Green Cheeked Conures - First Chicks Out

I was surprised yesterday to find my first two Green Cheeked Conure chicks out of the box. I thought they were going to be latter than last years but they are actually early according to my blog (this blog is a great record keeping tool). *One of the chicks didn't find its way back into the box last night and due to the coolish change I decided to help into the box.

* Most Conures tend to sleep in there breeding box.

Green Cheeked Conure Chicks - Leg Banding

I have banded the legs of all my Green Cheeked Conure chicks to help avoid the confusion of last year on not being sure which were the parents and which were the chicks.

Unfortunately the mother hasn't allowed me the same access as last year and the chicks aren't used to being handled and I got a few bites putting the leg bands on.

Blue (Right), Albino (Center), Turquoise (Right) 

Feathering Chicks

The Green Cheeked Conures chicks are starting to feather, I will band the youngsters soon so I don't have repeat of last years not 100% of telling apart the young ones from the parents.

Creamino Indian Ringneck

I have done some research on my yellow/white Indian Ringneck colour mutation and fairly certain it is a Creamino colour mutation.

I have put together a bit of a webpage to help my own understanding of Colour Mutations in Indian Ringneck Parrots.

http://bowdo18.wix.com/colour-mutations

Seeding Grasses

I provide fresh seeding grasses regularly to my grass parrots. I have been advised to do this by several breeders and have been doing for a long time now. The birds tend to favor this even over fresh fruit, vegetables and greens.

Milk thistle has always seemed a treat to my Scarlet Chested Parrots.

Conure Family

The Green Cheeked Conures have a fairly strong family bond compared to my other breeds of bird. The female even now spends around 90% of the time in the box and the male is often also in the box with the female.

My spare Indian Ringneck "Turk" has not taken too well to the new Indian Ringneck chicks emerging from the box in the adjoining section of the aviary and has lost a little feather condition. He has settled a fair bit but I hope this isn't replicated when the Green Cheeked Conure chicks come out.

Indian Ringneck's All Out

The second two Indian Ringneck Chicks followed the first one out of the box yesterday. The sleep grouped as they did in the box, there erratic flying is causing it to be a very noisy aviary setting off "Turk" in the adjoining section of the aviary constantly.  

First Chick Out Of The Box

My first Indian Ringneck has emerged from the breeding box (It was hard to get a decent picture of it due to its uncontrolled flying). It has been setting the whole aviary off as it crashes around the aviary.

The Green Cheeked Conure hen has left the nest for the first time I have witnessed and it allowed me a head count of the chicks. Three for this years clutch.

I have removed the eggs from the Bourke's and the Scarlet Chested Parrots breeding box (all eggs appeared empty after shining a torch through them). Hopefully this will stop my Scarlet Chested female sitting for no reason as there is no male in cage.

Green Cheeked Conure - Protective Mother

My Green Cheeked Conure hen is very protective of her chicks, I have not been able to fully work out how many I have. I know I have at least three to date, I have tried to move her but she puffs up and attacks my hand so I let her be.

1, 2, 3 Green Cheek Conure Chicks

I now up to three Green Cheek Conure chicks, the mother is very protective allowing very limited access and spending a 100% of the time in the box.

First Green Cheek Conure Chick of the Season

I was beginning to wonder when my Green Cheek Conure eggs would hatch but I discovered the first chick of five eggs this morning. Hopefully I will at least match last years four chicks.

Colour Mutation

It look as if my "Lutino" Indian Ringneck Chick is another mutation all together. Maybe Creamino or a Lacewing, not 100% but time will tell but it is still a surprising mutation from its parents (Albino & Turquoise).

Bourke Parrot - Abandoned eggs

I now fairly certain that the Bourke female has abandoned her eggs, last week after a thunderstorm she was out of the box and I have not seen her back in it to date. My father has always told me that thunder can kill eggs, there is a definite coincidence here but I'm not 100% on how true it is.

My Indian Ringnecked chicks are feathering well and seem very healthy.

Lutino Indian Ringneck

My youngest Indian Ringneck chick which a thought to be Albino turns out is actually Lutino or yellow. I noticed a few days ago it appeared an off white compared to the Albino one but now it definitely has yellow feathers. One of my pair must have a spilt, this very unexpected. 

IRN Chick Colours

I'm fairly certain that the darker chick will be blue and the other two are definitely Albino. They have not been appreciating my nest inspection over the past couple of days with the cooler weather.  

Mmmm definitely Albino, correction (see my later posts)

Not Hand Rearing

My wife has decided against hand rearing the Indian Ringneck chicks after talking to her friend which had a bad experience (one out three chicks survived). I will shelve this idea until someone can provide me good guidance on the subject.  

Green Cheeked Conure - Egg

I had noticed both my Green Cheeked Conures spending more time in the nesting box (they have not been out at feeding time in the morning). Today I noticed only my male out, so I checked the box and found my female sitting on one egg!! 

The Green Cheeks season must start later, end of September. I  will have to refer to my notes from last season to see if similar. 

Indian Ringneck - Feeding

Feeding has stepped up for the Indian Ringnecks as they try to keep with the demands of three growing chicks. I'm pretty sure I will end up with two albino or white chicks by eye colouring (pink eyes). I have now handled all the chicks and I complete a nest inspection every day.

Bourke Parrot / Protective Mother

Originally I thought my Bourke hen may have even abandoned her eggs as she was not often in the nest box but now she has turned into a fiercely protective mother, squawking and lunging at me during nest inspections. She is the most protective bird I have had to date.

Indian Ringneck Chick Progress

The Indian Ringneck chick are growing very quickly as all birds do, the pictures are the growth over a four day period. I have handled the larger one, I suspect it will be a darker colour (blue or turquoise) due to it eye colouring. I'm thinking about hand rearing them when they get pin feathers with the help of my wife.

Breeding Season

I'm still hopeful for a fourth Indian Ringneck chick and Nelly's biggest clutch as the four egg is yet to be pushed to the side and is still covered by the three other chicks.

The Bourke female is spending more and more time in her breeding box and is up to five eggs now. It seems my abandonment concerns could have been premature.

The Gouldian finches are now both going in and out of the box, no eggs to date.

Indian Ringneck - Third Chick

I love this time of year so much excitement and anticipation. My third Indian Ringneck chick was either hatched yesterday or this morning with one more egg that has yet to be pushed to the side.

My Bourke Parrots three eggs are pushed to the center of the box and partially covered by nesting material. The hen spends most of the time out of the box including night, I would say she has abandoned her eggs but she still goes in the box and the eggs are now grouped together.

For the first time a few day ago I witnessed for time my Gouldian finch hen in the nesting box. She seems to have worked the dry grass at the back of the box but no eggs yet.

Surprise!! New chicks

I received a pleasant surprise today with the discovery of two new Indian Ringneck chicks upon a nest inspection. I was expecting to be waiting another couple of weeks. One is clearly larger than the other and I'm hoping that the other two egg will equal two more chicks over the next few days. 

Nesting Update

I returned from my holiday at which time I had my sister looking after my birds (when I'm away I have worry that people looking after my birds will keep up my standards but she did an excellent job), to find my Indian Ringnecks now have four eggs and my Bourke Parrots now have three. My female Indian Ringneck spends the night in the breeding box but is rarely in there at other times and my Bourke female that seemed to be mostly in her box sitting has been spending a lot of time out of it recently including of a night, it is her first clutch of eggs since I have had her hopefully she has not abandoned them.

I also completed a full clean of the aviary on my return including new branches which I placed to obscure the entrance of the Green Cheeked Conures box.

Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary

A holiday to the Gold Coast has afforded our family to visit the Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary.

I has hoping to see more parrots but there was a good cross section of birds. The free flight show I found excellent and included a Blue and Gold Macaw, Green Winged Macaw and a Black Cockatoo.

I was really hoping for a bigger and better walk in aviary than Symbio and although it had bigger aviaries it didn't necessarily have the amount or variety of birds.

The Fig Parrots were very cool and definitely something I had not seen before. 

Breeding Boxes / Nesting Boxes

I have decided to put in the nesting boxes much the same time as last year. 

Due to the loss of my female Princess Parrot I shifted the male Princess Parrot into the grass bird aviary, this has afforded me the room to shift "Turk" my spare Indian Ringneck male to a separate section of the aviary to insure he is not related to the offspring of "Nippet" and "Nelly". This will allow me to pare him a young female.

I have used the same box as last year with non toxic wood shavings. They have already emptied some of the shaving onto the ground.

I placed two medium boxes in the grass bird aviary with parrot nesting material although I only have the one pair of Bourke Parrots in the aviary I believe it is beneficial to provide a choice of nesting place. I will introduce the finch box for the Gouldian Finches soon as well.

As usual the nesting box remains in the Green Cheeked Conures cage as it a roosting spot. I will provide a fresh branch in the coming weeks to provide cover for the entrance as I believe this was my good luck charm last year.

Cat Trap

After the upsetting loss of couple more of my birds including my female Princess Parrot which got sick and died a few day latter (also I believe as a result of cat attack). I have deiced to invest in a trap.

I have been using sardines to bait the trap, well just putting them in the trap to get the cat used to entering the trap without fear. The trap has had the sardines removed every second night and have set it only once which ended up catching my dog Leroy the following morning.

Roosters!!!

My bantam Rhode Island Red chicks both turned out to be roosters, they seemed to both change over night with development in crest and of course crowing. My first rooster started crowing and after looking at him I was pretty sure that the other was a hen but after getting rid of him within a few days the next one had started crowing as well.

I got rid of both roosters to keep the neighbours from getting upset, I have a fairly noisy hobby and I don't want to push the boundaries. The hens have started laying eggs and the chooks have provided good management of dropped seed and vegetable matter from the parrots as I alternate from section to section. They have also become an alarm sometimes for the cat...

Killer Revealed

I believe I have found what has been killing my birds. Last night I let the dogs outside to go to the toilet and they went flying down to aviary to chase away a cat. While down there I could pat one of my Scarlet Chested females on the chest as she was perched up against the wire, the cat could have easily killed it if it had good access.

It makes sense as the cat would have poor access to my other aviary. The Green Cheeked Conures sleep in there breeding box and there is no real way for a cat to get at the Princess and Indian Ring Neck Parrots.

My suspicions have been confirmed. I will be lodging a complain to council.

Bird Temperament

Most of the birds are getting more and more used to my presence in the aviary and are generally allowing me to get much closer. In the case of the Princess Parrots I can now feed them by hand if they are due for seed, I look forward to building this relationship with them and perhaps even getting them to start sitting on my hand.

Scarlet Chested Parrot Mortality

My trouble continues losing both my male Scarlet Chested parrots within a week of each other!!

I'm at a loss to explain the deaths so I have decided to removed all birds from the aviary and fully strip out and clean the cage.

My top theory was a local cat that is hanging around the house is killing the birds. It has poor access to the yard during the day with the dogs patrolling but easy could get close access during the night when then birds are easily sneaked up on and sleep very close to the edge of the cage.

After cleaning out the cage I found a large spider with a white tip on it abdomen living behind there feeder. I'm unsure if a spider will bite or could kill a bird but it would explain a lot if it could. I would suspect that most birds would have a natural immunity to spider bites due to the fact that most places they choose to nest in the wild are frequented by spiders but I'm unsure and finding hard to find information on it. 

These are healthy birds, it is very frustrating.

Nowra Bird Sale

I attended Nowra bird sale again this year with so many great birds and mutations. It is a awesome event but I just wish it was in a bigger venue (so crowded and hot). I recommend early start if your after something in particular or late if your after a bargain.

I didn't get many pictures due my one and half year old son wanting to be attached to me the whole time but I did manage to pick up what I was after (bird carrying box). I also resisted the urge to purchase any new additions for my aviary.

Scarlet Chested Parrot Mortality

I have had one of this season young Scarlet Chested females die recently. I'm really concerned about the high mortality rate especially amongst my Scarlet Chested Parrots. This particular bird looked particularly healthy and in good feather, the only abnormal thing I observed is that lower part of the beak was further out than the upper, something that I certainly had not notice before hand.

I'm going to do some research into this, I know they are not as hardy as some of my other parrots but the rate of loss I'm experiencing lately should not be so high.

My wife has burrowed a friends digital SLR camera, allowing me to get great high resolution images of my birds (see the side of my blog) which has been awesome.

I'm going to the Nowra bird sale next weekend which should be awesome. I'm planning to purchase a carrying box and I'll try and sneak in some pictures for this blog.

Leg Bands / Leg Rings

I have decided to leg band my birds. It is getting to the stage were I need to easily determine parents from young birds and in the case of my Green Cheeked Conures be able determine the sex of the birds which I will be able to do after they sit again.

Two of my birds already have rings, my female Indian Ringneck has a numbered metal ring and my newest male Scarlet Chested Parrot has a blue plastic band. I have not been able to locate a supplier of metal rings that doesn't require a minimum order of a size and I need three different sizes. I would probably spend $100 on rings and have a lot of left overs. So plastic bands it is for now.

I will probably do all my birds in stages to avoid upsetting them two much.

I have managed to band all my birds, however three of the bird were able to remove the bands soon after I put them on. The Green Cheeked Conure's being the worst as they both removed there bands quickly and they were one of the main species that I wanted to band to allow me to easily determine parent from offspring.

Most of the birds chewed at the bands until they got used to them.

Nesting Box - Scarlet Chested Parrot

Based on some advice from a breeder that I purchased my last Scarlet Chested Parrot from I'm going to make some changes to breeding or nesting box.

1. Size - I'm going to use a larger box. I have noticed that both the Scarlet Chested and Bourke parrots prefer the larger parrot box that I have been putting in with the smaller budgie sized boxes, often getting two females nesting in the same box. I have purchased two boxes between the budgie and the bigger sized box.

I have been advised that the male and female Scarlet Chested Parrot can quarrel inside the box causing concussion of the female if the box if it is two small. I have witnessed spots of blood on the inside of boxes in the past and could also explain the poor feather condition of male females during breeding season.

2. Material - To date I have been using non toxic saw dust. I have decided on advice to go for parrot nesting material that is a blackish colour and largely made of peat, I believe.

I this case I have been advised that saw dust can cause a lung condition in smaller parrots and finches. I have yet to find any contributing evidence though.

The range of materials able to be used can vary greatly from saw dust, straw, wood chips, twigs, dried grass, shredded new paper to hessian.