All Entries Tagged With: "breeding"

Budgerigar Health Part 2 of 5 – Medicine Selection

Sick birds are given their best chance of being saved by adding an appropriate medicine into the ER/Quik Gel formula and administering it directly by crop needle.

At the same time, whilst waiting for the final outcome of veterinary tests, adding Quik Gel to the drinking water may temporarily protect healthy in-contact birds.

Quik Gel

Quik Gel provides an immediate and sustained source of energy to sick birds and is also used during critical times such as breeding. The disinfecting qualities of Quik Gel help protect against the spread of infection.

Quik Gel is a high energy emergency gel also containing vitamins and disinfecting agents. It is used to accelerate recovery from illness and temporarily prevent an infection from worsening while waiting for the results of culture tests. Very sick birds may need crop needle feeding.

Breeding Pairs – Go or Stay – Artificial Lighting

Remove any eggs that you do not want to transfer, but leave the box open for a day. After a day close off the nest box entrance. Allow the pair to adjust to the new scene for another 2 days. Then remove them to a stock cage along with others similarly affected, but make sure the pair are close together.

Worming – Purchasing – Vitamin D – Showing Hens

Vitamin D that is lost in this way should be replaced artificially via multivitamin solutions and / or cod liver oil bought from your pharmacy.

Getting The Best from Your Stud

The desire to breed super exhibition budgerigars is the ambition of every fancier in every country. I am well aware of the fact that the Australian show scene and its structure and administration is different to the UK. That aside, we all have the same aim as it is the finest birds on display that we wish to breed and own for the simple reason of pride in having achieved something that money cannot buy.

Daniel Lütolf – A Breeder Ahead Of His Time

In my time, I have interviewed hundreds of very good breeders in their aviaries in many parts of the world – all have contributed good ideas. Occasionally I come across a few breeders who seem to think more deeply than their contemporaries. One such breeder is Daniel Lütolf in Würenlos, close to Zürich, Switzerland. Lütolf [...]

Breeding Advice

One has to remember that today we strive to breed bigger and better birds. General feeding apart, you must always provide grits which possess granite like particles (insoluble) and shell particles (soluble). Not only should it be given but it must be changed every week to every pair.

Accident at Daniel Lütolf’s Aviary

Daniel Lütolf accidently lost 18 cocks, mostly 2007 and 2008 birds, while breeding very recently. No hens were affected, but naturally eggs and chicks were lost as well. Eggs opened later with embryos in them, were found to have black heads on every embryo.

Creating A Stud

Spots are very important. You can breed outstanding birds, but if the spots are small the impact is lost. A bird without large spots is like a man in a dress suit without a bow tie. Both are unfinished.

Gerald Binks – Andy Chick Interview – December 2008

When I started in November 1945 there were few birds around except in the pet shops and I knew nothing at all about show points or anything really. I was raw in the extreme. There were no Beginner Classes – you started in Novice and then went straight to Champion.

A Budgerigar “Safari” Visit to Brian Sweeting

Last November, just prior to The Budgerigar Society Show in Doncaster, I decided to visit Brian Sweeting at his home in Bridgwater, Somerset. Arguably it is the best studs of pieds in the UK. I clearly remember seeing two magnificent pieds of his at the South Hampshire Show a few seasons ago; both massive birds [...]

Preparing to Breed

In the last 6 weeks I have been working to get the aviary “winterised”. A very cold one by UK standards is forecast. So, having a cedarwood exterior, it needs treating every three years without fail. That has resulted in it still being as good today as it was when I purchased it in 1971. It would be massively expensive to replace as it covers 1200 square feet (110 sq metres).

Chasing “Buffalos”

The Buffalo Effect (BE ) is created when a bird possesses great width above the cere before it sweeps upward but in no way downwards! Think of the buffalo horns. They are wide but then from the horn tips the horns dip downwards to well below eye level before suddenly going up again to join the head.

Fertility & Feeding

I have found that in my book “The Challenge” fanciers love to read the “juicy bits” but when it comes to the two most important chapters in the whole book – the ones on feeding – they gloss over them. They are the vital chapters because without taking them step by step and understanding what is required, then a failed breeding season is very likely.