:greenb: Shebet is destroying her skirt and the band around her cage.

 

I have found bits of cotton thread inside the cage and around it on the floor.

 

She likes attacking it at times, and l'm worried it may hurt her in some way?

 

I was going to replace them once they were fully un-useable, but l'm not sure if its worth it?

 

The skirt l bought (and band) is way too big for the cage, l wasn't sure what size to get so l bought one that was the biggest size - should l buy another that will fit nicely?

Hi Missy,

 

I can't advise on this one. I have never used a skirt on a cage, just kept a dustpan and brush near by

 

 

Feathers.

I don't use a skirt either but I would think the concern would be if a piece of stray thread wrapped around her foot or toe and she was injured.

I've seen seed skirts on eBay that don't look like they would be easy for a bird to chew up, they don't appear to have stray threads and seams to start picking at.

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/BIRD-CAGE-TIDY-NEW-...1QQcmdZViewItem

Maybe one of those is worth trying.

 

Personally i don't use a seed skirt, nor do i need to. I measure my boys seed (2tsp each) so that their cups aren't full to the brim ready to have seed kicked around, plus i put the dishes low in the cage so that there's more chance of the seed falling into the tray than out of the cage. Maybe you could try that and you might find a seed skirt to be unnecessary too.

Edited September 3, 200717 yr by Bea

I don't use one either never have. If you are not wanting to remove it you could add a really good 'chewing' toy to distract her or even some fresh leaves from a gum tree.

I do a lot of vacuuming, used to use one but the budgies at the time loved to throw seeds so it wasn't all that effective.

I also vacuum a lot!! Max (female) is the messiest.. she is also moulting so seeds and feathers everywhere. Charlie is not quite as bad although he likes to sit in his dish while he eats then when he gets out of the dish.. brings a supply of seed out with him!! Good idea about putting it down lower, i will try that, currently the dish is hanging on the side.. Also hadnt thought about limiting the amount of seed in the bowl .. i tend to fill it up... will try to half fill. I tried the tube seed dispenser but they just dont even look at that for some reason. Just not as exciting for them as making a big mess I guess!

On ebay i saw plastic seed guards which were adjustable in size. I was thinking you could do exactly the same with some thick cardboard from a craft store and some tape! Here's an example of what i'm talking about...

You could even find some plastic from a hardware store and it would be longer lasting.

On ebay i saw plastic seed guards which were adjustable in size. I was thinking you could do exactly the same with some thick cardboard from a craft store and some tape!

 

I looked on ebay myself I found a skirt which came in hot pink and l could get her name embroided onto it! But l've decided not to.

 

The cardboard sound like a good idea, although it may cause a few problems with the water/food dispensers (they are ones that you can re-fill from the outside) I will look more into it though - thanks Bea!

 

Oh, and totally off topic, l was doing a survey on a house today and they had in a small cage a bird, exactly like your Bailee! This one looked old, and it didnt have anything to play with I wanted to ask if she wanted it (because they were going to build a new house) and l was going to look after it. Oh well, l hope its happy

Okay, today l was sick and tired of looking at her droopy skirt, so l set out to buy another one. I bought a nice black one that fits much better.

 

I also thought "but how do l stop her from attacking it?" Then it came to me. I went to a cheapo shop and bought 2 pencil cases, the plastic kind. These were A3 size and the plastic was clear and also tough.

 

I cut out long strips (5cm wide) and weaved them in and out of the bars on the cage along the bottom. The tricky part was the 3 doors, but l ended up not weaving through them. Sherbet is now very happy, because she can see more, and the skirt fits much better - and hopefully with this plastic, she won't even need the skirt anymore - it should be able to keep the seed inside anyways :dbb1:

 

So that was my little project for the day, as well as buying a bigger wooden swing but cutting it down to size. Its a bit bigger than her plastic one (l noticed she crouched a bit with her plastic one because it was too high to the roof of the cage).

would you be able to take a picture of her cage, l'm just interested to see how it looks with the weaving around her cage it sounds neat what you did :hap:

would you be able to take a picture of her cage, l'm just interested to see how it looks with the weaving around her cage it sounds neat what you did :hap:

 

Sure thing Although, l don't know if you can see it too well. The plastic is really clear, like laminate almost I think she may have been chewing at her other one for two reasons - one, it was something to do, and two, it was blocking a lot of view from the bottom of the cage.

:dbb1: Sounds very clever, a picture would be nice! :ausb:

Okay here we have some pictures:

 

 

 

I had to change the lighting on this one with photoshop, because l thought you could see it better. Its just above the black skirt.

 

 

 

This is a better one, the strip of plastic is about 5cm wide.

 

 

 

This is what l used, this is one corner of the plastic pencil case. Cost me only $1.20!

ahhh.... l see, that is very creative. l hope it will prevent sherbet from chewing on the skirt too

That's a clever idea with the plastic. I have a similar thing with my new breeder cages where I have use a wide strip of glass on the lower section of the breeder cage. Hopefully it will stop seed spills when I start using them too.

Good job! Let us see how it works!

Do you actually need the material skirt now that you have the plastic in there? It's a good idea!

Do you actually need the material skirt now that you have the plastic in there? It's a good idea!

 

I'm waiting to find that out actually

 

This idea was formed after your suggestion

 

When l clean the cage out next l will see how much seed, if any, has gone into the skirt, if there isn't any, its going

Edited September 10, 200717 yr by Missy

I had to clean the cage last Wednesday, and there were husks in the skirt Which means that the plastic isn't 100% doing what l was hoping it would go, but she's not chewing on the skirt!

 

Ah well, at least she won't be destroying it l guess!

it too bad that the plastic is not 100% seed proof but l'm glad that it is preventing Sherbet from destroying the skirt

Yeah its a shame but at least it will save me from having to buy a new skirt every two weeks because the elastic has gone!

I think it's a great idea. Even if you still need to use the skirt it doesn't look bad as a chewed skirt