SunshineE

The first couple: the hen looks like a pied (I think recessive...) yellow base (if they have white/blue based chicks then both parents are split to white base. The cock is a lutino so your male chicks will be split to ino (possibly able to have ino babies depending on their partner) and all your female chins will be inos (you can tell that from the start from their red eyes the moment they hatch. Any with red eyes will be girls. From the photo the chick looks to have black/dark eyes so it will be a boy. For the hen can really tell much more about her colour without more photos from more angles. They all look beautiful rhiannan! Can't wait to see more photos of the babies! Chek out my thread on my ino clutch for photos of what the ino chicks will look like if you like this is the link http://forums.budgiebreeders.asn.au/index.php?showtopic=32784&pid=383090&st=20entry383090

I took chicky to the vet today and sadly it's leg was broken clean through and totally offset vet took an X-ray and it looked so painful for poor chicky. He put chicky under anaesthetic and set it and splinted it so hopefully it will all work out nicely. I have photos I will upload soon. Also discovered feathers on the eldest and youngest chicks' feet. Interesting genetic development!

Thanks Robyn, it certainly isn't a stupid question, I can see how it would happen! But they are definitely budgie rings. I was thinking I might have got a bit of Chicky's leg caught when I put it on too, so maybe that's it. The poor thing's leg and foot still have not completely unswollen but I think it is getting a bit better. I take chicky out every morning and evening and massage the leg/foot a bit so hopefully that helps! Hopefully I will have some more photos soon

Since everything has been going so well there was blind to be a hiccup eventually... nothing too drastic (at least so far it isn't) but none the less, bit scary for me! I have put plastic split rings on the babies so I can tell them apart when they have grown up (having four lutinos might be tricky otherwise!). When I was checking the best this evening I noticed that Chick 3's foot and bottom leg joint were swollen and the ring was very right around it's now swollen leg I cut the ring off very carefully and checked chicky for a cut or irritation which may have caused the swelling. I couldn't see any reason for it. Chicky didn't seem to be able to move that foot, ony the leg as a whole, and I couldn't tell if there was any feeling or not. I left chicky with the other babies and parents in the nesting box to get fed and then came and took it out for a few minutes about half an hour later to give the foot a bit of a gentle massage and move the leg around generally to get the blood flowing. Hopefully I will get up in the morning and the swelling will have gone down and all will be well (fingers crossed!)

They have a seed base diet with native plants from the garden (tree fern and maleleuca aretheir favourites and they also like bottlebrush and kangaroo paw). They also get carrot, corn, apple and oranges. I also have Passwell Budgie Starter in the aviary and cages in breeding season. We have a very large tree fern growing next to the aviary and the fronds push up against the wire and every last millimetre they can reach through the wire gets consumed if I don't replenish the stock in the aviary fast enough. We have had some very interesting looking fronds once i've cut them before, like they have been cut on a diagonal where they met the wire! Even our most un-tame birds fly over and sit on the tree fern and maleleuca when I bring it in and tuck in while I am putting it in the pipes on the wire, such greedy things! One of my very first two birds was a lutino (Sunshine in my picture) and she was incredibly smart, however the worst mother ever! :/ And Barty is easily the cleverest bird we have at the moment, his escapes when he was a baby certainly testify to that. We would be sitting down somewhere in the house and hear this soft 'thunk' noise and go to look what it was and find Barty on the floor under his cage. Luckily his wings were clipped when we first got him or I am sure we would have lost him! Our track record with albinos has not been that great sadly, compared to our lutinos. Our first one was given to me by a friend because she was lonely after her mate escaped. She had unfortunately never learned to fly (not entirely sure it was due to any previous housing arrangements or sizes either...) and she was just a very very stupid bird. Silas (chick 1) seems to be a pretty quiet baby at the moment so hopefully he/she becomes a lovely bird.

Sorry for the lack of photos, I have only just returned from a trip and was greeted when I got home by all five chicks having grown an enormous amount in a week. I have some photos from the day or two before I left and then yesterday after I got home. They all seem very happy and healthy so far! We have four lutinos and just the one albino of the five chicks and have decided to keep the first two (albino Silas and lutino Lucky). Lucky is certainly an adventurer, I put him/her on the table for two seconds while I put Silas back into the nesting box this morning and he/she took a running jump off the table into my lap. After I had put the cage back outside could see both Lucky and Silas putting their heads out of the nesting box. I actually found Silas on the floor of the cage when I got home yesterday so they are obviously explorers! Here are some photos, the first few are from just before I went away, and the last few are from yesterday afternoon. It is amazing to see how much they have grown!

More photos coming soon, I'm having some difficulty resizing images :/ The chickies are getting their pin feathers now and we can tell the colour of the first three chicks: Chick 1: albino (thinking of calling it Silas after the albino assassin in The Da Vinci Code) Chick 2: lutino (called Lucky thanks to Friday the thirteenth birthday) Chick 3: lutino (not named yet) Chicks 4&5 can't tell yet but tentatively suspect chick 4 is albino... They are so gorgeous and Barty and Bubble are amazing parents. Still a bit messy feeding but I think that is just Bubble's style... Both are loving the veggies available and have orange stains around their beaks from the carrot (definitely their favourite!) As I say, photos soon

They are all red eyed. The oldest will be albino and next one (Lucky) is lutino. Can't tell for the others yet

Thanks maz7 and robyn, they are so gorgeous! The pegs on the doors are so they can't escape as a team by lifting the doors up, we've had that happen before (while they were inside thankfully!) and Barty is named after the lead mastermind in The Great Escape because when we first got him he kept slipping through the bars of our bigger cage, the true escape artist! I was so relieved when her beak turned out okay, I was so worried about her. Barty was very cute feeding her though Can't wait to see how many of each yellow and white we get!!

We finally have an Ino family! Having thought for years how amazing it would be to have lutino or albino baby budgies, imagine my excitement when our Albino hen, Bubble, and Lutino cock, Barty (Bartlett) started getting friendly! Bubble seems to have a talent for annoying the other hens in the aviary however and managed to lose about a third of her upper beak in an argument with another hen about four months ago. Luckily it grew back with no trouble after I took her and Barty out of the aviary and into a separate cage. Barty was very good at feeding her when she was having some difficulty doing so and they bonded even more! Once Bubble was all better I gave them a nesting box and, after a while, Bubble laid her first egg. Sadly, she and Barty decided it looked very tasty and ate it. This was fixed that very day with a mustard egg and she laid the rest of her clutch without eating any more eggs. She laid five unseated eggs. The waiting game was very exciting, I always get very excited when there are clutches but I was super excited about the prospect of Ino babies! The eggs hatched as follows: 12/9 (laid 24/8): first baby hatched very late at night. Could tell straight away it was an Ino baby from its eyes (knowing it would have to be an Ino I was interested to see what Ino babies' eyes look like as chicks) 13/9 Friday the 13th (laid 26/8): second baby, already called Lucky due to its birthday 15/9 (laid 28/9): healthy baby 17/9 (laid 30/8): healthy baby 20/9 (laid 1/9): could hear pecking through egg when they were closed up on the night of the 18th. Could hear strong chirping and pecking all day on the 19th. Expected it to have hatched by late 19th at latest. Very concerned when it hadn't. Checked often all day yesterday (20th) and could hear chirping and pecking each time but could not see where it had pecked through the egg at all. I asked my brother to keep me updated as I was away last night. Was very relieved to hear it had hatched, although judging from the looks of the egg compared to all the other shells, Bubble or Barty seem to have helped it out of the egg. All the babies are very healthy at the moment and Bubble and Barty are keeping them very clean (at their own expense I might add, I have never seen them so messy!) and look to be some of the best parents we have ever had. All five chicks, L-R oldest to youngest Oldest chicky Barty and Bubble Very caring parents More news and photos soon ask the chicks grow up!

hmmm, maybe this is her problem... i will still be keeping an eye on her though!

The branches are all Australian natives. What should I give them as well/instead of carrot and apple? Seed mix is premium budgie mix from birdworld. The weeros/teils in the aviary with the budgies don't seem to have this weight problem, is that just because they metabolise differently?

Hi everyone, I did a check of all my birds for scale today because I noticed one of them had some around his beak. The rest of them were fine and I will keep checking them daily for a few more weeks. My problem is this: I caught my hen Speedo very easily because she was unable to fly. The reason for this was obvious when I picked her up and couldn't close my hand around her! She was given to us after she flew into someone's garage and their dog made it impossible for them to keep her. When we got her from that family she was a little on the heavy side already, but in the year since she has really become very obese. I couldn't weigh her exactly because our scales are broken at the moment but from holding her in one hand and comparing her to my iPhone she was heavier- obviously not a good sign as my phone weighs 112g! A few of our other 12 budgies are solidish too and I am wondering what I can do to stop this wirght problem. They have seed (no wheat or sunflower), maleluca branches, bottlebrush branches, grevillea branches, tree fern fronds and carrot and apple when we have spare. Any suggestions are welcome. I am thinking of taking Speedo to the vet in the meantime as well to see what they say. Thanks in advance!

Thanks Nerwen I can't tell which Mum is plucking them and they don't let any boys near the nesting box so the Dad feeding option is out :/ (even if i knew which the dad/s were!!) I don't want to leave them in there if they will continue to be plucked because we have a weero from our neighbours that was plucked as a baby and now had permanent bald patches years later and i don't want the babies to have no wing feathers or anything like that. Is there any other way to stop the plucking or will i need to take them out?

Thanks Robyn, I have previously put neglected or bullied chicks from other clutches in with other hens who have similar aged chicks, however there is currently only one other hen with a chick at the moment. It will be her only chick (she laid four eggs and three were obviously infertile) and it only hatched on October 11 so it is quite a bit younger than the other chicks, especially the oldest ones. I can't see that either hen wants to lay again right now, neither of them have dark brown ceres anymore but I do appreciate it still may be the case... any further light to be shed on the subject would be very helpful.

Hi all, Went out to check our chicks this evening and discovered three of the five in one nest had almost completely bald heads and some bald patches on their shoulders/wings. The oldest baby hatched on September 29 and the youngest on October 6 so they all have the beginnings of feathers. It was only they oldest three which had been plucked. They are colony bred (don't judge or berate me, I have been doing it for 7 years and have had my fair share of mishaps, however i do take out the known trouble makers at the start and keep an eye on them. I am well aware of the opinions of many here, however I stand by the way i manage my birds) Due to the colony breeding we have had several double hen partnerships. We currently have one now which also involves one or more cocks, as some chicks have characteristics which could only come from one hen and some only from the other (one is split for recessive pied from the mother who is the only recessive pied in the aviary and two are spangle from the other mum, the only spangle we have). These two hens and their various cocks have successfully raised three clutches before without a problem. What could suddenly have prompted feather plucking and how do i avoid it in the future and how should i manage it now? If i need to take the chicks out and hand raise them I am more than happy to, i have done it before and will do whatever is best for the chicks right now.

okay so this is what 'he' looks like now: as you can see, it's not even just 'out-of season' brown, its as brown as they come!! And he is definitely four-ish, not like i'm looking at the wrong budgie (i did ask myself that given the unlikeliness of a sex-change!!!) And we've had several recessive pieds before, both male and female and all of our previous ones have remained the correct gender!! our other two we have at the moment are girls (Gilbert, yes, i know, there is a naming issue, but my friend got naming rights when she was just a teeny chick, and Speedo, adopted after a neighbour had her fly in to their garage and they had already named her when we got hold of her.) But my point is that i have seen many recessive pied ceres and Lionel has literally gone from one to the other!!! hence my extreme brain confuzzlement!!!

Right, Lionel/Lily was an early 2009 chick, so 'reaching sexual maturity' at nearly 4...??? Also, photos: (current cere state will follow, but now just to get an idea of the 'original')

Hi guys, I recently noticed my bird 'Lionel' appears to have turned into a girl. When we bought 'him/her' I picked 'him' as a girl and we called 'then-her' Lily. I have been very reliable at picking sexes for several years and I am fairly sure this was my only 'failure' to date. The thing is: Lionel/Lily is a recessive pied so when the cere never turned brown at all and remained stubbornly pink I just assumed I had made a mistake, he was a boy and we renamed him Lionel. That was about three years ago (as soon as my computer has finished installing an update I will check this timing but it has definitely been a few years). 'He/she' has never shown the slightest interest in nesting and has been buddies with our extremely asexual male (thought nothing of it, we have had budgies with various sexual orientations before) My question is: could Lily/Lionel just have hit puberty/matured REALLY late (three years seems a stretch!)? I can't think of any other explanations!! I will find photos and post when I check the dates, but if anyone has ideas, let me know, I'm intrigued (also slightly confused as to which name to use!!)

Hi all, Recently I have discovered that many of my gorgeous birds are overweight or obese It is not from lack of food variety, they have greens and branches and leaves provided as well as seed. I have read that a healthy weight budgie should be eating about 2 teaspoons of seed a day plus greens and leaves. Is this correct? I have been trying to think of another way to stop this problem with my birds other than putting them all on a diet, but at the moment I can see no other way!!! Feedback would be appreciated! Thanks, SunshineE

Thanks Kaz we've got the cage in our outdoor/indoor area and it has a folding glass door on it so I always make sure it's closed up when we open the cage up, even just because Sky is an escape artist!! We've had to wire the doors closed! It's also a plus because it means the birds of prey we were getting can't get to the front of the aviary any more

I'll get some more photos of Sky today. They normally ate colony bred but Tex has a record of murdering other babies so we took her out two week before we put any nesting boxes anywhere so the only cock in play for these chicks has been Sky. Also, the all white chick would appear to have black eyes but I'll have another look when i take the photos of Sky

I was hoping someone could help me work out what sort of babies these are because I am slightly confused! I hope the pictures work, I've spent 40 minutes trying to resize them!! This is the hen (Tex- yellow one in the picture): And this is the cock (Sky- sky blue spangle): There are three chicks and I need some help working out the two white ones. This one has light purple-y cheek feathers, faint wing markings and looks like there is a very very very light body colour (but it's so light I can't tell what colour!!): And this one doesn't look like it has any markings at all and there may be some body colour but I could be imagining it: This is the other chick: Apparently Tex is a Clearbody but I don't know anything about the genetics of clearbodies (I may have read somewhere a while ago that it was an allele of the ino mutation? but again I really don't have the faintest idea!!)... Sky is also split for opaline but I'm not sure what that would mean for these chicks. so any help will be appreciated!!

Fabulous, I will get onto putting some mesh up, at least that way if it does come back my birds will all be safe! I've never understood why they insist on sleeping and clinging to the front of the wire, especially after several were got by cats that way, but they will insist on doing it

Hi all, I came home this morning and as I walked past the window I noticed a large bird sitting outside the aviary. I'm pretty certain it was a Swamp Harrier and it was really beautiful, but being rather protective of my birds I chased it away swiftly. I then checked all the birds to make sure they were alright and to my dismay saw that one of my favourite boys, Houdini, had what appeared to be a gash in his chest. I took him to the vet and upon closer inspection the injury was not nearly as big as I thought. He was given an anti-inflamatory injection and a course of antibiotics and I have high hopes that he will be fine. My question is: how should I best discourage the harrier from coming back? I would hate to hurt it (it was such a beautiful bird!!) and it lives in the area so I only want to discourage it. I was thinking of putting an offset layer of wire mesh on the outside so that there is a gap between the wire it can get to and the wire the budgies and weeros like to (however stupidly) cling to, is this a good option. Any suggestions welcome because I would love to avoid any further casualties! A similar thing has happened (several times) to my Aunt's budgies, except instead of a small gash, the Hawk actually caught her budgie and tried to pull it through. Having seen these awful deaths I am glad Houdini managed to live up to his name at least in part!