moglet

It's taken a while but I finally found a breeder at jimboomba who has a young male Albino cock bird to pair up with my Albino hen Tinkerbell. I'm so excited. We are picking him up this weekend. She said I can have a look at her aviary and set up. I can't wait as she has won a tonne of awards including Nationals. Also... drumroll... I finally have my first pair down in a cabinet. They have finished moulting and were getting seriously lovey dovey. I was a bit worried about the season, but they are indoors so I figured it should be okay. Sparkles, opaline recessive hen, and Cosmo, dominant pied green/gold have been smooching madly and rearranging their nesting box for days. I'm like a kid at christmas waiting for our very first egg. I haven't bred budgies for years and I'd forgotten how much I loved it all. This is Sparkles and Cosmo... any ideas on what the babies may look like??? I don't really mind as I don't intend to show... yet. I'm sure the bug will bite at some stage but I am no where near ready for anything like that. I'm happy to be a clucky budgie Aunty.

Hello, I am looking for a breeding age Albino cock to pair with a lovely Albino hen.

No, I haven't had a reason to take her off to the vet.... She looks like a grey tennis ball when she sleeps. I'm hoping she'll lose a bit of it in spring when I put her and Whizzy into a breeding cabinet. I am dying to see them parenting as she is SUCH a sweetie. She is so gentle and friendly even though she's not been trained. I think she will make a lovely Mum with her nature.

Very cool pictures! If you have a macro function on your camera, switch it on when you get close to him to take photos. That is why they are fuzzy when up close, the focal length for your lens is too long for the distance you have the camera away from him. If you can switch to macro you can get very close clear shots. I am lucky to have a mega 19x macro and can take pics almost touching the lens to what I'm shooting. That's how I took the ones of Gizmo and Whizzbang the Terrible. Don't be afraid Dalek will wreck your camera, they are usually built a whole lot tougher than a budgie....! I just love Dalek. He is such a hoot and a stunning colour.

Hmmm. I am going back today to see if that lovely male is there. I will post a picture if I manage to get him! I am really interested to know about him.

I got the guys on this forum to type her early this year as I was usure if she was a DEC or Ino. Their unanimous decision was Albino. She is absolutely snow white with dark red eyes and no iris rings. This is not the best photo of her, she is quite a shy little gal. The whole genetics thing is very interesting, I agree.

Ookkk... The breeder I bought some other birds from strongly suggested not pairing her with a white male... now I'm confused So... how do I know if a male is split for Albino short of buying him from a breeder and knowing his family line. Would the just about all white male I saw with tiny dashes of blue just be a really recessive pied, or is he split for Albino or can you just not tell by looking at him? What result can I expect in that case.

Hello, I have a pure white ino hen. My daughter is keen to breed her and would desperately love to raise white babies. I have advised her that putting two whites together is not necessarily the best idea as it can cause issues. I saw a beautiful male the other day. He was pretty much all white, but with small patches of sky blue on him. Would he make a suitable Dad? If not, what would you guys reccommend as a Dad. I understand we will get white females and probably blue boys from pairing her with a blue male as the ino is a sex link thing. She is a lovely looking hen, and will be ready in about October this year.

I have a cage full of the scruffiest moulting budgies at the moment. They all look bedraggled and are busily preening and hurling feathers out all over the place. Everyday I vac a big pile of cast off feathers up, even the dog has feathers on her from sniffing around the cage. They all have lots of pin feathers and the couples are preening each other madly around the head. It looks quite enjoyable, except that I don't think I could twist my head upside down to have someone else scratch my chin! My questions are: How long does a moult last for? How many times are year? Do all budgies everywhere moult around the same seasonal time or is it a community thing where mine moult at a certain time and some one elses at another time? Do I need to give them any kind of supplment during moult. I'm just curious to learn more about my darling birds.

Ha ha! Maybe. Or she might be going through the budgie equivalent of teenage awkward years. Whizzbang adores her though. Maybe he likes 'em big! She is quite a bit bigger and taller than he is.

Hey Cheeky, how is the little teletubbie Oscar going on his diet? Possum is just as pudgy as ever, despite my encouraging her to come out to fly daily and cutting out the fatso foods. She just eats more of everything else I think!!!

I wanted to show you these pics. I took them with the camera on the same table as the birds. I sat there for ages until they got far to interested in the camera to be afraid and came over to investigate. Sadly, Gizmo, the Lutino, died earlier this year. She was the most amazingly friendly and loving budgie I have ever had.

I love Dalek, he is so gorgeous! Your photos are terrific fun. I've been away for a bit being flat out busy with work, so it was so nice to log on and find Dalek up to no good again!!!! Got some photographers hints if you want them.... If you can, turn up the ISO speed on your camera to 400. Most snappy cameras are set by default to about 200. In low light you can push it up 400 and it will help with allowing more light and less movement blur. Also, if you have a tripod use it. If not, improvise and stabilise the camera in one spot. I have been known to use piles of books, boxes etc. It just helps in low light situations to avoid camera shake. Using a timer feature on your camera will avoid camera shake as you push the button. Set up the scene, set the timer and try to keep Dalek's attention from wandering.... LOL!! Whenever I do a shoot for work, I always shoot a million too many photos. Snap all the time, you can always delete them. You may find you have thirty photos, but one only with have the 'wow' factor. IF you have a lamp around, set it up behind or to the side of the camera, it will just help to throw a little more light on your scene. Keep going, they are way cool!!! What about some rubber insects, snakes, dinosaurs or even skeletons, pieces of fruit, he could be in a giant orchard!? Please keep posting, they are very fun

What a gorgeous boy! Maan, if he is overweight then my Possum has issues.....

I totally get that reason. My little dog, Daisy, is my furry angel. When the kids are at their Dad's or I am really down she makes me get my shoes on and go to the park. Watching her enjoying just belting around at top speed always helps. Having her snuggle under the doona at night is so comforting. Dalek is a lucky boy to be so loved

They are so sweet! Possum likes to sleep on one particular swing and Wizzy sleeps on the top where it hangs from above her. He gets crabby when anyone else tries to go to sleep near them and shoos them away. He follows her around everywhere just waiting for her to give him a morsel of attention

Dalek very obviously adores you, so the biggest punishment for him would be not to get your attention. He will grow out of it I;m sure. I had a biter for a while, he was supposed to be my daughter's pet but apparently I was the love of his life and he would bite anyone who tried to take him off me. I used to put him back in his cage when he bit someone and he HATED that. He soon either grew out of it or learned he didn't like the consequences. Budgies are very switched on. Dalek will come good!! He sounds like one of those very special birds that come along once in a while.

Yes, I think Whizzbang is a GF Cobalt. He is much darker in real life, the flash has brightened his colours a lot. His chest is deep Olive Green, and it merges to quite a deep blue down his tummy and rump.

Couldn't help myself....

The PMS connection is weird!! Official budgie colours... what a cracker. I have been known to take my PMS swatches to Spotlight at times.....! Lucky they don't have a PMS 185 budgie match... I'd be worried!!!! Well, now I know I have a beautiful Mauve pied girl.... who needs a good personal trainer!

A bex and a good lie down!

I did wonder about the supposed pairing for life thing reading about the breeders putting certain pairs and swapping them around. So you think Tinkerbell was frisky and after Cosmo? She's normally a very introverted little soul. Very active, just by herself though normally. There was so much going on in that cage for about an hour it was amazing. We all needed a bex and a lie down when they had sorted it out!

Today the whole aviary was a bit nutty. It was sooo weird for a while. Whizzbang decided to hit on Sparkles. He left Possum alone and was intently pursuing Sparkles all over the place (she was kind of responding but not overly). Cosmo is Sparkle's current love, so he was alarmed and chasing Whizzbang off very intently. It got quite intense for a while between the two boys I was keeping and eye on it and was about to take one of them out. One boy either side of Sparkles trying to out sing the other and grab her attention. To add to that commotion, my very quiet little Albino hen Tinkerbell, started actively pursuing Cosmo. She was flying at him and trying to land on top of him and chasing him and doing it over and over. I don't know whether it was aggression or what. Cosmo was completely not into it and kept trying to escape her and he looked quite alarmed. Tink has not paired with anyone. She usually loves to play by herself. Then it all died down after about 40 mins and it all seemed to go back to normal!!!! Whizz and Cosmo are best mates again and Possum and Whizz appear to be back where they were with him trying his hardest to get her to snuggle up to him. Does this kind of upset happen normally or did I inadvertently set them off in some way... or is Sparkles coming into season?? And what's with Tinkerbell being so intent on Cosmo so suddenly. Poor guy looked like he was being stalked.

Way cool!! How does the colour chart thing work? Is that a standard breeder thing??

Hmmm. Her tail is white mostly. She has a white patch on her rump starting in the smaller feathers then just about all of the long tail feathers are white. I think just a few shorter tail feathers underneath are sort of not quite black more a deep grey. But not many. The rest of her tail is just white. All her long wing feathers are white too. The feathers around her vent are kind of mauvey tinged light blue, tinging to quite an irridescenty blue/mauve/purpley colour right at the very end of her body feathers behind the vent. The dots on her face are black, the cheek patches are deep blue. Sorry about my tragic bird description... She is really pretty and I am quite interested to know what she is and why. She has paired up with Whizzbang (T2 yellowface cobalt something.... (I'll look it up again!) I hope they will have gorgeous babies in spring when she is older. This is so interesting. Thank you. YAY!! Some one knows what planet I am on at least!!!