|
I have a 6' wide by 18" deep cage housing three society finches, a canary, and orangecheek waxbill finch, and 4.5 zebra finches. Nobody picks feathers off anybody, so I thought I'd share. My cage has a lot of visual barriers so the birds can hang out in various places without having look at each other. Since they all prefer to hang out at the top of the cage, I made it very busy. There are fake ivy garlands from the craft store, bunches of silk flowers, and lots of little baskets hanging from the top, especially in the corners and ends. It makes it hard for them to chase each other around up there. My tweety birds absolutely love to build nests, to the exclusion of all other activities including incubating eggs (until recently...) so I give them plenty of things to build with. The floor of the cage is littered with hay, and there are several small baskets lower down in the cage where I leave things for them to discover. Fabric scraps, tufts of cat hair, chopped up bits of yarn, paper scraps, they love random crap. I buy teensy little baskets from thrift stores and hang them all over the place, they make good nest foundations. Yes it does make a gigantic loving mess, and yes they do lay a few eggs. On the other hand they are so busy building and sitting on eggs that they don't spend all their time picking on each other. I had intended to poke their eggs with a pin but the zebras had spent years failing to hatch a damned thing and lulled me into a false sense of security so I didn't bother and now I have an angry baby finch inside this masterpiece of architecture:  So yeah, give your birds something to do.
|
#
¿
Oct 26, 2012 02:53
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 4, 2024 03:19 |
|
|
Dudes! posted:I saw some wild cockatials the other day! Yay! Wild cockatiels! I'm always amused at the thought of wild cockatiels, they're such lovable derpy birds in captivity. Maybe the derpy ones were the ones who were easy to catch...Anyway, if you get a chance to get pictures or video I would be absolutely delighted! Nathilus posted:Amusing cockatiel story time... Awwww! My ~16 year old ladytiel started laying eggs a while after she paired up with my 26 year old boytiel. They took turns sitting on them and it was neat to see him get to have that experience before he died. Said ladytiel does all sorts of dominant behaviors, has zero nesting instinct, and eats her own eggs. Her current boyfriend is a splay-legged 7 year old who enjoys shredding and nesting. They're a good match. She also preens their 25 year old roommate.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 26, 2012 09:04
|
|
|
I grind up eggshells and sprinkle them in their fresh food every day in the hopes that they are getting enough calcium. It's kind of a tradeoff though, I think the enrichment of constructing nests is worth the health risks of laying eggs if it keeps them less stressed. Picking on each other isn't great for them either. If your birds care, you can swap their eggs for fakes and let them sit on those for a while. Mine just abandon any sort of eggs after a few weeks, and build new nests on top of old eggs all the time. They only lay one or two every couple of months though, yours might lay more often.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 26, 2012 17:16
|
|
|
dopaMEAN posted:Also, what's the word on owning both cats and a bird? Is it crazy? I have both and it's really only manageable because I work from home and the birds live in my home office. Most mornings I turn them all loose and sit at my computer all day while they fly around the room and eat my window blinds. Sometimes I shut the cats in the bedroom and let one or two of them hang out in the kitchen while I wash dishes. I also let my parrotlet ride around the house on my shoulder while the cats are at large, but only because she considers me to be her safe spot and doesn't spook and fly elsewhere. During the day the cats are pretty lethargic and they don't really find her to be that interesting when there are tiny fluttering finches to watch. All of the bird cages are large and very heavy and sturdy so they can't be knocked over or otherwise compromised by cats. We do miss out on having the birds involved in most everyday aspects of household life, though.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 27, 2012 04:59
|
|
|
Look what I found on the floor of the finch cage yesterday: Super-grumpy baby zebra remains super-grumpy. He is apparently also starving to death, from the amount of impatient beeping emanating from his nest. He has a rudimentary grasp of flight and is working hard at being a spoiled only-child. Gonna call him Cheddar or possibly Gouda.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 4, 2012 10:22
|
|
|
mjs6643 posted:I think the Cockatiel Caucus has meetings to determine when to molt because all four of the tiels started molting last week at the exact same time and now I have enough feathers to make like two backup tiels. Oh hell yes. Yes they did. All of mine are also shedding feathers, and Eliot is in her usual mid-molt haystack-mode.  I keep having to remind myself that she's molting and not dying. She's lost most of her tail and every single flight on one side, that's a hell of a lot of potential bloodfeathers for Miss Bloodfeather. Even Piper the eldertiel has stared shedding feathers. I am also beginning to believe that Eliot's Magical Cockatiel Cage has gender-reversal powers. Eliot herself is the undisputed King of All Birds and spends a good portion of her non-napping time displaying her dominance. Scotty spends his time shredding stuff and being really nesty for a boytiel. This morning I also found Piper snuggled in the basket at the bottom of the cage, lovingly incubating Eliot's most recent egg. I guess he didn't notice that she'd already cracked it open and gobbled down the delicious contents.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 9, 2012 03:14
|
|
|
I recall hearing about someone filling the bottom of their ladytiel's cage with random dollar store crap like plastic eggs. Whenever she climbed down to start laying everything would shift around and she wouldn't be able to settle down and get comfortable. "Welp, no good place to lay eggs, better stop making them." I can't remember if I read that in the first Bird Crazies thread or not, but it stuck with me as a creative solution when the light cycle isn't working.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 13, 2012 01:43
|
|
|
Piper is joining in the current group-molt. Each white feather on the cage floor fills me with glee. I'm hoping he'll look slightly less ratty, though at 25 he probably still won't grow flight feathers.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 14, 2012 04:35
|
|
|
Keep her very warm, heat is the best thing for a sick bird. When my parrotlet was sick she seemed to recover best on the days when her cage was kept above 90 degrees.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 14, 2012 23:52
|
|
|
Got offered a greencheek conure this morning and had to turn it down because my husband wouldn't be able to tolerate the noise. Poor girl will probably end up with the Lily Sanctuary in Los Angeles, her current people have crazy commutes and are routinely gone for 11 hours a day. We're going to take their parrotlet though, for double the furious peeping. (Anyone in CA/AZ need a conure?)
|
|
#
¿
Dec 6, 2012 03:02
|
|
|
Holy crap you guys, a Cooper's hawk just tried to eat my birds! A couple of derpatiels and my linnie were sitting on my desk in front of the picture window when suddenly the entire view was filled with angry raptor. He kind of hovered for a bit and then flew to the tree and sat there glaring while we all spazzed for a bit. Fortunately he didn't hit the window and everyone in here seems to be ok. Mostly. Scared cockatiels look like poo poo.  Buffy was totally unconcerned about the whole thing. 
|
|
#
¿
Jan 22, 2013 02:35
|
|
|
Slinky Weasel posted:I also figured out that my dog (11 pound terrier mutt) is still a dog and he tried to have a go at the bird. The bird was sitting on top of his cage and I was sitting on my couch across the room. The bird tries to fly off the top of the cage and flutters to the ground (he's clipped) and my dog dove for him. Luckily he stopped when I yelled at him, scared the living poo poo out of me though. Terriers are tiny death machines that will kill small animals given the slightest opportunity. My roommate's extremely docile 15 pound terrier mutt was so abused he was practically catatonic, and he would stop going for the birds when I yelled at him. He still killed my flighted bird when she figured out how to get out of her cage while I was gone for ten minutes. Do not ever, ever, EVER trust your terrier near your bird. In my experience they are more dangerous than cats. Terriers just seem to have a "KILL!" switch in their little heads.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 22, 2013 10:44
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 4, 2024 03:19 |
|
|
Buffy is guarding my 'o' key again. "You may not type 'o' today. Any other letter is fine, but no 'o'." 
|
|
#
¿
Jan 23, 2013 23:30
|
|