Walked past my new aviary today which hold 3 budgies that were given to me with the (secondhand) aviary and heard a little thump....

 

upon investigation i saw the female on the bottom of the aviary near the water bowl which i just placed in there.

 

i thought "just having a drink until she could not fly back up to the perch.....

 

she climbed up one side of the aviary and finally reached the perch and say next to the male which i thought was her mate... but the closer she got the male began to peck at her???

 

I took her out and bought her to the toilet which has no hazards at all and placed her down. she confirmed that there was definately something wrong when she tried to fly and only got to approx. 2 inches off the ground and then dropped.

 

I had a look at her wings and they seem fine but im no expert.

 

i also noticed here cere was raised, brown and crusty. this made me think that she may be pregnant but then thought could it be scaly face? ... looks almost the sam to me...

 

she was flying today according to my wife so this has come to a but of a shock...

 

any thoughts???

 

do they stop flying when pregnant??

 

HELP please...

 

Ian

sometimes a hen can get what i call heavy when close to the lay

you can tell when a hen is going to lay as her bottom is quiet large and low

but ive never had one so dont know but be interested in responces myself

Well, for a start birds do not get "pregnant" so the only way they get "larger"as such is an egg sized lump under ther tail at the vent just before laying an egg...a day or so before.

Double check the flying thing as you need to watch her some more to work out exactly whats going on. There are some birds that dont fly or dont fly well even with all their flight feathers.

Whether or not she is about to lay an egg will have nothing to do with her flying ability or not.

A flaky crusty cere is a breeding condition thing and scalyface is something entirely different.

If you can post some pictures we can help you identifying the problem if there is one.