Gaby

Hello everyone, I found a recipe for calcium blocks on this forum and am wondering if there has been a change to the recipe as it was posted in 2008. If there is a member who has a good recipe he/she is using for their budgies, I would really like to know it as I want to make my own blocks. Cheers Gaby

Hi all, The last 3 or 4 months have been a steep learning curve to say the least. Amongst other things I learned, budgies can be very aggressive. Sadly, I had some fatalities but some I was able to save. One of the injured budgies has lost all its "nails" on her claws and even some claws hacked off before I could save it. I watched one budgie pinning another down on its back, jumping on top of it and starting to hack. He was so busy that I was able to grab him and remove him from the avairy. But nevertheless, it is so lovely that there is now peace and unity in the aviary and my budgies have started raising their young. Each nesting box has 6 or so eggs in it and in each nest 2 chicks have hatched. My question is now: will the other eggs hatch as well and in what amount of time should that happen?? Can't wait to see what colours the chicks will be It is so cute to see the man of the house feeding his wife ..... lol. Its so nice just watching them! Just felt I had to share how rewarding this all is :-)

I would like to know what seed mix do breeders on this forum feed their budgies? I know all about the fresh greens etc but am in doubt which seed mix is best when they are breeding. I heard about feeding a mix of canary and budgie seeds, or canary seed mix and millet - what millet should I use? Cheers Gaby

I thought I should fill you in as to what happened with the budgie with seizures. I found this on another website and especially budgies can be prone to these stress symptoms. It says as follows: Symptoms: Seizures may be mild to severe, partial or generalized, frequent or infrequent; and may involve twitching, paddling or convulsing. A bird may present a sudden, temporary loss of consciousness and control of motor function It may appear disoriented and unable to perch. During a seizure, a bird may vocalize, lose consciousness, fall off its perch, flap its wings uncontrollably and stiffen its body. A bird may lose consciousness, vocalize and flap its wings uncontrollably. A partial seizure is characterized by a continuous twitching of a wing or leg. Fortunately, many birds will recover from a seizure and slowly regain their ability to control their movements and perch. After a week or so my budgie started improving. It is now almost back to normal and I will keep it at home as a pet.

I will use Ivomec as you suggest. I am observing them carefully but so far , no new sick budgies. I have posted another topic, would you be able to help with that one? There was no clicking noise or abnormal breathing. jThey were just fluffed up, very sleepy and head under wings most of the time. I feel a bit disheartened whether breeding budgies might just be too difficult. By The Way I heard someone saying that purple or olive budgies are mutations and don't live as long as blue or green ones - Is that true?? :-o

I seem to have a bad run with budgies at the moment. The budgies in my shop are healthy and happy, except one which arrived through a local breeder at the end of last week., It was the smallest budgie and as far as I know they handfed it for a week or so till it was ready to eat seeds. It spend Friday with the others (all from the same breeder and nest) and appeared normal. This morning I arrived at the shop and this budgies displayed signs which I know from ducks and geese: sitting with legs spread wide and very erect almost falling over, twisting head and very unbalanced. What is wrong??

Thank you for your replies. I did not ask what they were fed with . How silly of me. I am feeding the budgies in the aviary with Golden Cob Supreme Breeders Choice which is enriched with vitamins and minerals. What Finnie mentioned sounds very much like what the first one was doing. The second budgie was still eating because I saw the empty hulls,but it just as skinny. The other 2 budgies are in the aviary with the other birds and look okay. Do you think I should quarantine them again? Could it be worms? What is the best wormer to use?

what about wholemeal rice? Is that okay?

Hi all, the following happened: I bought a breeding pair about 6 weeks ago and left them in a cage for about 3 or 4 weeks and they seemed to be normal healthy budgies. I then added them to my aviary. After a week I noticed one was always fluffed up and just sitting on a shelf looking miserable. I caught it and noticed it was very skinny. I placed it in a cage, tried different seeds as I noticed it was picking up the seeds but not eating them and dropping them back in the dish. I then added some honey and vitamin supplement to the water. It seemed hungry and pecked at the seeds as if there was no tomorrow. It shortly picked up and I though I had found the right seeds for it, but the next morning it was miserable again. I just died after another week. I went to check on the other budgie I bought at the same time and noticed it was as skinny. I took it inside to look after it but it died a couple of days later. Does anyone have an idea what happened to these budgies? I am now watching the next pair as I bought 2 breeding pairs at the same time. Maybe I can this time save them if the same happens with those. Thank you.

Thank you so much for your friendly advice and encouragement! None of the above I knew

Hi all, I have been reading posts on this forum for the last couple of hours and now am not quite sure which way to go. Hubbie is building an nice walk-in aviary for me and I have the following questions: what is the best and most economical wire to use and what should be the must-have "furniture" in the aviary besides the obvious like feeders and perches; as in an aviary you cannot control which bird is breeding with which, would cages be better; what should I use as flooring - concrete, hay (as I have horses) or maybe pebbles or road base. Questions, questions ....... Hope someone can help me and answer my questions. Thank you. Gaby

Hello, thought I introduce myself. I live in regional WA an hour from Perth and want to try breeding budgies. It is a bit daunting because of the colour genetics if you want to achieve certain colours or mutations (?) but what I gather most people I know that breed budgies for fun don't really worry about colour very much. Anyway, I am running against a brick wall at the moment as I find it impossible to find some breeding pairs to start with. Maybe I have to buy some babies and wait till they are old enough .... Hope you all have a Happy New Year. Cheers Gaby PS I have 3 pet budgies and the rest lives temporarily at the pet shop I own :-D