Finnie

Well that is why it is a Breeding Journal Dave I write mine for myself but also for all my friends and family all over the globe. Some of them are really into it! If I was doing it all for myself renee then this is not the easiest way to do it So very true! Totally agree! It is harder this way, Dave, but it's also nice to have it for a record in the future. Don't you ever go back to your previous years' journals to remember how things went back then?

There is an area on the front part of their wings that I have noticed. When they stretch, you can see down to their skin. The first time I saw it, I thought it was bleeding. Now I see it all the time. But I doubt if I could get a photo of it!

To me it looks like his yellow got darker, and his sky blue turned to sea foam color. Maybe the difference will seem more pronounced to you after he molts a second time.

Hi Greg, welcome to the forum. You are in some good company, we all have HUGE soft spots for them!

Interesting, Robyn. He also looks a little bit wet, when you zoom in like that. Perhaps he had a bath, and got almost all the way dry.

Splat, I'm very sorry to hear this. My heart goes out to you. :hug: (I know that last emoticon won't show up, but the thought is there.)

Wow, that is really awesome, Splat! Congratulations! What a great day.

To tell if your cock is mauve or grey, I would look at his cheek patches, to see if they are grey or violet. But, since he's a spangle, it may be hard to see the color of his cheek patches. Statistically speaking, if he were a single factor grey, three non-grey chicks isn't really enough to rule out his being grey. And with that hen, if he were mauve, all the chicks would have one or two dark factors, which yours appear to be. But again, it could take 4,5,6 (or more, you get the point) before you got a sky blue chick to disprove mauve. Not to mention that he could be a mauve AND a grey I'm sorry, I'm not turning out to be much help, am I? But at least try to see what color his cheek patches are to start with.

Which post and hen of Kaz's are you talking about? Can you put a link to it here?

Hey Val. I've had this same question before, and did a lot of searching, and it can be quite confusing. But I got a couple of good answers when I've posted about it, and also, here is a link to a post where RIPBudgies gives a good explanation: http://forums.budgie...=1 And in my thread here, Neville had a good answer for me:

An operation?! I hope it is not serious, and that you have a speedy recovery. And that your husband can manage the birds well, without you. Best wishes Renee.

Your summary is perfect. An excellent way to put it. And you are exactly correct, that if your two chicks are opaline, then they are hens. (And you are not confused, your are right that hens cannot be /op.) And to split hairs, there are other mutations that can have white down, they are just not as common. So when we expect opaline, we look for white down. Hey Dave, look at that hen again, I think she IS recessive pied. Look at her belly. (Maybe she might be a combo pied?) Parakeet Val, does she have iris rings? (And you can post much larger pictures here. Set your Photobucket account to resize your uploads to 640 x 480, and then they will automatically be the correct size. )

Flip, they're not that smart. They're not going to trust you after just one "rescue". And I doubt they would give you the credit for it, anyway. More likely view you as the scary monster that grabbed them in the dark.

Hi Kaitlyn, you have taken some nice cere shots. But I'm thinking that your hens are either just coming into, or just going out of breeding condition. That's because they have some nice brown to them, but it only covers about half of the cere. If it's the case that they weren't brown before, but now they are starting to turn brown, then just be patient a while longer. But it kind of looks to me like they have gone past peak breeding condition. Also, I'm seeing quite a bit of brown staining above their ceres, in their feathers. Are you sure that they are in the peak of health? How do the rest of their bodies look, strong and meaty, or thin and bony? It might be a good idea to take them out of breeding cabinets, beef up their diet for a while, and then put them down to breed later, after all the proper factors come into play.

I like your approach, GB! And PJI, what a smart idea to quote the photos so you can look back at them! Why didn't I think of that?!

I agree with Dave. And for a long term solution, you should probably clip his wings, or else go to the store and buy a bird net. But if you are trying to tame him, clipping is the better option, because the net will just teach him to avoid you, and he will get really good at flying right toward the net and then dodging away at the last second.

I agree with Kaz about watching for signs of moulting. I've had pairs that just wouldn't get down to breeding, and I've split them up only to find that they immediately went right into a moult. I guess they knew it was coming on, and just weren't in the mood. A couple of suggestions. For one, it sounds a little bit like you might be hovering too much. Otherwise, how would you know that she goes into her box so often? Just check them twice a day, morning and night, to make sure they are looking good, and you can check the box then for signs of disturbance. Then leave them alone for the rest of the day. Like Kaz said, you might not actually see them mate. But you should see them at least being friendly to each other. If they seem like they ignore each other and want nothing to do with each other, you could try closing off the nest box so they can see into it, but the hen is forced to stay in the cage with the cock. Some hens will decide to just go in the box and never come out to give the cock the time of day. Sometimes I think the frustration of being able to see into the box, but not get in, causes the hen to get more, um, interested.

Okay Splat that is not the same as Calcivet, does it have the same sugar content? I tried your link but couldn't read the blurb, please could you post it for me? Try this link, Renee. It costs more at this site, but it tells more information: calcivet plus Hmm. I use 1/2 teaspoon Quiko calcium and 1/2 teaspoon soluvite in a half liter bottle of water, which works out to 10 mL of products to 1 liter of water. To use 4 times that much seems a lot. I'd be wanting to pay 1/4 the price, to make it even. The brand Splat uses looks promising, but I 'd have to see if it's available in the U.S.

You know, they look pretty pale, to me, too. So I was thinking that maybe it's because they are so young? Maybe they will get darker as they get older? (That's what happened to Finnie when she went through her first molt. Her body color AND her grey markings both got darker.) Well, if they do end up as dilutes, that will still tell me something about Finnie. She's obviously not a visual dilute herself. If she is split to dilute, then that rules out FBC greywing, leaving normal greywing/dilute and clearwing/dilute as the only choices left. Oh, and now I have an awesome new surprise that I figured out about Finnie: She must be split to recessive pied!!! At first when chick #4 started to feather up, I thought it was odd that it had a yellow splotch on its wing, and the back of its head is clear. And there's no dominant pied or clearflight pied anywhere near those parents, so I was thinking it must just have a bit of a "damaged" spot. But then the sixth chick is now starting to get feathers, and I've never had a recessive pied chick before, so I'm not sure, but I think it must be: So I took another look at chick #4, and sure enough, it has clear areas around it's shoulders, and just look at its belly! I'm also starting to doubt whether chick #4 is opaline. Its wing markings are washed out, but I don't see any body color in them. What do you guys think?

Thank you, Renee. Wow, 40mL per L, really? That is a lot, I would be going through that bottle in no time! But I guess it would be taking the place of both my Quiko calcium AND my Soluvet liquid vitamins. I will have to crunch some numbers and see how it compares.

Okay, I'll have a try. I'm with Splat on the first one, light green opaline spangle greywing, cock, it looks like. The second one I think is yf2 (or goldenface, whatever) mauve (maybe grey, but by cheek patch I'm going with mauve. Can't look back at the photo right now, though.) Also a greywing spangle, but without the opaline for this one. And hen. I suppose they are pale enough to be dilutes, not regular greywings. That last tail photo is the first chick again, isn't it? okay, after double checking the cheek patch, I think it could be grey after all.

:lol: How funny! I don't think I've heard that one before.

I know this is after the fact, but for anybody reading this who wants to know for future reference, applying pepper will stop the bleeding. (No, it doesn't sting them.) Ellie, I hope he's doing better today. Any chance you can get a picture of his beak?

Great thread, Dave! I'm all caught up on it now. About a half a dozen times I wanted to hit the Multiquote button, to add my two cents, but I know better than to chime in before I have read all the way to the end. Invariably someone else will have already said what I was thinking. I'm glad Tess is doing better. If her pancreas does start producing insulin again, will that mean adjusting the dosage that you have to inject her with? Your are probably in for a bit of testing and monitoring for a while, huh? A couple things I thought of as I was reading. Macka really isn't all that far off. I have read that a single mating can fertilize a whole clutch of eggs, so my guess would be that IF a stray cock had managed to get past that one hen's mate, then all the eggs she laid for the next couple of weeks (I suppose that would be all the eggs) could be mystery fertiized. So it will be interesting to see how those chicks feather up. (Sorry, I have to admit that I didn't keep track of which pair that was, and what their chicks are now, I could go look though.) Oh, and also, as soon as I read that you knew your green hen wasn't split for blue because both her parents were green, I started to chuckle, and thought "I bet you anything she turns out to be split to blue!". Sure enough, a little later on, you got blue based chicks in there. Too funny!

Don't worry about clipping their beaks, it is rarely needed, and usually only in the cases where they have a disease that causes excess growth. Normally, budgies don't need beak trims. I'm thinking he only asked you that because he thought you might have done the damage yourself.