Dave_McMinn

Thanks for the video. They look like they are having heaps of fun. I like the cover around the cage base. I like that it keeps the area tidy, but the fact it is semi-transparent is a good feature. Did you buy that or make it?

Definitely both female. You pics show the difference between birds that are in and out of breeding season. You can see why people get confused.

The eldest spangle in with Earl and Latte keeps leaving the nestbox, so I put an ice cream container in the cage, with some wood shavings and some seed in it, to encourage him/her to pick and eat. Anyway, I picked the little one up and put him/her in the ice cream container. Earl came and checked out the container and all was fine. Then Latte came and checked out the container. She jumped straight down on to of the little one, pinned him/her and proceeded to attack him/her. This happened in the space of 30 seconds as I stood there. This is all it took for me. I removed Latte straight away. I do not want them having another clutch, and Earl should be doing the feeding now anyway, and if Latte is going to attack one, she is going to attack them all, so best be proactive, well reactive after 30 seconds, but you know what I mean. All the others are going well. Little guys in the aviary are moulting. Icarus is having a particularly hard moult. A lot of blood on his feathers. At first I thought he had been attacked, but closer inspection reveals that it is just some tough feathers.

Some very nice looking birds.

Excellent looking birds Nubbly

I know you are 11 years old, and I know that you want what is best, but everytime you buy a new bird and you put it with your surviving one, it is going to die. You are pretty much signing its death warrant. My advice - see if you can keep the two birds you have. If one dies, then do not replace it. Keep just the one. Eventually, if they are both infected, and they both don't get vet treatement, they will both die. Before you buy any new birds, clean out their cages, disinfect them, and save enough money for multiple vet visits.

I like the last two hens. What are the markings like on your clearwings Shannon? I am trying to breed better birds at the moment. The Clearwing variety was far too much work for a novice like myself.

So is the desire to treat birds properly - damn novices!!!!!!!!

Poor little thing

You do make me laugh

Quite so, I had omitted to mention that in the above reply. I would be very worried if a breeder removed the hen and then put the hen with another cock within a short period of time.

thanks for telling me bluntly Romeo Jr has been jumping on anything he could since he was old enough to stand independantly, so that is strange. Maybe they just need some more practice.

See now they would be great. I saw one of those at that Auction where I got that bird for Kaz. I had to leave so I didn't see what it went for, but it was stunning.

Actually pulling the hen out early is a tip if you want to preserve the health and well-being of the hen, most cocks if conditioned correctly are quite capable of raising the chicks to fledgling stage on their own. This year I have been doing it the other way round and pulling the cock bird out at week 3 and then moving hen and chicks to kindie cage together and allowing the hen to keep feeding chicks. This has successfully cut down any attacks on chicks, which was the original goal. But this also means the hen is having a full 3 months turn around time. However, I have found that the hens have been going out of condition after a stint like this and another very experienced breeder has pointed out to me that the hens will take longer to recover because they continue to be harassed by the chicks in the kindie cage. So I will be reveiwing this system and will probably do things differently next year. Top breeders may do it Renee, and you may think this is the way to go, but ethically I still have some concerns about it. There are things done in different arenas to "improve" some animals and I disagree with it. Cutting the tails off dogs is a great example. I think this practice of removing hens early to allow them to breed again with another mate, is a problem in the budgie world and it will obviously lead to learned behaviours that are negative. Simple as that. Now, you or others may continue this practice, or your own variation, but in no way is it something that I will ever do as I believe that ethically it is wrong. I suppose it comes down to what you want out of breeding birds - the best show birds or the best all round birds. You choose.

now now Kaz. It was you who told me that you grow to love that which you once hated.

Very good idea. Thanks for the mental image with ken -

I will take these two please Dave When I first saw these pieds in the nestbox, I did think of you kaz, but they are growing on me

Funny how some breeders are so keen on success they do not think of the welfare of the bird. Now I am sure that this breeder is a much more successful breeder than me, but that "pulling the hens out at 2 weeks" just seems wrong to me. Understandable in a breeding factory, but ethically not right to me.

hopefully less plumbers crack - LOL

They look like they are recovering well. I really do hope that they turn out well, and there is no folicle damage. Do you retire that bird now? Or do you breed her and use that egg dropping invention of Daz's?

As promised, here are the First are the kids in the Kinby cage. The two boys are the sons of Dumb and Kestral. The 3 pieds and 1 cinnamon winged grey green are the daughters of Twitch and Kiwi The pile of jelly beans are actually 3 in number - the youngest underneath you cannot see and he/she is only a day or two old. These are the offspring of the green cock and greygreen hen. Here are Kiwi and Twitch poking his head in with their two youngsters. Sorry about the bars. These 3 eggs belong to Bruticus and his Albino hen. The darker looking one has only just been layed, so I am not classifying it as infertile just yet. The two spangles and the rear of the DF spangle you see are in the DF widows nestbox. The spangle, the DF spangle, the opaline grey and the Opaline cinnamon grey are all in Earl and Latte's nestbox.

Both babies are from nests where dad is skyblue greywing and mum is green split blue so fingers crossed See that is good news. It is of course personal preference that I think blue greywings look better than green greywings. Ultimately, it is about breeding the best greywing.

So all my old birds are duds in the nestbox? :rip:

You need to try to get the blue line in there Kaz.

Seems I am the only one interested in keeping this thread going, but regardless I will continue. Often people may read and not comment, so that is cool. I moved the birds in the big Kindy cage into the aviary. This includes Caesar's offspring, the offspring of Latte and Earl, the eldest from Kestral and Dumb, and the Dom Pied orphan. All seem well and appear to be enjoying the extra flight room. I moved the two remaining youngsters from Dumb and Kestral into the bigger Kindy cage, and they were joined by the offspring from the first clutch of Twitch and Kiwi. Twitch and Kiwi have 2 little ones. Interestingly, Kiwi might be getting bored. She plucked the down off the oldest in this clutch, where she was perfect before. I have given her some more millet to chew on. Dumber(RIP) and DF have 5 chicks, 3 in her nest, and 2 fostered with Earl and Latte. They are getting read to come out any day now. Earl and Latte have 2 of their own - 1 grey opaline and 1 cinnamon grey opaline. Green and his Greygreen partner have 3 young. The other three egs are not fertile, so this is good news. Bruticus and his Albino have 3 eggs, so that is very exciting. Unsure of fertility at the moment. I will go take some :rip: I am still deciding on some other pairs. I have 3 spare cages, so I am thinking what to do. I want to breed Luthor - he was with a lute but they produced infertile eggs. I might put him with a green cinnamon hen. I want to put the old man down. He is a grey green cinnamon so I might put him with a John Hewitt Blue opaline hen. They are both big birds, so they should produce big chicks. The last pair are a green cock and a grey green hen from Greg Gregoriou. They are both awesome looking birds and they are looking for somewhere to breed, in the aviary.