Dave_McMinn

You stole my thunder!!!!!!!!! Breed her with an Albino cock if you want Albino young. Nothing else with give you albino's.

1 month to 6 weeks is what I have used before. Better to extend then shorten - always!!!!!

i cannot call a lutino apple. Not right. I can not call it delicious - the last thing i want to encourage is it to be eaten. They are magnificent looking birds Jimmy. I have to seriously evaluate some other birds now.

Not sure where you are seeing apple. The only thing is those cages are birds, newpaper, seed and water with sparks, soon to change to doxy

Not good photos. i need to buy showacages for that, but here is their current situation Everyone in their cages Boys cage 1 - 5 cocks Boys cage 2 - 5 cocks Boys cage 3 - 5 cocks Boys cage 4 - 4 cocks Girls cage 1 - 5 hens Girls cage 2 - 5 hens better photos will come - might get some show cages tomorrow, depending on time, so stay tuned

Well I am home and all the birds are settling in. Most travelled well, but a few were a bit stressed and one lutino has a broken feather. She seems well and is eating, so I am not overly concerned. Yes, there were 29 birds. 10 hens and 19 cocks. They are in 6 cages, with 2 cages of 5 hens, 3 cages of 5 cocks, and 1 cage of 4 cocks All seemd pleased to eat normal seed and drink water. There is sparks in the water, so that should help them. They will all undergo doxy treatment soon as well. Pics are uploading to photobucket so they will have to be added tomorrow

Renee, thank you for those beautiful words. It was nice to meet you. Thank you for welcoming me into your home and showing me your birds. Trish, thank you for the nice words. Preparation is always the key to success. Far too often I have learnt that lesson through hindsight.

welcome to the forum.. Nice bird

I think that the hen is a YF mauve and he is a sky blue grey wing, though it is hard to tell from here. If you bred then you would get all blues, with 50% yellowface

okay, a lot to say, here we go. 1. Don't breed siblings. It will only lead to problems. 2. Only you can tell if your eggs are fertile. We cannot see them. Did you candle them as suggested? 3. Don't ever just take out one cock and put in another cock. The hen can often feel defensive, and kill the cock to protect the nest she thinks she has established. 4. You were asked what your breeding set up is like but there was no response and no picture. You ask for help but refuse to provide info that is requested. By answering our questions, we can help you more, and provide the best situation for your budgies. That is ultimately why we are all here.

Hi Dave, what a wonderful trip indeed! I can't wait to see photo's. I was just wondering, when you undertake such a trip, how do you put quarantine procedures in place? Having so many birds from so many places, although I doubt coming from such esteemed breeders as you have purchased from that anything would be wrong. Do you have lots of travel boxes and how will you quarantine at home? I hope I am not being intrusive, it is just that to obtain better birds myself travel is necessary also and it would be handy to know how you have done it for my reference. So sorry to hear about your hen also. Thanks, Trish. Not an intrusive question at all Trish, a perfect question to raise really. In an ideal situation, you would keep the birds from one breeder quarantine away from the birds from another breeder. However when you are travelling, that is not possibled. To overcome this, there are some procedures and methods you can use to put in place. 1. Eternal Vigilance - you need to keep a close eye on your birds before they travel. Any bird that looks like it has any sign of illness, you need to isolate from the others. I had a mauve hen who appeared to be regurgitating and had a slightly pooey bottom, a few days before travelling. We seperated her, treated her with meds, but alas, it did not help. She died, but what she had, she died with. No others were affected due to the seperation. 2. Birds will stress when you move them. When they stress they get weaker and then diseases that they carry such as Megabacteria can flare and kill them. Every bird carries mega, no bird is immune from it. I was speaking to Kaz this morning who used the HIV/AIDS analogy. Megabacteria is a little like HIV. Birds carry it and it will not kill them. But they get weaker and it changes to AIDS and they have very limited time to survive. So how do you avoid your birds getting weaker? Prior to travel I use a product called Sparks. It is made by Vetafarm. You add it to the birds water. It increases the electrolytes the bird has to help keep it strong. I like to think of it as budgie Gatorage - 3. Quarantining your birds away from your flock - when you do return home with your birds, you need to employ the strictest quarantine treatment for yournew birds. They should be an absolute minimum 10 metres away from your birds. I personally think there should not be a direct line of sight as certain feather/dust diseases can travel on the wind. Treat all your birds with a comprehensive quarantine routine. There are many of these on the forum you can refer to. If you are not sure, do a search. I will use doxy as adivsed by me vet at consultation through my avain vet before I actually came to Perth, I will do the basic worm and lice treatment (though later in the aviary I am going to test this new Aloe Vera treatment a breeder I met told me about) as well as giving each bird the basic drop of ivermectin. Even though I have quarantined birds before, i will still do a search and get further information from others. No one knows it all. As is often discussed, time is important in the quarantine as well. You should quarantine for an absolute minimum of 30 days, but you are much better off going for 6-7 weeks. The temptation to cut it short is massive. Fight that temptation. That is just some initial thoughts off the top of my head, with help from thoughts from inside Kaz's head. I will post more later.

As Kaz has said, my grey hen is dead. Sad that she is dead, even worse since it is a hen, but imagine how I would have felt if she had of been exposed to my Cec Gearing or Henry George/Fran McLaughlan. I would have been devastated. BudgieBuyer09 - I have bought a bird of a breeder you bought bird off. It went down ill after only a day, and it was quarantined seperately. It lasted 3 weeks with meds and hospitalisation before it keeled over. Whatever he died of may well be hidden in birds you bought from him. I understand you thinking, your desire to have them down breeding, the fact that you have bought them from show breeders, and all the points you have made. Caution should be employed here. I would hate to see you lose any birds after the effort you have put in so far.

Do I need to be the respondee to my own incredibly thoughtful and incisive comments? Why, yes I do!!!! Another great day for everyone but my wallet. Again it suffered due to my greed and willingness to purchase small fluffy friends. Today I had the privelege to go to the home of Cec and Brenda Gearing. What a beautiful house they have. Before I even talk about the birds, let me wax lyrical about the incredible job Cec has done in the construction of this home, the beautiful artwork of Brenda, the welcoming nature of both of them, and the sheer hospitality they showed us throughout lunch, afternoon tea, in fact, the whole afternoon. They are such lovely people. It was a pleasure to meet them and talk with them. Now, as for birds, they have wonderful birds of the highest quality as we all know. It is great to see Cec surprise himself sometimes when he comes across a bird that is of a superior quality than he thought he had bred that year. Amazing chicks everywhere to see. As we concluded our aviary tour, Karen broke the ice, asking Cec what we hens he had that were available. I already had a testosterone imbalance so I needed oestrogen, and fast. Birds people, birds. At first Cec thought he had nothing for us, but after some questioning, some furrowed brows and some thought provoking staring, Cec gathered a few birds up individually for us to assist him with checking the ring numbers. In the end, I was able to obtain 3 excellent hens. The first, an 07 opaline, grey green cinnamon. Nice head and general width on her. pics to come tomorrow The 2nd, an 06 Lutino. Her brother came 4th and 5th at the Nationals in recent years, so not only is she a good bird, she has good genes. The 3rd is a young bird, born october 08. She is a grey green spangle Not too much to look at at the moment, but Cec put her full brother from a previous clutch in the show cage next to her and he was magnificent. We pretended to bid on him, but even Cec laughed at our suggestions. Cec thinks he might go to Nationals. Amazing looking 08 cock bird. This little hen will not be as good as him, but she has a long way to go herself and she has great blood lines. So 3 Cec Gearing hens to go with the magnificent 2 boys I got on Sunday. 5 Cec gearing birds is amazing, and combined with the other birds I have bought, I am very very very very very very very very lucky. Kaz did not leave empty handed, although this time she was kind enough to enable me to leave with more hens than her. Kaz purchased an 07 yellow faced grey hen. Lovely bird. Cec bought the father of karen's hen for $2200. Karen got a great deal paying only half that - ha ha ha. Ken did not think that joke was funny either the first time I used it on him. Bit of sad news. My grey/mauve opaline hen has not been good. She was regurgitating, had a pooey bum and recently started salivating from her beak . She obviously had an illness when she was purchased, and will not be joining my birds tomorrow on the flight home. We have dicsussed this with the people she was purchased from and as such, she will be returned tomorrow. Overall, it has been a great time here in Perth. I thoroughly recommend a week here at Chateau Morgan. Come, stay, buy some birds. I did. Loved it. p.s at the beginning of a thread by Liv I mentioned that I would not beat her record of 19 birds. That is true in a way. I did not beat it - I crushed it into the ground. I think I am at 27. Hard to keep count. Ran out of fingers and toes. Anyway, pics will come later, if not tomorrow, then definitely by the end of the week as they all settle into Wattle Flights. Fare thee well Perth people. I am done!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I do not know why you were hiding inside with all those hard bodied firemen at your house. As a straight man, they do nothing for me, but if I was to turn..................................

I concur

I do apprecitate the point you are trying to make. I am an IT teacher and I have a little knowledge of the internet and the world wide web myself. Of course, if a person "lifts"one of my photos and uses it without asking me permission, then they misinterpret what is meant by my photo, not only is it their own fault, but they deserve to suffer as they have broken a major international law to "lift"my photo. I may have posted my photo on an internationally viewed forum, but my photo is still mine under the Copyright Act. Whilst you are correct I could have been a little more helpful, it is not my place to assist those that would seek to pirate my work. It is a shame that you did not like Jerry Seinfeld. I mean, he was a very famous comedian for many years before his sitcom was made, after which he became a household name. His show was syndicated earning him millions, it has gone on to gross even more on DVD, where it has become one of the most successful and highest grossing TV box set DVD's in history. Not everyone has to like the same thing. Always tough being in the minority though. I remember that saying. I always heard it from the people who had the worst senses of humour and just could not see the humour in any situation. I wonder if you could apply that saying to all walks of life. Proctology is the lowest form of medicine. Pop-up stories are the lowest form of literature. Thumb wrestling is the lowest form of combat. Well, since you detected the sarcasm, I suppose the only positive to come out of this is that you are clear of dementia. It is alright, no need to thank me for the free check-up - As for my day, I lost the plot and bought too many wonderful birds. I suppose I am rarely going to get the chance to buy such high quality birds as such low prices. The only problem when you get these great birds is that you want to breed the next generation of birds, I go ..."what do I put with such great birds? I cannot improve on that!! Anyway, pics to come soon. Off to Cec Gearing's today. No more birds today (I don't think so anyway)

I was a bit sarcastic in my reply to RIPbudgies and I did apologise in a pm. I thought I should also apologise in a public forum. I did not mean to insult her and if I offended, let me publicly repeat my apology. Sorry.

Sunshine, I think you have done a great job on making this new flight cage. I am sure your birds will really love it. I am not sure the classification is right though, I think it is a flight cage, not an aviary.

Perception is a funny thing. A recent study showed that many young Australians who go overseas get drunk and get arrested. It creates an ugly image of Australians in some overseas countries but is is the way that we are seen. This is a small number of Australians who carry on this way, however we all have to bear the burden of these people's actions. Not every person from the middle east is a terrorist, but when a middle eastern person gets on a plane, people, whether they mean to or not, glance at this person with a look of fear on their face. Is this person a terrorist? No. Yet they are preceived this way. Any person who is speaking truthfully will acknowledge that the US has a perception problem. A lot of this has bee caused by the foreign policies of your government. If the most recent election is anything to go by, the vast majority of US citizens disagreed with these policies. However in saying that, you cannot not acknowledge that the US, as a country, and thus its people, have rightly, or wrongly, appeared arrogant. I once had a lecturer form the US who stated that the US citizens have great knolwedge of the US, but poor knowledge of overseas. Perhaps we have seen this in the Middle East. This topic has strayed greatly away form where it is started. You, as a US citizen, are feeling insulted by comments made. Ultimately, they were not intended to insult. It was a matter of perception. Rather than getting emotionally insulted about it, perhaps it would be better to seek to enlighten on why they are called Keets and not their true name? A comment was made about how one person perceives things, someone else interpreted that in a different way, then others got insulted. Ultimately, little is achieved.

It was, but then it seems that some people took it to heart Yet this failure to give one of our native animals it's proper title, but rather to call it by a category of birds, is insulting. If you called a platypus a mammal you would be right, but it is not its name. Let me clear up this confusion then, every budgerigar can trace its origin back to Australia. Budegerigar is a combination of two aboriginal words. Now, as far as I know native Aboriginals are not dutch or american. Native Australians, who named a native animal, are native to AUSTRALIA!!! I respect different nationalities and peoples rights to call things differently, however I was always taught that we should call and pronounce things the way that the people who come from the area do. For example, if a person who comes from Newcastle pronounces it phoentically is "new-cass-el" then that is the way should say it. If they pronounce it "new-car-sel" then that is the way we should say it. The budgerigar is an Australia bird. I am sure that American's would be insulted if every one around the world started calling the eagle that appears on the coat of arms a white headed sea eagle. Yes, the budgerigar belongs to the parakeet family, so it is correct to say that all bugerigars are parakeets. It is not coorect to say that all parakeets are budgies, and that is the major point in this debate. No one is setting out to insult anyone, no one is setting out to denegrate any other cultures or nationalities. Many Australians just dislike that one of our native animals is called by so many names that are not its true name. We have seen Engligh Budgies and American budgies. That is rubbish. The budgerigar is Australian. When someone asks me what my dogs are I say Cairn Terriers. Imagine how silly it would be if someone walked up to me and said "what are they?" asking about my dogs, and I said "they are "canines." Do you think people could see that? If you had a siamese cat and someone came up to you and said "she is beautiful, what is she?" and you said "she is a feline". To me that would be ridiculous. If I want to the zoo and there three different type of monkeys in three enclsoure next to each other, and there was a big sign in front of each that said "monkey". I would look at the sign and think "stupid zoo, at least go to the effort to inform people correctly about what type of monkeys they are". The zoo is right, they are monkeys, but it is more correct to say Spider monkey, or whatever particular monkey they are. All that is being said is that by saying parakeet people are naming the genus or the group that budgerigars belong to. Like calling all typoes of dogs canines or all types felines. It is not specific. That is all we are saying.

I think it is best to keep them seperated. Saves any issues

picture 1 - yellow/green dominant pied and a green normal picture 2 - both yellow/green dominant pieds

The female may not feel there are the right conidtions to breed. What is a "smallish"nest box? What is the cage set up like? Maybe take the nest box out of their cage, leave one out for abotu 2 weeks, then attach one to the outside of the cage and see what happens. Sometimes, some birds just won't breed. If they do not take to this, give them some time without trying to have them breed. Say, 4 months, then try again.

I think you should apply. There shoudl not be an application fee or deposit on the application. You should be able to apply with nothing to lose. If they want you as a good tennant, they will think you are worth the wait.

all the WA birds may be fine, all of Liv's birds may be fine, regardless of this, NO, you should not shorten quarantine. Some birds can have hidden diseases that the move will bring out. Stress related. It is always best to be thorough. I know we all think and want to shorten quarantine, but go the distance.