Bourke Parakeets For Sale: Babies, Hand fed, Very Tame; Rosies, Opalines and Opaline Fallows

Life is so busy lately that I've not posted recently. I want to, and have lots of questions sent to rosie.bird@gmail.com that were answered and I hope to share with Readers.

I've been hand feeding five baby Rosy Bourke parakeets. Prices range from $150 to $225, depending on color. All are very, very tame and sweet. Sorry, but I don't ship. Can meet buyers from Coquille to Reedsport. We are in North Bend, near Coos Bay, on the southern Oregon Coast. (Not Bend, which is in Eastern Oregon).  Three are $150 each and the Opaline Fallows with red eyes are $225. Contact us at rosie.birds@gmail.com

These darlings are $150 each. Hand fed and very sweet.

Pale pink, Opaline Fallow Rosy Bourke with red eyes.
This one is $225.

Hiding in a tissue box. These sweethearts are $150 each.

Just had a bath. Feathers are wet.

Contact us via email at: rosie.birds@gmail.com

PEACE & BLESSINGS!

Bourke Parakeets, 5 weeks old

These five-week-old Rosy Bourke parakeets are Rosie and Pretty Boy's babies. They are eating on their own, but still need some hand feedings to be sure they're getting enough to eat.

Last year we seemed to get several red-eyed babies from three different sets of parents. This year, we haven't had any with red eyes, but we are seeing a lot with yellow feathers mixed in with the rosy or pink. Not sure why there would be such a difference when the parents are all the same birds, both last year and this year.

I moved them into a larger cage and off the kitchen table today. Rosie kept calling to them, so I let her visit them to reassure her that they're all fine. She's on the far left.

One of the babies cheeps more than the other two, so Rosie fed her to shut her up. Rosie wouldn't feed the others. You might think that baby was the youngest, but actually she was the first hatched.

The babies above after their mom went home. While Rosie was visiting, Pretty Boy kept calling to her. He is hand tamed, not hand fed.

Usually I let Pretty Boy out to fly free too, but didn't this morning because the cats were nearby. Rosie stays on my shoulder or hand and I can take her anywhere, but I wasn't confident that Pretty Boy would.

Pretty Boy... Dad to the birds above.

I don't believe either cat would ever hurt one of our birds, but I'd rather be cautious. If the birds are out flying, I try to be sure the cats are either outside or locked in a bedroom. Better safe than sorry. In spite of that, I've had birds fly and land right in front of our black Mei-Ling and she freezes. She's afraid of getting into trouble.

Mei-Ling being introduced to a baby Bourke.
She is a very gentle and obedient cat.

Patches wanting some attention.
The baby bird being fed doesn't interest her.

It's actually the older calico I worry more about. She's a stray we took in several years ago and, as she's gotten older, her hearing is going. I can't yell, "NO!" and be certain she will hear me these days.

This morning it didn't seem fair to wake her up in her chair and lock her in a bedroom when she was so happy where she was. I knew Rosie would be easy to move from one room to the other in order to visit her youngsters.

Merry Christmas everyone!

 

Our front yard this morning with four deer. Two young
ones in the middle are licking each other. It's been
raining for several days and many deer come to graze.

Baby Birds with Problem Parents

Neversink7 asked, "...have you ever had problems with splendid or bourke parents pulling the feathers off of their babies?"  His Splendid parents are misbehaving and he wonders if a nutritional deficiency could be a possible culprit.

I don't think nutrition of any kind would cause this. There are plenty of feathers available that fall off the birds naturally and I often see my birds "playing" with fallen feathers, as well as routinely preening themselves. They can chew on all the feathers they want to, so why take them from their babies?

I've never had Bourkes pull feathers, except for the incident with one pair savaging a baby. With that pair, I always rescue and handfeed the young almost as soon as they hatch. I believe the male wants to breed again and dispatching the babies will allow that. I recently put the hen on "rest" and moved the male to another hen whose eggs have always been infertile. She's now on fertile eggs and I'm interested to see what happens. I may end up handfeeding her young too, if this male is actually the "bad" parent.

[UPDATE: After the cock was successful with another hen and a good dad, it turned out that the mother of the brood was to blame. Although she could hatch her eggs, she would not raise the babies and would begin savaging them as soon as all the eggs hatched. I still have two of her offspring (a brother and sister) that were hand fed and are wonderful parents with their mates. Both are very sweet natured. Their mother eventually developed an odd "droop" and died a few days later. I've wondered if she had a brain tumor that made her crazy or something. Also, she was sold and came back to me after her first clutch with a different mate also died. I don't know what her history was for the two years she was away from me.]
 

My experience with Splendids is different.  Many years ago I bought my 1st pair and the hen's back was bare. I was unfamiliar with Splendids, but didn't like the fact that the male pulled the feathers from her back. She was sweet and tame, but he was wild...drew blood the first time I caught him.

Their first brood died. They didn't seem to know to feed them. Their second clutch of three did fine and I still have a male from that clutch. He has NEVER pulled feathers from his mate(s) and neither has his son (the grandson of the 1st bird). None of my Splendids have ever pulled feathers from their young. I was happy to let that original bird go as a lone caged bird to someone else who enjoyed watching and listening to him.

To Neversink7:  How many clutches have your problem birds had? I'd limit them to two or three, with a few months in between. Maybe they're tired of feeding and caring for their young...? Sounds like you are doing the right thing by pulling and handfeeding them. 

Another thought ... if the young birds are fledged and able to eat on their own before the parents begin pulling the feathers, in the wild they would try to chase them off to live elsewhere. In a small cage or aviary, they can't leave. Is only one parent feeding and the other pulling feathers? That seems likely. I remove my own young birds as soon as the father begins to "chase" them from their perches. By then, they're eating okay and he wants them gone.

Past experience with Finches:  I once had a beautiful pair of Zebra finches. The hen was all white and the male was pied. They produced gorgeous babies with a "saddle" of color over the backs of white birds. Very pretty. However, about the 3rd year the male began to throw newly-hatched babies out of the nest. I'd put them back, and he'd throw them out again. He continuously did this and wouldn't raise them any longer. They'd produce another clutch and he'd do the same thing. My belief is that he felt he'd produced enough progeny and only wanted to continuously mate, not work to raise young. I gave him away to a bird store.

Past experience with button quail:  As a kid, I had a pair of cute button quail that hatched a large clutch. I

was shocked one day to go out to the aviary and find half the clutch bloodied and dead. Apparently, a male button quail will kill his sons after a certain age ... Sad. I don't know if every one of them does this, but enough do, that babies shouldn't be left with their dad for very long. Perhaps removing male button quail as soon as their eggs hatch is wise.

This sounds like it's the males of the species that savage their young. That might be typical, but I did have a female budgerigar parakeet who visited the nestboxes of other hens and killed their young. After she'd done this more than once, I finally caught her in a box that wasn't hers and realized who was doing it. She was "dispatched" and I never had another problem in that aviary.

There must be good birds and bad birds, just as there are good dogs and bad dogs, good people and bad people.

Sexing Splendids

Although there are many hybrid colors of Splendids, I think the normal variety is the prettiest. Why fool around with a good thing? Adult male Splendids in their normal wild color are easy to recognize. The males have a scarlet chest and the females don't.

All young Splendids look like hens. It could be many weeks before bits of red begin to show on their chests, indicating that they're male, gradually filling in to cover most of their chest.

As with Bourkes, I'm not going to go peering inside a bird ... it might injure them and I wouldn't know what to look for anyway. I'm not a vet. Leave this to the professionals!

However, there is another way that may help determine the sex of your young birds. Splendid males tend to have black beneath their wings, whereas, females have white bands within the black. If the white bands are broken, you may have to wait and see whether the white bands fill in or disappear. In my case, I've seen partial white, broken bands fade out to become all black (males). If the underside of the wings are already black, then you know you have a male. If there are strong, unbroken white bands (lines) on the underside of the wings, then you have a female.

I posted this description once before and a reader said he appreciated it. He used this and said it's always proven true for him since. Handling the babies to check the feathers on the underside of their wings should also help tame them.

Good luck sexing your youngsters!

Sexing Bourkes

You may already know how to sex normal Bourkes (those with brown backs). Adult males grow a narrow row of blue feathers above their cere (nose/nostrils). Females don't have that line of blue, and typically neither do Rosies.

Sexing Rosies or young birds is more difficult. I'm not a vet and can't peer inside the birds, or do a DNA sample. But, watching the birds will often give a clue as to their sex. Males tend to strut their stuff by throwing their shoulders back and slightly flairing their wings at the shoulder. This is an obvious clue that they are male. Sometimes youngsters will start to do this almost as soon as they are weaned (eating on their own).

Another clue is if they attempt to "feed" a sibling. When this occurs, the one doing the feeding is likely male. Very young birds can be seen "practicing" this behavior. Don't, however, mistake this for when they are trying to steal food from each other's mouths!

Male Bourkes feed their hen during courtship and when she's on eggs. As soon as young leave the nest, father Bourkes take over most of their feeding. So, male feeding comes naturally to them, even at a young age.

As for identifying very young hens, that's not as easy. All you can do is say, "well, I don't see any male behavior, so this is probably a hen."  You have a 50/50 chance of being right!  

Peace & Bird Blessings.

New Temporary Home

Our three baby Bourkes being hand fed are now able to fly...not well maybe, but they can leave the table and end up who knows where. 

They still need to be fed and still want to hide away during the day. But, their previous shelter/box was no longer safe. It was time to move them into a cage, but still give them a place to hide. The small cage I had available has small doors and the box they were in wouldn't fit.

The answer? You see it here. A Puffs tissue box turned on its side. Paper towels in the bottom are changed each time the babies are fed.  They can go in and out as they please, so they are free to roam and practice their flying as they please. They can also try to eat on their own as there are several easy-to-eat choices available.

I put tame Rosie and Flame in with them to see how they'd do. Rosie has already taught the smallest one to eat spray millet, or at least try to. When I reached into the cage this afternoon, the oldest flew onto my arm next to Rosie who always gets there first. Granted it was time to feed the babies so he was motivated, but it was a first for him and pleased me.

The two tame older birds are setting examples for the babies. Interactions between the young adults and the youngsters are cute to watch.

Be careful if you decide to do this, however. Adult breeding Bourkes might try to chase the babies away and could harm them. These two tame birds are very gentle and still very young themselves. Still, I watched them closely until I was certain they wouldn't "bully" the younger birds.

Weaning Babies

The easiest "starter" food for baby parakeets is spray millet. Fuchsia is now sharing a cage with other babies who were reared by their parents. They all have spray millet available, as well as Petamine breeding formula because it has a soft powder mixture that may make it easier to eat. Typical parakeet seed is also present.

Several water sources are also in place. I have two cups of water and two bottles hanging on cage sides. Smart youngsters will find everything they need, but I have one that seems slow to mature and want to make finding water and food easy. Although all the others learned to eat right on time, one had to go home to his parents twice in the past week because he wasn't eating on his own and begged the other babies to feed him. They didn't.

Watch your babies closely to be sure they're eating. If not, you may need to put them back with their parents and wait a few days before taking them away again. Sometimes you will know it's time to remove them when their father starts chasing them instead of feeding them.

Most often, however, you will see them in the feed dish eating and leaving seed hulls behind. Empty hulls are a sign that they are successfully eating on their own.

Hand Feeding Baby Birds of the Smaller Kind…

These photos are of Fuchsia, the Rosy Bourke baby I previously wrote about. In these photos she/he is 18 days old. How do you sex a Bourke? It’s difficult in a baby bird, but adults are easier. I’ll cover that in a future post since this is about hand feeding.

A newly hatched chick should be fed a watery mixture of food almost every 2 hours. For best results, get up in the middle of the night and feed them. After a week, you can cut back to 3-4 hours. Fuchsia is being fed about every 4 hours, 5 times a day. However, I’m not getting up in the middle of the night. She waits from 9:30 p.m. to 6:30 a.m., 9 hours without food. She’d probably like to be fed in the middle of the night, but I’m lazy and she’s doing fine without it.

I use Exact Hand Feeding Formula. The proper mixing amounts are included with the package. It’s available at numerous sites on the internet, in larger pet shops and usually at the Grange. With a glass measuring cup, I boil a cup of water in the microwave. I put 1 ½ teaspoons of powdered Exact in a tiny bowl and mix in 3 teaspoons of boiling water, stirring until well dissolved. Newly hatched chicks to 2 days old get 1 part Exact to 6 parts water. Two to 5 days get 1 part Exact to 2-3 parts water. Five days until weaned, they get 1 part Exact to 2 parts water.

Formula should be stirred until all lumps are out of it. This also helps it to cool. I keep the Exact in the refrigerator to keep it fresh and the cold powder helps cool the mixture. It should be warm, but not hot when fed. They don’t like it cold, however. I test it on my wrist just like with any other baby formula. When very warm, but NOT HOT, I pull it up into a glass eye dropper (usually found in pairs at pharmacies). When it starts to get too cool, I set my smaller dish into a larger dish of the extra boiled water and that re-warms it. Always checking, however, to be sure it’s not too hot or too cold.

Some books on birds recommend using a thermometer to be sure the temperature stays at the optimum degree (they’ll tell you what that is). I trust my wrist. Or, as you can see from the photo, a dab on my fingers tells me if it’s cooled too much.

Fuchsia learned very quickly to know where the food comes from. I slowly squeeze the formula into her mouth until she turns her head away. She puts the tip right into her beak and turns her head away when she’s ready for a short break. When she’s ready, we go at it again. She usually eats very quickly and I fill the dropper only a few times. There’s always food left over, but it’s easier to retrieve it from the bowl and into the eye dropper if there’s enough in the bowl. By putting my fingers around her head, it helps steady it. She tends to “bob” back and forth. I don’t hold her still, just create a barrier that restricts how far she wobbles from side to side.

I’ve read that you don’t want to inject any air into a baby bird’s crop. So, I make sure the dropper is full of only formula with no air in between. I even eject a small amount before putting it to her beak to be sure any air in the tip is exhausted before she’s fed. That’s another reason to have enough food in the bowl so the eye dropper can submerge far enough to avoid sucking air with the food. (However, I’ve noted what looks like a “bubble” inside their crops and it never seemed to harm them. Don’t panic if you see this too.)

Parent birds stuff their youngsters so full that they look like they could burst. I don’t worry about overfeeding hand fed babies. Their little crops do bulge. However, never force feed them. Let them decide if they want more or not. Check their crop and you’ll get used to seeing it at the size they are comfortable with.

Apparently some breeders put a tube down larger birds’ throats and feed all the formula at once. That is fast and efficient, but I can’t imagine doing it to a small bird like a Bourke or Splendid. They eat quickly anyway, and it’s much safer to let them eat from an eye dropper at their own pace. I’m certain they’re happier that way too.

Be sure to inspect glass eye droppers before every feeding. If it becomes chipped at the tip it won’t be noticeable and you don’t want to use it if it’s damaged. Children can become curious and play with droppers when you don’t know about it … so check them. Eye droppers are very fragile; anyone can pick one up to move it and accidently damage it without realizing it.

Be sure to clean all your utensils thoroughly after each feeding. Run hot water through the eye dropper until there’s nothing left in it. Also make sure the rubber bulb on the end is well rinsed. Because food can dry inside, I sometimes leave the dropper in the bowl of boiling water (now very hot, but no longer boiling) while I clean up the baby.

Yes, the baby gets sponged off too. Formula is going to spill out the side of a baby’s beak and probably on its chest. If left there, it will harden and be difficult to remove. It’s much easier to take a damp cloth or tissue and wipe it off after each feeding. Fuchsia appears to enjoy the attention from this procedure.

Do not save left over prepared formula. Mix it fresh each time you feed.

When I began feeding this baby almost a week ago, I was disappointed to need to do it. I knew it would take time and effort to save this baby’s life. However, I find now that I truly enjoy my moments with this baby and have great affection for her. She has a pleasant, peaceful effect on me.

In the future, I expect to walk around the house with Fuchsia on my shoulder and exchange “birdy” kisses with her. Although it’s easy to tame a young Bourke, just like with a young Budgie, when hand fed the birds bond in a unique way.

What about our three cats? Trust me, they leave the birds alone. I expect to introduce this baby to them when it’s outside the cage. More risky, but I’m confident they can learn to accept the new, tame pet that’s occasionally loose in the house. Never unsupervised, of course.

I have lots of cats with bird stories to share. I’ll get to them eventually, I promise. Have a great tomorrow.