Finnie

If you want to keep her from getting hurt, you probably should keep her inside a cage when you are not around to supervise. You said she has already gotten stuck in a lamp. She could also chew on an electric cord, or who knows what else.

Would this be Wally, from your other thread? Can you tell us more about what is happening?

This is right in GB's back yard, isn't it? How exciting. I hope you all have a great time! (Have missed you around here lately, GB.)

This could be true. Or she could also be a double factor dominant pied, with or without the recessive pied. You probably won't be able to know for sure until you breed her. But keep an eye out for whether she develops one or two iris rings. She doesn't look like she is done with her molt, yet. Oh, she does seem to have a lot of staining above her cere. How is her health? (Droppings, vent clean or dirty, any respiratory symptoms?) She's definitely a pretty one!

It is up to you. Your hen probably has several weeks to go before her cere starts to turn smooth tan again. If the breeding cage is small, I would house them somewhere larger until they are ready to breed. If the breeding cage is roomy, then just take the box out until they are ready. If you have a large enough cage that can house all 6 of your birds, then you can keep them all together, and let them pick their own mates. (Which isn't necessary, they bond and un-bond, and will usually accept whatever mate that we choose for them.) Or, you can keep them separated by gender, and then when it's time for pairing, you won't have to be concerned about sperm from an unkown cock fertilizing any of the eggs.

Well, this was what I was thinking, because she must have gotten something to modify hers, which her brother and sister didn't get. So maybe they are not really dilutes, maybe they are greywings where the body color was washed out extra from the opaline, and the wing modifiers washed the wings out, too. In that case, maybe the father isn't diute, either. Maybe he is also a super washed out greywing. Then he could either be homozygous for greywing, or he could be greywing/dilute. Combine that with whatever the mother is split for, and then we could get chicks with two different genotypes. (Well, plus the normals, who would be split to one of the genes from the dad.)

Hi Ccrane, welcome to the forum.

Yeah, it's pretty normal for baby budgies to have black beaks. I don't think I've ever noticed it right at hatching, though.

There's probably no way to know what caused it. Maybe that's why you haven't gotten any responses from anybody. Has it happened again since? You might want to make a note of the episode and the date in her record, for future reference.

Yes, i know this, but i was rushing when typing, because I was going out to a restaurant... you only do what i said if the bird isnt a fussy eater Being in a rush is no excuse to give out bad advice! Fussy eater or not fussy eater, no one should wean their bird off seeds. (I realize there is a "pellets only" camp, but I disagree with them.) But the trick about putting some seeds on top of a new food you want them to try is a good idea. I agree with Maesie about using millet for training. I think it's great they they will already land on your arm, and you will want to encourage that and build on it. They sound like they might have a natural bent towards tameness! Lucky! And they sure are cute. I think they might both be boys, but since the green one isn't quite as obvious as the blue one, I am with the others on trying to get a better photo.

Hi Anna, welcome (back) to the forum! I have worked out that DD and DS refer to your children, but for the life of me, I can't figure out what the acronyms stand for.

Sounds like he will be a great resource!

Yeah, I realize that this would be a show budgie nightmare, but mine are just pets. My goal is to produce a cinnamon opaline greywing, which was inspired by an article I read a long time ago, before I started breeding my budgies. The thread is here: http://forums.budgiebreeders.asn.au/index.php?showtopic=26856&st=0&p=319655&hl=+cinnamon%20+opaline%20+greywingentry319655 So anyway, the father never threw any cinnamon chicks for the other breeder, and this clutch had 8 chicks hatch, and no plum eyes. But I agree, that the photos of the hen chick do look like she could be cinnamon, except that in real life, it's grey, not brown.

It sounds like you have a girl. I would think that if there was a sudden drop in the amount of attention you give her, she would get crankier and bitier, not extra affectionate. But I could be wrong. I don't assume that animals have human emotions, at least not in the same way we have them. But I definitely think that budgies need a good deal of attention and bonding with their human flock, if they don't have a bird flock. So if the puppy has displaced her, then you're going to have to make an extra effort to keep giving her the attention she needs. As for your description of her cere, normally the crusty flaky stage is followed by a stage where all the brown flakes off to reveal the smooth whitish/bluish color for a while. Then the smooth chocolatey-brown color will come back when she goes into breeding condition the next time. It sounds like your bird went right from crusty to chocolatey, or did you just not mention whether she had an in-between whitish phase? Because maybe her hormones are a little messed up. I usally associate an increase in chewing and biting with going into breeding condition.

A change in diet can bring on a molt. Maybe cutting out the vegetables forced them to eat more/different seeds than usual? Could be a coincidence, if they were about to go into their fall molt anyway. And Archimedes was right at the right age for her first molt. Did you ever find out what the vet thought about it yet? Is sodium benzoate one of the meds that would be good to follow up with a probiotic? It sounds like your birds bounced back after the treatment anyway, even without probiotics.

A well balanced diet. Access to oyster shell grit, bird charcoal and mineral powder. And supplement with liquid calcium and vitamin D3 if they don't have enough access to unblocked natural sunlight. Breeding birds should have fresh vegetables daily, not occasionally. If you think your birds may have a deficiency, re think over your daily care regimen, and see what needs tweaking.

Here are some photos of the chicks now that they are fledged. Chick 5, who I think is dilute. (Chick 3 looks just like her, so I'm not putting any of him.) Now for the oddly marked one, chick 4 I just realized none of these shots show the tail quill on the dilute hen. I still have her brother, I will have to try to get some shots of his tail. So I'm still wondering how a dilute cock and a hen that is only split for one of the dilution alleles can produce anything but one type of dilution combination. The breeder I got the cock from said he threw similar chicks for her, so I have to wonder if he has some kind of modifying gene going on. Or maybe he's not really a dilute. But I still think it's odd that this chick #4 can have the body color of a dilute but the wing markings of a darker greywing.

This is very related to my question about modifying genes. I'm going to go add pics to that one and bump it. Really good to see you posting, Nubbly!

It's usually pretty easy to tell the difference between a greywing cobalt and a sky blue. But for some reason today, whether it's the photos, my monitor, or my eyes, I'm not quite sure about yours. But compare her to your Emmet, who is a sky blue, and your Sky, who is a cobalt. You should be able to tell which one she resembles more. Yes, greywing does lighten the cobalt, but it doesn't give it the same hue that the sky blues have. Hope that helps until somebody else comes along with an opinion.

I just now noticed that your profile says you have 25. So, if I guessed 20, and you are saying that 25 looks a little crowded, then we are both probably right. There is a rule of thumb I have seen around that you need 4" of perch space per bird, minimum. Well, I have seen them with just 4" per bird, and there is no way they could be happy with such a small amount of perch space. I at least double that, and then also add as much extra as I can without blocking their flight paths too much. I actually make sure that I have enough perch space for all the birds on each side of the cage, because I know that when I'm feeding them or doing other stuff, they will all fly to the opposite side away from me. So I figure they need enough spots to land on in each side.

Well, when you are doing your twice daily checks in the box, at first you just check each chick over quick and then put it back. Once their eyes are open, you can take more time with checking them, and cuddle them and talk to them a little each time. The older they get, the more time you play with them during the daily checks. This will at least get them used to the fact that you are handling them. It won't necessarily tame them, but I have noticed that some of them are more interested in me than others. Some are quite curious to look me in the face and get to know me. The harder part is when they fledge, because once they come out of the box, they are harder to catch. In fact, during the week-to two weeks that I try to let them stay with their parents, if the parents are not threatening them, I completely stop trying to handle them at all, because it causes too much disturbance chasing them around in the breeding cage. But once you know the chicks can eat fully on their own and it is safe to remove them from the parents, then you put them into a kindie cage. This cage should be in your main living area, so they can get used to household activity and human presence. It will be easier to catch them and play with them on a daily basis from this cage. Hopefully they won't have lost the head start they had before the two weeks off. If at this stage, I have some that are too flighty and hard to work with, then I give those ones a feather clip. But basically from then on, you work on their taming just like any other bird.

They are beautiful! I was confused about the hatch dates you wrote at first, until I saw the last one says April, so I think maybe the other ones were meant to have a "4", and not a "5"! (Cuz I know you didn't mean they hatched yesterday and today! )

Hi Roxio, I have no idea about housing them in aviaries, but since you haven't gotten any responses yet, I will tell you what I know about cages. My cages are 5 feet wide by 2 feet deep and 3 feet high. I feel that when I squeeze 18 in there, it is a little crowded. So I would say that 18 to 20 would be quite comfortable in your aviary, since it is slightly bigger all around. Height doesn't matter so much as width, because they are all going to want to crowd near the top, whether that's three feet up or seven feet up. The extra height does allow for a little more exercise, though, if they fly down to feed at ground level. Maybe someone else will know whether you could fit more than 20 in there. By the way, welcome to the forum!

Hi Arthur, welcome to the forum.

I agree with the others about giving supplemental feedings. It sounds like in addition to not feeding them, the hen is also not keeping them warm. It sounds a lot like a maiden hen who just doesn't know what she's doing. I've had some like that, and the next time around they did great. (I waited 6 months before trying again). But it's heartbreaking and worrying to lose the first round. I hope the fostering and supplemental feeding works well for you. Well, seeing as it's been over a week, how did it go?