Christopher hails from Tasmania but is what one would prefer to call a “Thinking Fancier”, full of ideas and suggestions for others to think about for the benefit of all breeders around the world.

The poisoning accident occurred two years ago, so, as a result, many of the hens in particular were aged from 18 months to two years. That said, he has had far better results with these more mature birds – which begs the question about using hens at 7 months of age.

Budgerigars need time to develop and as a hobby we are promoting the breeding ages more and more.

Certainly we know that the Northern Hemisphere breeders are at a disadvantage compared to their southern counterparts. Reinhard Molkentin stated in the past, that having started in his home country of Germany and later moving to South Africa, breeding is far easier in the latter.

Hence younger hens can be risked more easily within the warmer climates.

Christopher Slaughter has now recovered well after his setback, but has employed some new ideas into what has recently become a very good season:

• Install an extra perch, two inches from the floor, so the emerging chicks can perch without threatening the “superiority” of the adult cock or hen feeling their sexual territory has been invaded by “newcomers” on the floor. Not a single chick has been attacked in a complete season, as a result.
• When preparing the nest boxes with, say, sawdust, add a small piece of cuttlefish bone before the pair are introduced to the breeding cage. The hens attack that until it is reduced to dust within a day or so. The result – not one single case of soft shells or egg binding throughout the season!
• Use only the standard water founts sited on the front of the cages for water only. Use a separate container to hold any vitamin supplements dissolved in the water so the birds are not force “fed” so overdosing does not occur.
• Use “prepared suet” in the soft food mixture. It is a first class source of animal protein and fat which are vital to growth (e.g. meats, eggs & fish are all animal protein sources). He also uses semolina, fine ground porridge oats and malt. The last is for the yeast content, vitamin B group and of course a source of energy. The malt in question is supplied in powder form that one makes hot drinks with.

Why is only the top end of the bird(s) displayed in budgerigar photographs?

As I was the founder and editor of Budgerigar World Magazine, I perhaps was also “guilty” of doing exactly the same as many other photographers in concentrating on the bird(s) from the perch upward, but I had my views at the time which I will come to later.

Mick Freakley. leading breeder and official Budgerigar Society photographer, kindly supplies me with a great many photographs, so I decided to request him to answer this good question on behalf of Budgerigar.co.uk .

The Freakly Point of View

Below are four pairs of images to illustrate why, in my opinion, the camera concentrates on the top end of birds for public viewing.

Four are full length and four are cropped for comparison purposes.

As far as I am concerned, any full length image lacks impact.

The Grey Green cock featured here is the Best in Show bird from the 2010 Budgerigar Society Club Show – shown by Les Martin of Studham in Bedfordshire. A bird in the super class.

In the full length view you can clearly see the two tails are present. If it did not have these in the first place you would not be looking at the major part of the bird.

My personal choice is to see all birds from the perch upward in a photograph.

I did a series of full length photographs at the request of the UK Budgerigar Society for them to consider their possible use in their magazine. This followed a complaint that only “cropped ” images were being used all the time.

Obviously all judges will have penalised any suggestion of a dipped tail or a badly hinged tail while judging, so as winners are always the subject of published photographs, it can be accepted that the tail is / was right and in line with the body axis at the time.

The other three birds featured in this article clearly illustrate my point.

Please click on an image to enlarge it.

Summary by Gerald Binks

I have to say I am in full agreement with Mick.

Anyone can breed a body, whether big or small, but it is the detail in the head and top end that is essential to be pictured in all photographs.

That said, when I was the editor and photographer of Budgerigar World magazine, I began the series of featuring, say, four birds to a page and either judging them myself or inviting other judges to do the same: pointing out the good points and bad points on each bird – and, on occasion, complete with tails!

This feature was very popular with beginners and novices, so I propose to introduce it on this website at a later date.

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.

So, where your personal budgerigar stud is concerned, ask yourself, when your birds are getting to look really ready to start breeding, is the Ring Issue date more important than grabbing that moment to begin your personal season? Personally, I grab the moment these days and “get a round in” from perhaps a third of the stud and get results on the perch early with whatever rings I have to hand. I then have a cushion under me if the birds paired later, to meet the following years’ ring issue date, fail in breeding condition to meet such a specific date. Many breeders work to whatever the established issue date happens to be – often with poor results or worse. Breeding fitness first is vital!

As experienced breeders will know, our birds need first class daily attention and a feeding technique that supports high fertility and hatchability. However, a few added words of advice. Many breeders have large outside flights but small inside flights for roosting and feeding. Sometimes these inner flights are too small and the birds are cramped. As a result they become stressed, but we do not realise it. Birds need roosting space for each individual because otherwise the more robust birds pressurise those who are less aggressive and shy. Overnight can be especially stressful and dead birds can be found the following morning for no apparent reason.

In flights and stock cages, budgerigars need to chew. Fruit tree and Silver Birch branches are ideal and I know Eucalyptus branches are popular in warmer countries. Seeding grasses can be selected as well, but be careful that your local farmer has not sprayed his crops if you are choosing grasses close by. I have also found that if you visit an aquarium shop, you will find mis-shapen pieces of wood which have holes everywhere (for fish tanks) which last forever. A number of these piled high give added interest and if you scatter softfood throughout, as I do, they provide endless active searching through nooks and crannies. These all keep the stock very active and this is so important when we try to breed with these large heavily built hens that are so common these days, who otherwise just sit there all day.

To summarise. Keep your birds active. You are the provider and it is your job to see to it as part of your avian husbandry. The results may then pay off so that you can pair your birds at anytime of your choosing with finer results all round.