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Thank you Dan.

Christine your birds are lovely

Leave it till the morning, it will be fine

Hi Dan Hi and welcome to the Forum, yes Mark has stunning birds and I believe you will need very very deep pockets at his sell out auction but if you go or bid good luck, I am sure you will come away with something stunning.

Sounds lovely

I will have get some pipe cleaners too Robyn and give it ago. But the make up pad is working very well this time around. Taylor I hope you don't have my problems either because it is getting me down. But here are some more photos. Grey green cock he has a sister that is good too but she would sit still for a photo so next time. grey green clearbody, pity there is so much suffusion nest with my other clearbodies Here are more pairs that are going together when they are ready Sky violet spangle cock and grey green dom pied Grey green cock and grey green cinn hen better photo of hen

good luck with Kochy.

Thanks Pride, that's what Geoff said last week, he said that most of them are really good and I should be very pleased with them. I have quality which is better than quantity considering I should have over 50 chicks by now but all have died. To date I have 19 live chicks ranging from 1 day to 6 weeks old.

Good luck with the breeding Ratzy.

Time for an Up Date.... Things haven't improved much but so far I have 3 clearbodies from one nest, 2 of them look really good but sadly they have diffusion, but i can work on that in the future. clear body no1 No 2 No 3 From another nest i have a light green spangle and 1 light green light green This is dad. From another nest 1 white Df spangle From another nest 2 Df spangles, no photos yet. from another nest 2 grey greens no up date photos yet from another nest 1 grey hen, 1 violet and 1 violet cinnamon opaline hen,. violet grey violet cinn opaline From another nest 1 light green cinnamon pied hen who has one splayed leg and is wearing a makeup pad thing trying to fix it. yesterday she was a fluffy ball of white down and today she has all her down plucked down to pink skin, so annoying. and still no photos. from another nest 1 grey green or dk green, have to look tomorrow he is only about 2 weeks old, he is the son of my violet green. Violet green I have 3 chicks in a nest that belong all over the place, once they feather up I will know where they come from. One is from my white Df spangle cock. chicks in the nest I had a chick from the Lutino nest hatch two days ago but died stuck to the shell and another one hatched today and it is a ino and so far still alive, the hen is young and I have no where at all to transfer the chick. I will take some more photos tomorrow of some of the chicks I missed. Or I should say I will try and take better photos, lol

Yes Gb I noticed that too but it is the photo, the way I took it, trying to use a the new camera, you know me I have that big SLR nikon and I at long last got my canon Ixus 105 and am still trying to work out how to use it, besides making my birds look worse, the photos are all blurry and and they all look faded. lol. That hen won best pair in show at the Riverina, so she can't be to bad. But the photo makes her look awful. She has more hen than that too but she was holding it tight, nervous of me taking the photo I guess,lol. Anyway I will see what happens, these 2 chicks are hers from another cock. Actually this is dad and these too are from the grey hen above and the light green cock. one hen one cock, they look better now as they are older.

Sounds like he is sick, a messy bum is a sign that something is wrong. do you have any sulfa AVS , that's what I give my birds when they have a messy bum before I give them anything harsher like antibiotics. You can get a broad spectrum antibiotic from the pet store.

Hello and welcome to the forum. sounds like you have some pretty colours, love to see some photos.

Last Thursday I found this hen in shock almost dead, she was in a cage with 3 other hens waiting to go into a breeding cage but I guess the other hen come into condition and attacked this hen. She scalped her but thank god it was only to the scalp. She spent 6 days in the hospital cage, I put her on probotic and spark, she is doing good now but it looks like her wing is damaged or her hip is out because she sits strange now. I tried hard to save her because I paid a fair bit for and and she is well bred. But then today I go out to the birdroom and found this hen like this and now she is in the hospital cage. She was with a light green cock bird since last week and all was going good but he must of decided he didn't fancy her last night or this morning and attacked her. I think she will be alright though as she doesn't seem in shock as the other hen but her head looks worse. The cock bird is the partner of the hen above and he seems he doesn't like yellow hens. a couple of weeks ago he was with another yellow hen and I caught him attacking her, he would jump from the perch have a nip and jump up again so I quickly took him out. The funny thing is that I grabbed the nasty boy out and chucked him in with another cock in a holding cage and next to that cage was a light green hen in a holding cage, well they were trying to get to each other through the wire so I put them both in a breeding cage and they took to each other straight away. Who says birds don't have there own fancy. I have worked out that this boy does not like yellow hens. he they are light green pair that chose themselves. The they are both well bred so I am hoping for something good, fingers crossed.

The answer to your question depends on how old they are. Photos would be handy, do they have rings on. I would let them settle in for a period first to start with.

Hi Gb, I have had the same disaster here, very disappointing and heart breaking , i had over 48 fertile eggs and I have only 18 chicks survive, I have had most of them die at one day old because the hens won't feed them. I have had a couple die at 10 days old. And the other nest had all clear eggs. I put more pairs down I think about 8 pair and only one nest with have fertile eggs, the rest all clear. One hen sits to tight so her eggs didn't hatch which was very disappointing. The chicks range from 5 weeks down to about 10 days old. I have bred a couple of really good clearbodies and a really nice spangle and 2 nice grey greens so far. oh and a nice grey hen, so am happy with the quality I have bred, most of them will be keepers so far. Yesterday Geoff helped me pair more up, so I have 32 cages going URGGhh. But this time we plucked the **** out of their below area, and it was amazing how much heavy dark down my birds carry. So have my fingers crossed now.

There is the Ballarat Budgerigar Society if you are interested let me know and I will send you a message with the secretaries phone number. They will guide you

Hi , to start with you are better off buying a young bird but if that isn't possible, look for a lively bird with nice sleek feathers, nothing that is fluffed up, check the bottom area to make sure there is no wet area or pooey mess, check above the cere to make sure it is not wet or stained and finely when you pick your little bird out ask to hold it and feel the keel bone, there should be a little meat over it, if it is very sharp don't buy it pick another bird. If the bird has a ring check the year number which is written side ways on the ring and the colour of the ring, 2011 is purple, 2010 is blue 2009 is red and 2008 is black. I hope this helps, someone else might have more advice that I have missed. If you go to a breeder you will have a better chance of getting a healthy young baby bird.

I read it. It's a great article. I do almost the same thing with my fostering of eggs and chicks.

Are you in Australia

Lost another chick yesterday about 15 days old. Good news though another chick hatched today, there ar e2 chicks in a new nest and so far all good. I think I have worked out the problem, SEED is NO good.

I have had a few like that, I think they just strain to get the egg out, more time out none they are large eggs. I have a young hen yesterday that she laid her first egg on the floor and it was huge and blood all over it but she looks fine, I am closely watching her for her next egg tomorrow. But up till now I have found it is nothing to worry about.

Just a figure of speech but the price would be right out of my reach.

OOps sorry Neville, I didn't even look at the cheek patch I should know better I was just looking at the body colour . But I know what you mean, but the cheek patches do look grey to me but I am half blind these days and my computer screen doesn't help much

I would say it would be worth the risk if you got a good quality hen that through quality youngsters. Cocks are a different story, they can be older. A friend went to the Hills auction and he said in his opinion Henry George birds were of top quality, so this auction could be well worth attending but I can't anyway because I work that weekend. I just love number 1 in the auction yellow face violet from memory. It will go for a fortune I think. But he looks stunning. I actually prefer feminine hens and yes they do breed better than the male headed looking hens. Cheers