Many products come from ground-up pallets that come from trees that have been treated in all different ways – both when alive and subsequently in sawmills – and indeed sprayed with paints of different kinds. If used as flight flooring and cage floors, it is arguably a source of trouble for our birds.

In recent times I was helped by Les Martin – whose stud has proven itself to be one of the best in the UK – who recently won Best In Show at the London & Southern Counties Budgerigar Society Show.

At the time, he sent me several bags of super sawdust which I needed for the nest boxes and I found it perfect. That got my thoughts swinging towards the flights and cage floors. Was it suitable for these areas and how safe was it?

After contacting the suppliers, Lillico, I found that they supply a product called “Gold Chips” – where the sawdust is ultra clean and has been heat treated to remove contaminants. Added to that, it is great for us fanciers because it does not scatter as the birds fly – and furthermore, goes further than many other baled varieties and is far easier to lift each bag.

The upshot of this, is that I now have, as has Les Martin, only “Gold Chips” sawdust in use permanently.

From experience, no deaths at all from suspicious other forms of sawdust has occurred anywhere.

Lillico has now taken up advertisement space on Budgerigar.co.uk’s “Gold Pages”, and based upon my own personal experience, I can happily recommend the whole hobby to order this product, if they want to make certain there cannot be any deaths from this sawdust.

All details for contacting Lillico are on their “clickable” advertisement on this website.

So, thinking cap on and the first step was to consider what changes had occurred in recent times? It came down to a suspicion about the sawdust bedding on the breeding cage floors, which I had been forced to change to following the cessation of business by my previous suppliers.

I changed to “Easibed” which is perfect for stables, but in speaking to fanciers like Trevor Clarkson, Geoff Tuplin and Les Martin, it is alleged that such bedding comes from all sources of woods including old pallets and is certainly not sterilised. Apparently, the Snowflake Easibed packs are cleaner, but I was also concerned that I had seen, when a cage was cleaned out thoroughly and new bedding replaced, that the birds went down immediately and started picking up all sizes of particles. The question was, were any of these being caught in the airways and death was instantaneous? My policy is that if there is any doubt, act and change the situation.

I made a lot of enquiries and finally decided to pass all my stock of Easibed over to my granddaughter, who has horses, and research a safer source. I accept that my suspicions about that particular product have yet to be proved. I can only surmise that ground down pallets may contain all manner of treated and untreated wood chippings – the question is, treated with what? Our Budgerigars are highly sensitive as we all know.

I have been helped considerably by Les Martin, who did so well at the 2009 Budgerigar Society World Championship. He had earlier directed me to “Gold Chips Bedding” sawdust, from a company called Lillico, for nest box use. It is perfect for that purpose and I have used it for about three years. The company provide all manner of samples that can be sent for, but the big advantage is that they supply all their products from clean wood sources, some of which are heat treated to 550 degrees centigrade and supplied, if required, with a batch-numbered certificate of analysis.

Having talked to Trevor, Les and Geoff, I started by contacting Lillico for a heavy based sawdust for the cages so that it would not scatter everywhere. A set of samples were sent and two seemed suitable. However, I spoke again to Les Martin and he said “Gold Chips” was perfect for flights, cages and boxes. It was also pointed out – and this is important – that “Gold Chips” in the boxes can be too deep, so that the eggs cannot be turned by the hens and are consequently addled! So only a thin layer is required. I tend to put a big handful in myself – so I continue to learn.

Geoff Tuplin mentioned another Lillico sawdust product that he uses for the nest boxes. I got a sample sent to me and it looks great – so I am thinking about that and will make a decision after a test run with some pairs that are yet to start breeding. It is called “Gold Flake Bedding Material”.

In conclusion, the last time I was in South Africa (at Reinhard and Holger Molkentin’s home), I noticed they were using a thin layer of silver sand in all boxes. That is also worth thinking about, as young chicks, as they start searching around, will get sand grains down into their gizzards much earlier than usual – which I would guess could be an advantage. Secondly, one could add silver sand in with the “Gold Chip” which would cover both the absorbing factor and sand grain effects together?

Before somebody writes to me, I am well aware that a contradiction to deep sawdust being a problem in a nest box, is that Ray Steele in Yorkshire has really deep boxes, almost full to the top and yet seems to breed well. So it is a matter of choice and a bit of deep thinking. Anyway I am going over to the Lillico products immediately and I will have a happy granddaughter getting a few freebies of “Easibed” for her horses!

• Gold Chips Bedding website:
  • www.goldchipsbedding.com
• Lillico Biotech website (requires registration):
  • www.lillicobiotech.co.uk

This original version, now edited for international appreciation, was written by Jean Horrobin and Marilyn Harrington and is reproduced with their kind permission and acknowledgement to the BS of New South Wales and The Budgerigar. My appreciation also goes to Keith Gough for the accompanying photographs.

GSB

Introduction

Henry George lives with his wife, Diane in a stunning area just north of Brisbane in Queensland. He is arguably one of Australia’s pre-eminent budgerigar breeders and his results at national level are second to none. For the record, Henry was the driving force to get 4500 birds into Australia from the UK so many years ago and the leader of the first syndicate. Incidentally, Henry was not Australian born – he comes from Yorkshire, UK!

Henry George – In His Own Words

My wife Diane and I live on a property situated in a picturesque valley with a mountainous backdrop. The aviary is large and is situated towards the middle of the property and is surrounded by horse paddocks along with 40 horses – which are my wife’s passion. We have a German Warmblood stud of horses with arguably the best bloodline in the country. Germany has the best dressage horses in the world. Our horses are headed by our stallion Donnatraum (Donny for short) who is unbeaten in the show arena.

My Budgerigar History

I started with budgerigars in 1975 when my daughters expressed an interest, but, like others experiences, they eventually took a different route – but I continued. I discovered the Queensland Budgerigar Society (QBS) and went to meetings and obtained advice on aviary construction. We learned a lot about budgerigars at the same time.

I moved through the ranks to Open Status in the minimum time after successes on the show bench and then took the judges course to become a Queensland judge in May,1979. By 1991, I became a National Judge and have subsequently judged at the nationals on four separate occasions.

My major achievements included winning, at first, Champion of Show with a cinnamon grey cock at the QBS Annual Show – when still a beginner! However, the achievement that ranks highest in my mind was winning my first national with an opaline light green cock in 1982. Since then, my achievements include 27 firsts at national Level and include greens, blues, yellowfaces, dominant pieds, lutinos, opalines, spangles, lacewings and clearwings, all of which varieties I still keep.

My Stud

My aviary is 25 metres long by 9 metres wide (82 by 30 feet). It has four major flights, 75 breeding cages and a walkway from where to enter the flights easily. The aviary contains a store, an office, a 5 metres wide (16 feet) birdroom fitted with food storage bins, a bank of 16 show cage training cages and a further 12 more cages for newly weaned youngsters and birds being prepared for shows. There is also a quarantine room for new purchases and any sick birds that arise with a heated hospital cage to hand. The room also contains two glass-fronted trophy display cabinets.

Since our water comes from a borehole, all water has to be boiled and filtered before it is pumped around the property. In the aviary, various vitamins are added for half the week, and a water cleanser for one day a week – mostly KD powder. (A product from Dr Rob Marshall – click here for more details.)

The birds receive a softfood mixture daily. This comprises soaked wheat and oats, an animal protein called Hi-Pro supplied by the veterinarian Ron Woodhead; grated carrots or silverbeet and a square of multigrain bread which is dampened with milk, over which I sprinkle canary egg biscuit and Budgie Starter. Seed is soaked for 24 hours and rinsed, put back and KD powder added to kill off any bacteria. It is drained and then fed.

Breeding

Nest boxes are checked daily and my system is to have record cards on the boxes after which the vital details are recorded in the year’s main record system. Breeding time for me is spring and summer, not winter as winter gives bad results. I check that every bird that is possibly fit to breed is exactly that, starting with a hen and then finding the right cock that is related and looks visually suitable. My favourite pairings are aunt to nephew; uncle to niece, first or second cousins and half brother to half sister, providing that the cock or hen that I am breeding back to, was not closely related to the birds that produced the half brother or half sister involved. I never closely inbreed as it never seems to work for me.

With my selection process, it is rare to have a hen refuse to nest but if this is the case then I allow her three weeks to lay. If no results, then the pair is broken up and returned to the flights. I normally allow for two rounds, but if a pair produces real quality in their first round, I foster out their second round eggs and let the pair rear their third round.

I check all eggs for fertility using a laser torch. In hot weather, I get a bowl of warm water and place all eggs that are within two days of hatching into the bowl for 10 seconds. This is enough to soften the inner membrane and it increases the hatchability. Other fanciers seeing this have remarked how much this has helped them as well. Feather plucking can be reduced by putting a lump of rock salt in the breeding cage concerned – it sometimes works. If not, remove the offender and leave the partner to finish the rearing process.

1950s

In those days, nest box designs were the “leftovers” from pre-second world war thinking. They were designed to be placed inside a cage and hooked on to the rear facing cage wall with the nest hole facing the light. Other “leftovers” were like minature desks, where the parents entered via a hole on the top and squeezed down vertically. Watching them emerge was always good for a smile and a laugh, as can be imagined.

My great friend Jim Moffat used these and even up to his passing in the last decade, still had a few pairs using this box design. Old habits die hard!

It was not long before I realised that breeders were, like myself, having many problems, particularly when trying to retrieve the box for inspection, unhooking it, then seeing the hen, or the pair, dashing around and trying not to drop the box with one hand. Needless to say, at best, the eggs were scattered all over the place and many times damaged. The final irritation was when the fancier entered his birdroom, all the hens would come off the eggs to have a look at him. Lots of faces would appear to see the newcomer. This could not continue, as far as I was concerned. So my thinking cap went on.

Nest Box Design Changes

With hindsight, it is easy to look at today’s designs and accept what we have, but back then we were stuck with what we had. I realised that a box had to have the following changes listed below, to avoid the above disasters, but with the added sound reasoning required which would suit the breeding birds, before such a change was made.

So I addressed the following:

• 1 – Overcome the danger of dropping the box.
• 2 – Overcome the problem of massive disturbance and smashed eggs.
• 3 – Overcome the hens leaving their eggs when you entered the aviary.
• 4 – Overcome unhooking the box with the adult birds inside.
• 5 – Overcome the chicks dropping out too soon and either dying from cold before you got home or similarly overnight.

I started with items three and four! Build a test nesting box which could be placed on the outside of the cage, ideally on the front with the entrance hole facing away from the light. This, I hoped, would work.

In the inside I had the usual concave base. This box was up for a full season and when empty a new pair introduced. The result? A massive improvement with more chicks in that box than anywhere else!

I had 20 cages at that time. Still thinking about it. I could see that hooking on this box was stupid. Fine for taking over to the bench to inspect, but the parents were difficult to dislodge and if you held your hand under the box, it was cold. I wanted it warm! In fact doubly warm and that gave me another idea.

Why not have a double box, one inside the other with the outer box bolted to the cage? So, I scrapped that first test and re-designed again. The result? Even better! Steadiness with the parents, box solid with no movement on the cage front and with a round perch sticking out under the nest hole protruding into the cage for perching.

The last was also a developing problem as I found that a round perch became slippery with use, so a square perch, as with the major perches in all cages, was fitted. Finally, I had forgotten about the chicks dropping out too early. The new test box was the same as previously in depth from the base of the entrance hole to the concave. Back to the drawing board and try an 8 inch (20 cm) drop. Certainly better and by this time various manufacturers were taking notice and marketing, “The Binks Type Double Nest Box”.

That snowballed and a few years later everyone had them. Then the Binks name vanished – hardly surprising and understandable, but the hobby was breeding bigger birds and was the better for it.

Darker is Better

In 2000, a visit to Jim Laurie in Scotland made me think yet again. He was a breeder who had very thick walled wooden boxes some 9 inches (23 cm) high outside measurement but only a 5 inch (13 cm) square concave in the base. Breeding was fantastic as he had coupled the feeding to my diet and was breeding better results than I was. He was, because of the thickness of the box walls, spraying the boxes every night very heavily. Naturally I was very interested. Could my 8 inch (20 cm) boxes be still too shallow? Time to test again! This time up to 11 inch (28 cm) height (outside measurement), but more of that later.

Jim Laurie had a great knack with budgerigars, as most Scottish fanciers will attest to. With his deep boxes and with five chicks in most of them, they were crammed into the boxes – vertically when the parents were in there! And they were big chicks that you could hardly get your hands round. However, they could not reach the nest hole easily until nearly four and a half weeks of age and that had the benefit of holding back the hens from laying too soon and having those eggs scattered and soiled in the process.

My only reservation was the 5 inch (14 cm) square base. I felt it could be enlarged to the standard 8 inch (20cm) x 5inch (14 cm) size, made 11 inches (28 cm) deep and a small inside stepping block under the nest hole glued in – mainly to keep the eggs restricted into the resultant smaller area in the concave. Remember, the darker the box inside, the better the hens sit and incubate. That leads to more chicks on the perch at 6 weeks of age.

I did this and now have 56 boxes with all these factors incorportated. The result? I breed budgerigars reasonably easily given full attention to other well understood essential factors. Boxes today are a far reach from the very early fanciers’ techniques. They started with a coconut shell!

Note: This article is more fully discussed in “The Challenge” book which is to be recommended as an essential addition to your library. Other successful designs are also discussed.

• You are a young school person who has little money, but your parents are fully supportive in all that you do.
• You are in full employment with a family, but need a sound hobby to relieve the pressures of the workplace – something different in fact.
• You are in full employment, but can see that retirement approaches or redundancy might loom at any stage.
• You have just retired and want a hobby that both you and your partner could enjoy together.

What is the first stage?

Firstly, the advice so that you do not waste hard earned money from whatever source.

This is to not do anything in the way of erecting a birdroom or buying budgerigars in the first year – you have much to learn and you learn from two sound, must have, up-to-date books and you have a lot of visits to make to aviaries owned by very well experienced fanciers.

This website advertises many breeders and the links, appropriate to your country, will open such doors to gain massive quantities of ideas and designs for your aviary that suit the birds first and then you – in that order!

The essential books are published on this website.

Stage #2

In most countries, but not all, there are National Societies – plus what are termed State or Area Societies and then the Local Societies near to you.

Your contacts with other breeders will have opened such doors. My advice is that you join the National Society immediately.

In addition to paper magazines that are supplied as part of your annual subscription, it is through these major societies that you get your budgerigar rings – which are called closed rings. These have your personal code number inscribed on each ring for the rest of the time you are in the hobby.

Stage #3

You are now a member!

In addition to the books mentioned, you may find there is a National Mixed Variety Publication – contact your paper shop as they will have details. A few mixed variety magazines are superb covering Budgerigars, Parrots, Foreign Finches and Canaries.

One such is the Australian publication “Australian Birdkeeper Magazine”. High quality, beautiful photography and whichever variety is your preference, there is something to learn within the pages on the other species.

As you gain experience, ask questions all the time. Many beginners feel they are being silly at a meeting of their chosen club, asking basic questions. Do not hold back – nobody minds especially any lecturers who feed off such questions and thrive on them.

Also never put anybody, who you might think is a top champion, on a pedestal. We are all in the same hobby, all involved and our doors are open to beginners and champions at all times. Just call up out of courtesy and make a time to visit and above all – enjoy the experience.

Stage #4

By the end of your first apprentice year, you will be bursting to erect an aviary and get going – but the wait will have been worth it, believe me.

Remember, it is no use spending on basic sheds unless you anticipate you will have to move home at some stage. Even then it is better to make a sectional birdroom that can be moved. Next, remember, however big you decide you will have your aviary, eventually you will want a bigger one. So allow for expansion.

We now come to Local Authority permission to build! However, before you do that, I strongly advise you to approach all your neighbours that border your property and ask their permission, or their approval, to erect your aviary. Ninety nine percent will give that if you explain clearly what the design is and that you are not putting up a chicken run affair. Once they have been approached and know what you are doing and have said “Go ahead”, they are then happy and thereafter will have great difficulty if they have a complaint. Noise can be controlled by a design that does not necessitate outside flights, but in hot countries this may be desirable.

You now approach the “Local Authority”. Be aware that staff in such organisations are not always sure of their own rules and will insist that you have to have Planning Permission and conform to Building Regulations. This author found out the hard way on one occasion.

What you need to realise is that if your aviary is not attached to your property you (probably) do not need Planning Permission, as it is “external to the uses of the dwelling house on freehold property”. Local Authority property is another matter.

You do however have to conform to the Building Regulations which are an easy matter to deal with. At your Local Authority Offices ask for sight of the document applicable to a structure for a hobby (in the UK it is called “The Town and Country Planning Act”). They will oblige with copies of that information for you to study and give you forms to complete. If you have a problem, go to another Local Authority and ask them for help – on the understanding that you are moving into the area they are responsible for. Then armed, go back to your Local Authority and submit what you now know beyond doubt. Obviously such rules will vary from country to country – but the basic principles apply.

Stage #5

With full approval and design decided, you can start building.

There are basic pitfalls – such as having too much light with oversize windows, so that in hot weather the birds suffer and do not breed well.

Aviaries should be about ten feet / three metres wide, minimum, all through. This allows for external nest boxes and seed store benches and yet allows space for you and visitors to be comfortable.

Make sure your aviary is on a very sound concrete base with a solid foundation underneath. Are you having water laid on as well as electricity? It is cheaper in the long run to do this at the start.

Consider skylights above the internal flight areas, but not in the breeding area as other indigenous birds can cause disturbance at the wrong times, plus budgerigars like to breed in shade.

If you can afford it, double glazing is also greatly beneficial and avoids the dreaded painting and rot replacement as with wooden frames. You might trace some second hand double glazing to save money. It is certianly worth the effort.

Stage #6

Fitting out is a pleasure. Keep your eyes open for anybody stopping their hobby, if money is tight. Their cages may suit you and you can get them at a low price. If cost is not a problem, this website has a list of reliable suppliers and these should be approached first.

Your initial early visits to aviaries will have told you what you require. Once complete and you have obtained all the seed and foodstuffs that you require, not forgetting a heated platform and antibiotics for the odd sick bird – you are ready to start buying your birds.

Just one last word. When buying what will be your Foundation Group to build your stud, use your eye for quality to the full that you have learned along the way. There are all sorts of great people in the hobby who treat you fairly but there are a few “rogues” (as there are in all walks of life) who will sell you poor or problem birds that have little or no use.

The test for any fancier is to travel, say, 250 miles or more and have the courage to walk away and go back home if they have any doubts at all. Then you are a true fancier. Treat everyone, in time, who comes to you when you are a champion, totally fairly and then you will have great credibility and respect from everyone.

Enjoy your new found hobby and remember your friends are more important than the birds – not the other way round!

GSB: 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.

After two weeks there, both should be safe to place in the flights and the hen’s internal organs will have reduced back to normal. Treat hens very carefully at this time.

I came into budgerigars for the hobby – not politics which is depressing when it is destructive rather than constructive. Should I stay?

GSB: It is not a good answer, but it’s life everywhere especially in all forms of exhibition livestock breeding.

Successful societies are when there is a good chairperson who will not brook troublesome members who are out of order and do not know how to behave in a public meeting. A weak front table of well intentioned fanciers who form the officers of the society, is a measure for aggravation and loss of members.

The cure is obvious. You have a vote! The society is more important that an out of hand member.

Put another way, tennis was more important as a game than the irrational behaviour of John McEnroe in his heyday, which should have been stamped on immediately on the very first occasion it occurred.

Regarding artificial lighting, what extra hours does one allow for the aviary lights to be on when darkness begins to set in ?

GSB: In the northern hemisphere, as a generalistion, lights should come on in the summer months at about 17:00 hours until 22:00 hours.

In winter advance this to on at 15:00 hours and off at the same time as summertime. There’s no need for any other change unless you are about managing your stock and it is needed.

We cannot speculate about the southern hemisphere. Perhaps we can be advised please?

I take a laid back attitude preferring to look at the end of season total rather than getting depressed about losses over which I have no control. By the same token I am obsessed with good husbandry throughout and certainly this has a direct bearing on the end results.

Feeding

This is where it all begins. There is a familiar adage that “You only get out, what you put in”. So very true, but, as I have written before, this can be overdone or conversely underdone – both with disastrous results.

I do not propose to dwell on this, suffice to say that if you have a copy of my publication “The Challenge”, then I urge you to really spend time on reading the two most important chapters – both are on feeding. The chapters are pitched in lay terms so my advice is to read both above all the other “glossy popular chapters”. They are the basic key to success without which you cannot achieve success in the hobby and these chapters also contain examples of International diets that have proven themselves over years of trial and error.

Bad feeding and poor husbandry both combine to give a poor season. Remember that.

Starting The Season

There is no doubt that the start to any season is the most difficult. I can tell that the birds are ready to breed by looking at the behaviour of the hens as well as their condition. All my flights have the sexes mixed year round. This is because the current year stock learn their sexual habits very early. If you keep the big hens separate they just sit in the flights and get overweight with predictable poor results. Mix them and keep them active.

You will have gathered that I ignore the fixed ring issue date we have in the UK (1st January), which I have tried to alter for 20 years (to no avail) because of the climate changes that have affected the start up period dramatically. However, there is hope on the horizon as the Budgerigar Society Exhibition, which is our most important show, is now held annually in the last weekend of September, resulting in a 3 month gap before our rings arrive and our birds, as a generalisation, need to be paired immediately after the show.

Pairing

The larger the stud the less the losses, whatever they are, affect you. If you are in livestock you have to expect tragedies – especially during the breeding season.

My pairings are made in a strict procedure. I place four birds to a show cage, sexes separate, all down the full length of the birdroom three cages high. This puts all under slight stress and shows up the faults particularly with type and stance faults.

I also select each pair on the basis of ideal choice first and pedigree second. Never the other way round. I certainly never pair birds by selection from the flights. I want the show cages to reveal their true qualities if they have any. Not all do and that applies to every aviary!

Laying

I have, like many other breeders of top quality birds, found that, unlike the post second world war birds which laid in 7-10 days, the massive birds of today take longer in many cases. Indeed, 21 days is not uncommon before the first egg appears, especially with maiden hens.

I have also established that with modern feeding techniques one can pair such birds earlier than the advocated 10 months minimum age. I can often see hens at 8 months that are raring to breed – so up they go and are successful. The downside is that such hens are difficult to start feeding their young due to inexperience and relative age, but I will come to that later.

Remember, I, like many other breeders, have totally enclosed aviaries and no outside flights.

The First Clutches

I now assume you have nests in with eggs everywhere. Fertility is the big hurdle and the worrying time. Bad fertility and you can suffer.

Again, coming from long experience, this is caused by you and your feeding and your poor husbandry. You are the provider. This cautionary comment applies to very low fertility over 60 per cent of your pairings – at least.

Looking on the bright side, let us assume the reverse situation and all has been done that can be done and 60% of the stud is fertile – perhaps even 80%. You will never achieve much more and certainly I always have to carry out what I term a “Cabinet Re-Shuffle” a couple of times in the early stages of any season for a variety of small reasons.

Disturbance

I recently had an e-mailed video from an airline pilot (Liam McGuiness). He has fitted up a webcam on a nest box to watch the habits of a pair. It was highly noticeable that the cock is a real interference as eggs are hatching, treading all over the place and on the small chicks and on the top of the hen.

Cocks that tend to sit outside the box are much to be desired. McGuiness stated that:

“The cock does feed the chicks, one is a day old chick and the other a three day old.

The hen has to work hard to protect the chicks when her partner flies in. You can see her leaning into him as he tries to barge into her to get at the chicks. She tries to keep the chicks beneath her while he is treading everywhere. In his attempts to get close to her he wraps his wing around her while he bullies her into submitting into being fed.

He gets very frustrated and disturbs her far more frequently than is necessary. Sometimes he rushes into the box, climbs all over her and then rushes out again. Chicks can easily be crushed at any time through these disturbances.”

Transferring Eggs

Some advice – do not handle eggs unless absolutely necessary. Your hands possess germs on them all of the time. They are one of the most infectious parts of the human body and will pass germs on to the egg surfaces – these are porous and you then wonder why some eggs have been addled, or dead-in-shell has occurred just as hatching is starting.

If the transferring of a clutch is unavoidable, wash your hands in warm water first.

Then take full note of two areas.

1. Where the eggs are positioned in the clutch to one another. Careful examination with a laser torch will show that the earlier fertile eggs are located on the outside of the clutches where they are placed by the hen to allow more gaseous exchange of carbon dioxide and oxygen to take place. Moving those eggs to another nest, without thought, into the middle of the receiving nest, can result in the death of the embryos.
2. Before I move eggs I mark each with a felt pen dot on the top surface so that that are placed in the same correct rotational position in the new nest.

We have begun to start chasing for our chick target result at the end of the season.

Hatching

Starting with dead-in-shell as the negative possibility, that again is poor feeding coupled with perhaps the Australian dryness requiring regular damping down in your birdroom. However a dry atmosphere is only about 10% of the dead-in-shell problem, at most. The rest is diet input.

We can have irregular hatching – by which I mean some chicks arrive bright red in colour and full of strength to call for food. Others can just emerge, pale in colour but they are exhausted and do not call. A hen faced with this will just ignore them until they are flattened. Not her fault – in this case it is yours! There are occasions where you find an egg(s) just struggling to hatch which requires help by you to assist. There is a chart in “The Challenge” advising you when to intervene safely.

If your chicks are red and active and get full crops you have your diet correct. Make a note of every mortal item that you are giving and the methods you have used to achieve such success. You will need that list in later years. Be sure of that because you will inevitably forget something that had brought you to such a high pinnacle earlier. I know that from my earlier years.

So, the hens are feeding and they are being fed but in a nest of five or more there are problems arising. I personally like four chicks per-round-per-pair – so moving chicks to less occupied nests has to be done. I do not like to do this as the crop milk from the original parents is different to the fosters – but one has no choice.

Keep a close eye under a nest of four chicks that have one or two late bred day olds underneath them. Again they are red, perhaps fed well and survive under the weight of the bigger chicks. But you have to move them both to save them, and if you do not the larger chicks will eventually be the first to be fed anyway and your small ones will go backward.

Returning to other nests, you will see the chicks are becoming scrawny in appearance. This means the hen(s) have a nutritional factor (F) missing from their crop milk. Exactly which factor one doesn’t know, but as soon as you see it in the oldest chick, move all out elsewhere. I mark my records with (F) for future reference.

I do recall that Robert Manvell wrote me a letter years ago in which he said he found that if there were too many nests with scrawny chicks, the addition of vitamins within a syrup base, such as vitamin B12, if overdone, can give rise to this problem. I agree with that.

Changes

I have made changes to my nest boxes periodically but based around the box-within-a-box principle. Some seasons ago I felt that the shallow boxes, some 8 inches deep, were too shallow. The chicks would exit too early and the hens were laying their 2nd round too soon.

Chicks were having to be returned and eggs were thus scattered and lost. With the end target in mind, I made the boxes 11 inches deep and the problem was solved. The chicks cannot reach their exit until old enough and the hens delay their cycle. More eggs saved!

Conclusion

If you want the results, and remember you need a full nest of chicks from which to choose the two best and sell the rest, then you have to work for it.

The aviary has to have priority in your day and time given to it.

I trust some of these practices that I employ at my home in England prove an incentive as well as giving all readers some sound tips on reaching their annual target year-in-year-out.

Remember – write it down when you have it spot on.

This is why anything made of wood for the hobby – be it cages, show cages, nest boxes and aviaries of all kinds – has suffered directly from these world wide increases. Manufacturers are all affected so such prices have to be passed on to even make a reasonable profit for any labour involved.

Aviary Maintenance – External

Let me take this year as an example. It is November. 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).

The window frames need constant attention (I hate painting!) and the roof needs to be checked for leaks. Virginia Water is heavily wooded so leaves are a constant problem, hence the gutters must be checked too. Elbow grease is essential. What all this is about is not having to attend to problems that could arise in very bad weather. Dealing with a leaky roof in wet conditions is not funny and the disturbance to the breeding pairs also has to be anticipated.

Aviary Maintenance – Internal

Moving inside, I am fortunate to have bought my cage units from Reinhard Molkentin back in 1988. They are made of a composition of a plastic nature (very heavy) with a aluminium framework. They never need painting (I like that) and just need washing to bring them back to new. They are in many aviaries in Germany, Jo Mannes’s aviary being but one example. Expensive, but in long term well worth it.

All electrics are checked, especially the heating systems and thermostats. I used to have tubular heating but this was far too expensive to run and inefficient as the air was not circulated well. These days I use (Dimplex) fan heaters which work very well provided you are attentive to de-dusting them out regularly.

Nest Boxes

Coming to nest boxes, of which there are currently 56 in use (and being double boxes with one inside the other it means 112 really have to be cleaned), I use “VIRKON® S” a great deal. All are finally dipped into this solution and allowed to dry off. This appears to contribute to a maximum of 5 or 6 minor French Moult birds only, from approximately 300 bred per annum. They are affected very little and if stripped from flights and tails at 4 weeks, then recover fully.

Incubator

Some time ago, I bought an incubator. I use it to keep oversize plastic eggs warm at the same temperature as real eggs. When the first egg is laid, in goes a plastic one. Use of false eggs has the following advantages:

• They prevent those strong day old chicks being crushed before you can get to them if they have not been fed. Note: Weak chicks because of poor management techniques will not survive anyway.
• They can stop a pair smashing their own eggs – they get fed up trying to break a plastic egg.
• They retain heat while in contact with eggs that have been left for too long thus saving the developing embryos.

Increasing Fertility

I am often asked what I do to prepare for increasing the fertility in my stud. Here are several thoughts for you.

• Make sure you have a round-the-year source of vitamins A & D – in moderation. Overdo it and you will be in trouble, as both are stored in the liver and not excreted.
• I use a powder product called Hormova. It again is present in the flights and cages all the time.
• A certain “X” factor which you can buy in specialist horse tack and feeding shops – but that is up to you to think out and track down. Sorry, but we all have our little secrets!
• Never give massive doses of antibiotics across the board with the exception of treating accurately against “yellow belly” in tiny chicks before breeding and the same again when breeding stops. This practice also improves fertility in my experience. I only treat a health condition which is preventative. If you start playing around with growth promotion then you risk ruining the whole stud – and it is banned anyway and rightly so.

Seed Mixtures

I now turn to the seed mixtures which we all use. I am after every chick I can get by every means possible. Seed that may have been harvested too early (and that applies to millets sometimes), is at risk of having micro fungi attached because of the dampness. Note: You can always test a bag of seed for ripeness by making a fist and plunging it down into the bag. If you meet resistance you know it is not fully ripened. Add any mites to the fungi, especially in millet sprays, and you have a recipe for loss of chicks. To kill off everything mentioned, use a super product from VETREPHARM (in Hampshire). This is put in the bottom of each bin before loading and fumes over 48 hours. The seed is unaffected and 100% safe to use.

Avian Flu

To conclude, a word about Avian Flu H5N1. Either keep the stock under cover or make certain that any indigenous wild visitors cannot excrete into the outside flights. As of November 2009, DEFRA has designated that the UK is free from any reports of Avian Flu. However fanciers should check the DEFRA website for any changes.