his budgies alive. He took a soaking wet wool blanket and hung it on the side of his outdoor aviary to catch the wind, and had to keep wetting the blanket down every few minutes because the searing hot winds were drying it as fast as he could pour more water on it. In the end, we decided we had to get the budgies into the house, which meant taking the back door off its hinges to get the cage inside! He managed to keep them all alive. I'm really proud of him. The terrible news of the death toll started trickling in on Sunday morning. I was working on the Diamond Creek Relief Centre every day since Sunday 8th Feb and one by one, people I knew from the local community and beyond started coming in, all with stories of horror at the things they had seen. A very dear friend from Strathewen managed to get out alive with her husband and two young children after sheltering in their burning house, which exploded around them. At the relief centre, it was heartening to see such an outpouring of community support. The government departments were all falling over themselves to be more important than each other, but the real heroes of the operation were the people from local communities who rallied together to help each other. The weather forecast for next week is frightening and people are not even wondering whether to stay - they are just getting the *** out and trying to save their lives. I hope next week is boring and uneventful. It's been so terrible around here. Everyone in this community knows someone who lost their home and most people know someone who was killed.