have their first egg and with an incubation period of 18 days the first babies hatch well before the eggs 4,5,6 and seven which means that these babies are at a disadvantage as the early babies are becoming quite large before the last ones hatch and often number 7 does not survive even though the hens are feeding all the babies. You should aim to close ring your babies to make record keeping possible. When ringing at between five and eight days of age I hold the baby in one hand with a foot grasped between my first finger and thumb, then the ring is slipped over the two longest toes, along the foot and up the leg shank, I then pull the two remaining toes through the ring with my fingers or a small pointed stick, I do find that some of my own saliva placed on and inside the ring does help this exercise especially if the baby is a


Fit healthy young Budgerigars will fly from the nest box when they are five to six weeks old at which point they are fully feathered. The brood of youngsters can be removed from the parents when the youngest has been out of the nest box for eight days as they will all be feeding themselves by that time.


bit larger than the norm as the saliva acts as a lubricant. Fit healthy young Budgerigars will fly from the nest box when they are five to six weeks old at which point they are fully feathered. The brood of youngsters can be removed from the parents when the youngest has been out of the nest box for eight days as they will all be feeding themselves by that time. Although in an aviary environment I tend to leave them there for several months so that they can learn ‘life skills’ from their parents and other adults present. Of the 70 babies bred in 2017 I have not had a single baby with an undershot beak which is normally caused by a build up of food that lodges on the inside of both the upper and lower mandibles, this food becomes very hard but can be quite easily removed with a match stick. Also I have not experienced


BIRD SCENE 13


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