Not much going on

Not much is going on except my on-going struggle to treat my yellow turquoisine hen.  She's been on another round of antibiotics for her sinusitis without much improvement.  I think my crop feeding helps her, but the symptoms of the sinusitis has not shown much change.  I am intending on trying a more holistic approach with her next.  Will try using some essential oils that have shown benefit in birds to see if we can clear up the sinusitis this way since traditional antibiotics has been a bust so far.

I did get a couple pairs of lineolated parakeets.  They are bit different than the finches and grasskeets I'm use to but very pretty and cute.  Will try to post pictures soon.

new birds

Just wanted to update on how the birds are doing and a few new birds to my collection.  To the right is a black headed purple breasted normal green back male gouldian from the past breeding season.  He has very nice and rich colorings.  A red faced parrot finch is in the background.

Above are some pictures of the society and zebra babies.  They are starting to get their adult colorings.  The society is chocolate euro self.  There is a gray and a CFW zebra baby.

A "cream" shaft tail hen - not a creamino, but also lack the grayish coloring of a fawn and isabelle mutation.  Planning on breeding some shaft tails this season.

Here's my silver gouldian baby of the past breeding season.  She is black headed and white breasted.  A purple grenadier hen is in the background.

Here's one of my new birds - a pink rosy bourke grasskeet.  This is the male of the pair I believe - he has a pale yellow green blue rump, but I think he's the male because he is the singer of the two.

Here's the pink rosy bourke hen.  She has a pink rump and doesn't nearly sing as much.

Here're the 2 of them together.

This is my new young yellow turquoisine hen.  She was born this year, so should be very young without her full colors yet.  She is suppose to have a red belly.

Here's one of my male scarlet chested grasskeets.  Note he has gotten a few red feathers on his belly as he is going through a molt.  I doubt he will be a full red fronted scarlet chest, but it's interesting to see him still getting more colors as he is getting to 3 years of age.

rest

Not much new occurring.  A few birds are still finishing up molting.  4 splendid babies went home to their new mom yesterday in addition to a bunch of gouldians.  Everyone is resting.  The gouldian pair I put together hasn't done too much.  Some nest inspection but no eggs yet.  If nothing happens after another week or so, I'm going to separate them and let them save their enthusiasm until fall when it's really the breeding season.  I haven't had too much good luck with pairs trying to breed during the summer - simply too hot.  My poor turq hen had lost a lot of weight through the current illness.  She's finished with her 2 week course of antibiotics for a few days now.  Minimally mucousy now, but still not very energetic.  I've decided to crop feed her some new born formula with probiotics twice a day in an attempt to speed up her recovery.  I don't feel she can eat enough to gain back the weight she's lost, and being underweight puts her at higher risk of a slow recovery at best and reinfection at worst.  Fingers crossed that she'll eventually get back to normal.

summer updates

The one and only turquoisine egg turned out to be infertile as I suspected.  At least I got to try out my new incubator with self turner.  A bit noisy but works very well otherwise.

The scarlet chest babies are weaned now.  The 2 babies that were plucked are growing feathers back, so should be ready for their new homes in a few weeks.

Here is one of the babies.  At this stage, the juvenile look almost exactly like females except the beak is not as dark.









All of the zebra babies have fledged.  They are still weaning and are very noisy doing it ^_^.

The mother is the CFW at the most left, and the father is the gray normal 3rd from the left - he should be split to CFW.  There is a normal gray behind the CFW baby 2nd from the left.  There are a total of 4 CFW babies and 1 normal gray.



I've put a pair of gouldians together since they were looking very interested.  These were some of the first gouldians to finish molting.  They immediately did the dance, so I provided a nest box.  I've been seeing them checking out the nest.  We shall see if they succeed.  It's the first time for this pairing.  The weather is pretty hot, but hopefully they will do well.  See below for the happy couple.  The hen is on the left - she is a black headed purple breasted silver, and the male is a red headed lavender breasted double factor yellow split to blue back.

Incubation

It took several days to get my little home made incubator to near constant temperature.  It consists of a plastic small animal aquarium/terrarium with ventilated lid, a small container for water and a snuggly bed area for the egg.  I used both my terrarium digital thermometer with a probe to be right next to the egg and another digital thermometer and hydrometer.  I used a terrarium heat lamp as a heat source, varying the distance betweent he terrarium to the heat source.  It was a struggle to get the temperature around what is right and stay there.  There is still variations of 1 degree or some thoughout the day.  My incubator finally came in the mail, but it too takes about a day or so to get to stable temperature, but at least once it's set up, I won't have to do much else.  Turning the egg several times a day is not a big issue.

Unfortunately, after all that, I'm starting to think the turquoisine egg is infertile since there's been absolutely zero change in the egg since incubation.  I'll probably use it to test out the new incubator with self turner but doubt I'll get a baby out of it. 

My sick turquoisine hen is status post 1 week of antibiotics.  She's better, but not completely recovered yet.  I tried to see if she would like to get better sun and fresh air in the bird room during the day yesterday, but she looked a bit tired again, so I think I'll keep her out of the breeze until she finishes all her antibiotics - another week.  She's still quite lively when I try to clean her face with a wet cotton swab and appears to be eating well, so at least that's good news.

not meant to be

Just as my female turq is laying its first egg, she got sick again, and I am having to pull her to treat her for infection again.  Hopefully she will recover, but I am definitely not going to allow her to breed again this year.  I am trying to incubate the one egg she laid.  It's very difficult to maintain constant temperature and humidity without an incubator.  I bought one, but it will not get to me in time, so I am trying to make a home-made incubator until I receive the professional one in the mail.

turqs

The yellow turquoisine grasskeets are finally looking like they are breeding.  They were fighting a lot right before they were more amorous.  Having read this was likely and does not affect fertility, I left them alone.  Shortly thereafter, the hen started accepting feedings from the male and they were mating frequently.  The hen is spending more and more time in the nest, I hope this means she's sitting tight on the eggs.  I have been reluctant to check in the nest since it's hung high up in my ginormous flight cage.  I may give in after a week or so when they are both out of the nest since I do want to candle the eggs to make sure they are fertile.  I have been watching the hen carefully daily since she did have a bout of bacterial infection a few months ago.

 Here is my bachelor split to yellow turquoisine male.  I should be getting a yellow hen for him soon.  His feathers is a lot better now after molting and improved nutrition.  

Here's the male yellow turquoisine.

Here's the yellow hen.