tomlou670

by budgie starter for the parents, is that the hand rearing stuff is used to hand raise the babies. I do notice the other day, Kramer ate spinach leaves, he used to NEVER eat that stuff, lol. you mentioned parts, what size is a part lol, out of curiosity.

congrats Jack, from me and all the Budgies lol. :yes:

The third chick just recently hatched . So now we have two babies. Kramer is eating the seed and egg biscuit and other stuff like crazy. I just put fresh water in the cage and he is going back and forth from the water to the food and back. Once in awhile he cocks his head in the direction of the nesting box. What is weird, is the first and third chick hatched in the evening around the time she laid the eggs. The Second Chick hatched in the morning . We will be trying to get pics while she is out of the box tomorrow when there is alot of natural light,to avoid the camera flash. Talk about major size difference lol between them, and they were only born two days apart,lol :yes:

I feel like a Child on Christmas Eve waiting for morning . The Third egg should be hatching anyday now. Second Chick is doing very well, getting fed by Mum who in turn gets fed by male. He has his routine lol. He grabs some seed, jumps up and drinks some water, then he jumps up into the egg and biscuit, then back down to the seed, and back to the water. Mum will either fly up to where he is sitting or she will perch outside of the nesting box and he flies down to her. Once today I was walking by with something in my hands and she stretched her neck to see what I was up to lol. How long should I wait to remove the eggshells. I have removed the first two already. I have heard she will eat them for extra calcium, but she hasn't done that and I discarded both within a few hours of hatching. It will be exciting to actually see what they inherit from both parents. We have another pair in another cage where the hen tends to be sitting on the bottom of the cage in a corner. We are keeping a close eye on her, as that is what Hedwig when she laid an egg on the bottom of the cage. how many spinach leaves can we safely give them, I bought some the other day. We wanted to put vitamins in the water but were afraid of overdose,having read that the chicks could OD on the vitamins.

Hard to get the jelly bean pics as the hen is watching like a hawk, lol. She seems to be okay with me when I held the chick to check it over, but got highly upset when others would come near the box. Kramer just shoots me a look as if to say, now what do you want, I usually put my ear to the back of the box and kinda peek in the back slot of the box. I noticed the second hatching when I saw through the back of the box that she was not in her incubating egg stance, but was somewhat different pose. I uncovered the cage and she came out and I then checked the box. I removed the egg shells and checked the baby to see if it was being fed, then placed it back in the cage. not sure when the other four will hatch, as the second one threw our hatching timetable right out the window as it was supposed to hatch today but in the evening lol. :angel: Will keep updating as the saga unfolds, can't wait to see what colours come out of this. As this is my first time, I was kinda startled at the size of them, I was expecting bigger for some reason lol

We checked the box last night, we lost the first chick :angel: . It was discarded away from the egg area :doh: . This morning though, Chick #2 hatched, completely caught of guard, we weren't expecting it until this evening . Seems like night and day the two chicks. The first one just laid there and never even moved around. This one is all over the place and very active. The actions of the parents seem to be different this time, as Kramer is doing all the stuff I read that a male does when they are raising chicks. We took the chick out to observe and check it, and we noticed the crop was full. The mother is doting all over it and the male will stick his head in from time to time lol. He never did that with the first one. We have stocked up on vetafarm hand raising and have syringes ready to go. Just in case. Is there a link that shows the exact location of the crop,I remember someone saying it is a yellowish area. We check the box everytime we spot the hen out stretching and doing what a Budgie does lol. Hmmm, what a day for a chick to be born, Friday the 13th,lol. I want to name it Jason if it is a male, but got voted down by Loulou. Will keep posting updates and we will try to get pics when we can.

will try that, we already have in that cage two mineral blocks. Her mate does not make the same sound weird. She is a very large hen lol, she dwarfs poor Ollie. She personally is my favourite as far as the hens go. She is the one that we took that picture of her after a bath.

I covered up our blue hen for the night. Not the one that is setting on eggs. And she started making real quiet whimpering sounds. Is this normal, if we had a puppy, I would have sworn it was it. She is across the room diagonal from the breeding pair of budgies.

Just a little update, we peeked back in the box while the hen was out. She has the little chick surrounded by the five eggs. Does the little chick constantly making a peeping sound or the like. We are so new to this and this is both frightening and a fascinating experience at the the same time. It appears to be very warm but just lays there with no movement. The hen is darting out very briefly and seems to go afte the egg and biscuit and then ducks back in, the male flutters from the high perch down to the box and back up again. He doesn't seem to be standing guard at the nest very often, well when nobody is in the room he does lol. We are expecting the stork to make another appearance tomorrow night. This is definitely a learning experience for us. We don't have an incubator as of yet and this is our only pair that have laid eggs, we wanted another pair to start but apparently nothing at the moment, not from lack of trying from the male,lol.

We have a bouncing baby Budgie. It Hatched not very long ago. I had to wait until the hen left the box then checked it. Needless to say it was a very brief check as she went storming back into the box and I Had to close it real quick. If all goes well the next one will hatch on Friday as it was laid two days after the first one. I walked by the box and heard this really faint peeping sound, and I peeked into the back of the box and noticed the hen was sitting differently. The male kept looking at me, as if to say, and just what are you doing, lol.

lol, as I have 15 Budgies and have handled both sexes. They both have their pros and cons. I have found out of the seven hens I have, all but one will bite. I get the job of handling the hens as the others don't like the biting that they do. Males also will bite if frightened but not as instinctively as the hen. As far as laying eggs, I have only have one hen do it to date. I have read and found that males are not as territorial as the hens and are easier to train as far as tricks and talking. If you want to breed you will need both of course lol. It is advisable if you want a budgie to bond with you, go with a male budgie. If you do add a second bird later, either the bird will learn from the first one,or the first bird will become less bonded to you and more to the other bird. Basically it all boils down to what you prefer in a Budgie, as either sex will bring you amusement,lol. Listening to a hen chirp away down the hall.

Thanks Libby and Finnie, She laid her first egg on the 21rst of last month and an egg every other day until the 29th, so we should be coming up close to hatching day. She sits on them day and night with only brief trips out,and when she comes out, Kramer starts getting very nervous and keeps flying to the box and back,lol until she goes back in. He is very dutiful and sometimes sits in with her to help and keep her company. It seems weird though, seeing him up on the top perch all by himself. So far out of our 7 pairs of budgies, they are the only ones who have gotten the breeding bug. A relief for us at the moment, being this our first time lol. I want to thank all of you on here, especially Kaz for all your help and bits of wisdom.

very nice birds Finnie. I was observing the pics and noticed you put the obituary section in the cage, rofl. We try and get a variety of birds. I think the only two the same are our two grey green males. we our currently sitting on 15 Budgies, but that could change lol.

lol, Just a funny little tid bit. I uncover them every morning and she comes out and stretches and sits next to Kramer to be fed. I hover nearby and she starts chirping at me. I open the nesting box check it and then close it back up. As soon as I close it back up, she then climbs down and goes back in it. This seems to be her morning ritual, and she won't go back in until I have had a look. I started to walk away once and she screeched at me,rofl. by uncovering them, I mean the cage that I cover at night. They all know exactly when I am going to cover them up at night, they all go to their perch positions for night sleeping. Before we split all the pairs up, there was screeching as to whom was going to sleep where, it was comical.

As promised, he wouldn't sit still long enough for a side shot lol

It seems she has stopped at six eggs. Yesterday was the day for another egg to be laid, and there wasn't anymore. She is setting on the eggs almost all the time now, with quick trips out to be fed and stretch, then it's back in. Once in awhile Kramer will climb inside the box with her. I was covering them up last night and I was peeking through a gap at the bottom, he came out of the box jumped down on the perch and bent over to look out , as if to say, I know your there, I can see you. So now it is a wait and see till and if the eggs hatch. I peeked in the box and she had them laid out in a circle in the concave section of the box. I told Lou, it reminded me of Lisa Simpsons necklace.to be continued...........

rofl, I was trying to be discreet,forgot about the word mating. , funny thing was they did it right in front of our guests. needless to say, they got an up close and personal education on Budgie mating. Twice mind you, I tell you Kramer has no shame . The guest said his name should be Randy, not kramer

everytime the hen comes out of the box lately, Kramer decides to show love to it. Is that normal while she is laying eggs? she's laid six so far and it happened twice today?

sorry, we had company today and we were out and about yesterday, carefully avoiding pet shops, rofl. There will be a picture one of these days, we have to go out again tomorrow,

Ratzy, I was checking through the forum, and I came across a post from a few years back, that said to be careful , because the female only feeds the male when he is sick. It also said to check to see if she is not just begging. Hope that helpsAs far as preening, both budgies preen each other, ours do it all the time.

Our Budgie has laid 5 eggs and about ready to lay a sixth on Sat evening. I was wondering what factors determine the size of the clutch. I have heard from some that it is cage size and how much food was available. We took out her dish the other day to refill it and she shot out of the box with a "worried" behaviour,when we placed it back in with food, she shot back into the box.

okay, another breeding update. There are now 5 eggs in the box, she spends almost all of her time in the box, but comes out briefly to stretch and eat and then it's back in the box. The male will climb into the box with her from time to time. The first time he did that, I kinda of panicked because I thought he found a way out of the cage. I saw his white face in the shadow of the entrance lol. I have the laying pattern down and check every other day, when she comes out for a bit. It seems like she comes out, waits for me to open the box,check it and then close it and she goes right back in. Almost as if she is waiting for me to count the eggs lol. We started to give them spinach leaves,the male cannot seem to get enough of them.

I must be getting better, I had the opaline spangle down, but thought it was cobalt. thanks Kaz.

He does have black eyes, his body has a very light bluey grey type stain on the front, other then that is all white, will post pics tomorrow, no natural light at this time lol. His name is Angel. We seem to be stuck on a Buffy theme: Willow,Zander,Drusilla,Angel.