renee

Don't despair. Isolate the affected chicks and IF YOU CAN give them a course of doxy.

What a good design! Tony has to duck for ours

Thank You Nubbly and RIP for your informative posts on this subject! Very Much appreciated.

Your chickies show a lot of promise Uli ~ Well done you! Please tell us more about yourself. How long have you been breeding show budgies, what got you interested, details about your club and who you bought your foundation stock from?

She is a beautiful yellow face cobalt budgie

Fingers crossed Morgana pulls through for you both. I hope you will have a lovely ceremony and honor the memory of "Dad".

At the end of last year's breeding season I had 3 nests affected by french moult, I don't know what caused it but at the time there was talk of fodder mites being a contributing factor and I had a fair number of those flying around. This year I changed how I manage deep litter to cleaning it all out after every round and have zapped any fodder mites on sight. However, 2 1/2 months ago I used one of the hens that had had a french moult nest last year and unfortunately one chick was so badly affected I sent it to God (and soon after the hen in question). To add to my woes I moved the other nest chicks around to other nests before realising what was happening and as a result a further 5 chicks were affected and dropped their flights and tail feathers in the kindie cage. And then one or two followed suit and so on .... Currently I have 15 chicks that are affected. But there is a silver lining! Not long ago Gary Armstrong posted on the MBC website that administering doxycicline to thus affected chicks mitigated the effcts of FM by building their immune system. So I started giving the affected chicks a course of doxy and slowly but surely these little chicks are recovering. The ones that were infected over the past month are completely or almost completely fine again while the five infected 2 months ago .... well I'm not sure if they will come good or not. No I would never breed with a French Moulter, they have their own cage outside, and if I identify another carrier parent they are going to God before they can flap their wings. :laughter:

French Moult is a virus and is very infectious but it mainly affects chicks that are still in the nest (they catch it from the mother) or when they are newly fledged and come into contact through other chicks.

You are very welcome to come and have a looksie I live near Freo and am free most non-showing week end days. Club details as follows- Bassendean: The Metropolitan Budgie Club, meets every 3rd Saturday of every month www.metropolitanbudgerigarclub.com.au Girrawheen: The Rare Budgie Club, meets every 1st Sunday of every month Mandurah: The South-West Budgie Club, meets every 2nd Sunday of every month

No injuries today?

Cool...arent you coming ? Well of course, but as we all know He is the handy one!

The best thing you can do for yourself is to visit other people's places and see what they have done- this will give you some good ideas. If you'd like to come and see my set up, just PM me and I will give you my details. There are 3 Budgie Clubs in WA. The Metropolitan Budgie Club (in Bassendean) is having an auction in December and I think the South-West Club (in Mandurah) is also having an auction at the end of the year too. I would not jump into this and make sure you have a suitable aviary before getting any birds. Also try having a look at the MBC website (Metropolitan Budgerigar Club) www.metropolitanbudgerigarclub.org.au

and Tony will be there on Saturday to help!

Thank You Hamish !!!! Love the set up .... every one has to start somewhere and my first year breeding looked very much like how you have yours - this was before I realised I could convert my garage into a breeding room

You wish Well it depends how much Kaz wants that Dommie Pied of your Dave, doesn't it? :rofl:

Well you're a brave person if you are considering putting a Normal hen to your Clearwings - I did earlier in the year and the markings were darkened considerably to the point that I could quite easily enter one of the offspring as a Greywing at a show and no one would bat an eyelid ..... I do believe Nubbly has said as much elsewhere. If money was no object I would buy better shaped and sized Clearwings from the Best Clearwing breeder in Australia and take it from there ....

:hooray: YOOO HOOO! :hooray: :hooray: :star: :bliss: :star:

:hooray: I know you don't like disturbing your birds after shut eye in the breeding room - but I'd be setting the alarm for soon after dawn and just checking mum is feeding it.

Well sometimes the love of a good pairing overrides variety :hooray:

And isn't she just GORGEOUS! I can't wait till she feathers up over the next 10 days.

Welcome to the world of budgie breeding - if you have a 'problem', think outside the box and try something else!

As you may all know last year I had a spate of regular deaths .... every 4-6 weeks a bird would die. So come year's end I did a really comprehensive medication program that lasted a few months and by about February I was pretty confident that I had solved it, in fact the last birds to die in my aviary passed away at the end of December. This is not to say I haven't lost birds since. I did lose a few that had just been purchased, I think 3-4 in total that died within the week. And recently I lost a cock bird and a hen from different nest boxes about 10 days apart. No sign of illness, just your 'dropped off the perch' scenario. It really annoys me that this happened and it's the first time that I can remember ..... As for medicating, well I don't really do anything any more. My birds get fresh water now - changed every 2 days and if they go mopey on me I pop a bit of Triple C in the water for 3-5 days. I'm a bit over the whole meds regime and hospital cage set up. In August I had a bird that just wouldn't get well no matter what I tried, so I took it to Libby's. I know, what a cop out! But I had reached the stage I was ready to wring it's neck in frustration. So at the moment if a bird is looking fluffed up more often than not I will put it into a holding cage so it's got easy access to food and just wait and see. BUT I do give all my fledged chickies doxy, fresh every day until they go into the Young Birds aviary. I am a convert of doxy, I have been told it boosts the immune system of birds and so I use it liberally. In a couple of months when all my adult birds are in my main aviary I will be giving them an extended course of doxy.

Looking good GB though I am looking forward to when they get a tad bigger, say in a week's time I always find chickies look scrawny at this stage. I am no expert at the early sexing but from the width of the cere I'd take a punt and say hen chick. Let's see what the more experienced members say though

I hope you both can pull through this difficult time..... you are in my thoughts constantly.

You are doing very well Dave. Yes, the little Pied has got 'the look' - no wonder Kaz is putting her hand up for her :rofl: