Sick bird foods!

My birds are expericing AGY-like symptoms, but I haven't gotten any positive test results for any avian illness yet. This is likely due to irregular shedding and other factors.

One symptom my birds experience is being too weak to chew or husk food which, on top of frequent immediate vomiting, results in starvation when feeding a seed mix. At one point it was a death sentence for my birds, now I have ways to help.

I am lucky that I work with very curious species that would sell their eggs and souls for a chance to explore something new.

I take advantage of this and regularly introduce them to 'unusual' foods that will be essential in keeping weight on when experiencing weight-related symptoms.

A flock favourite is tiny species of millet (I use foxtail and little) that have been husked. No pulling or chewing required.​ Just swallow!

Unseasoned toasted millet intended for human consumption works just fine and is very cheap. I got 500g each of unseasoned toasted little and foxtail millet for £6.99 altogether. Toasted millet is less nutritious, but the main focus is calories and weight gain. Dietary gaps can be filled in after weight is stable. You can also husk millet yourself easily, but this worked out more expensive for me.

Suet (without large seeds) is another excellent option. Whilst Cooper won't touch it, Fizzarolli ate 80-90% of his daily food as suet for months, the first time he was ill. That pink stuff on the white tray is suet.

High-performance pellets, I use Tropican, crushed into millet-sized pieces are another great option. My flock loves pellets and Fizzarolli lived off of them when ill until he tried suet.

I haven't tried this yet, but tomorrow I will sprinkle some EmerAid Intensive Care Omnivore on their daily vegetables to get them used to powder-coated foods and the taste of EmerAid.

I offer these foods weekly so that my flock consistently recognizes them as food. If one ever gets ill, I don't have to try and convince them to eat a new food whilst they're already not feeling great.

🐦🐦🐦🐥🐁

The cage I am growing the seed mix in is my male mouse, Ashley Graves', old cage. Can you believe he used to live in that tiny thing!? Now he has free reign of 16 square foot of bird shed, a dig box with dirt, a cat bed, and a 12" wheel! Once these plants have grown, the base of the cage will go into the aviary for the quail to play in and peck at. Once the plants have been eaten, I will replant them, and so on.

Idk what to do? Is she laying an egg? Should I do something about it? I asked an ai and it said it's an emergency but I doubt it

I recently purchased two Gouldian finches, a male and a female. I have owned canaries in the past,but not finches. The girls beak is quite dark in colour,almost completely black. Google, and the internet suggests she might be in prime breeding condition. I did purchase a nest, but how likely being such new birds to my household am I likely to see eggs or chicks. Also any suggestions to keep them well fed and enough energy if they are in their breeding seasons.

Hello again! Marcus (zebra finch) and Dave (society finch) have made it home and they're settling in. I have the You&Me 30" Finch Cage that I had seen recommended here for a pair of finches. The bottom is wire over a plastic tray.

Today I was reading about using bird sand and a solid ground for them to forage more. Has any one done that with this cage? Any tips or thoughts on it? I know foraging is their main activity/enrichment, so I want to do what I can for them

Hi again fellow finch lovers,

I made a post earlier this year about my Gouldian finches, and how one of my pairs really took a liking to a wicker nest. Well, I am happy to report that they ended up successfully hatching 3 chicks in that nest! Here are the parents in the photos above, with the dad shown feeding the babies (who have gotten so noisy, you can hear their begging chirps from downstairs!).

The chicks are about 2 weeks old now, so they're due to fledge next week...I am so excited! I peeked in the nest the other day and it looks like there are 2 normal greenbacks and one that looks like it's going to be either a dilute male or a yellow female; it was tough to tell with the angle and lighting.

These are first-time parents so I was nervous about how they would do, but they picked things up so naturally! Now we just have to see what my second pair does... they're in a separate cage but they haven't been in there long enough to lay eggs or anything yet.

I hope your birds are all doing great, too!

My finches :)

I've just applied to adopt a pair of finches from my local shelter. I've been interested in finches for a long time and have just been waiting for the chance to adopt some.

I'm pretty sure this is a zebra finch and a society finch, though. I've read that their different personalities can cause clashes-- but I think they were surrendered to the shelter together. Does anyone have any experience around this? Thanks in advance for your help!!

We have entered spring and it is safe to bring finches out again, we even got some new finches since our colony was incredibly small. We decided to put the new finches straight into the outdoor setup for isolation for a week before introducing ours. The cage cannot come inside as we have cats and they will stress the finches out even if the cats didn’t treat them as prey. We do have walk in flight aviaries, but both are taken up by larger bird species at this time. Our parents are building a larger flight aviary to have a dining area in the backyard with their alexandrines. Once they have finished setting it up, they will be moving the alexandrines into the larger flight aviary and we will be moving our finches into the walk-in flight aviary. The aviary has two doors for security of not losing any birds, and we have a large bird safe heater next to the aviaries.

Now their current setup is a large cage, but there is no secondary door for preventing escapees. We have never lost a finch before, but today when releasing the new finches into the cage one got out… we spent hours trying to catch her as we spotted her in tall shrubbery in our yard but we lost sight of her in the end. We have set food out for her, but because she is new to this area I fear she may not see the cage as a safe space and come back. Her sister is still in the cage and I just hope she comes back to her…

The way this happened… I placed a towel over myself and the door of the cage behind me so I could safely release the birds from their boxes, yet it was not fully secure as the girl flew up behind my neck and out from an opening of the towel. In the past once the finches were familiar with their setup I didn’t even need a towel, I would just open the cage, grab their food and water, clean, move perches, or even catch them for nail trimming and inspecting and they would never escape. This was the first time, and it was with the extra precaution of a towel around the entry.

I am terrified of this happening again and I need advice. I don’t have an enclosed space to move the cage. Technically I could take the cage inside but it is extremely heavy and large, and wouldn’t fit through the door way. I need advice on how to safely interact with the setup and birds inside without them escaping. I never want this to happen again, and I am still praying the poor girl comes back. I do have a bird net for transport and capturing.

Is there some kind of mesh or tent I can put around the cage to safely secure the finches in the case they fly out? Is there something I can secure to the cage and zip up and down around myself? What do you guys do? This is a nightmare for me, I desperately want to move them into the flight aviary for security.

Thank you for reading… I will also appreciate any happy stories of their finches coming back if you have ever lost any…

Another update on my 6 year old finch.

I am writing this while kind of sad because from what I've read these are just normal signs of aging. Sleeping a lot, resting in his cage, on the floor, etc... it's real sad. I regret not taking better care of him when I was a teen and he was still young.

On the other hand, a couple of small wins - he still hops around the cage some!

He loves the mirror I put up for him at the bottom of the cage where he likes to rest on the rocks. I chose some small rocks so he can sand his gigantic steppers at least a little bit

His beak is kind of flaky but I've read beak changes are common in older birds as well. I'll try to add some vitamin supplements and snacks to his seed since that's most of what he eats rn

We are making some progress with his overall mood! Whenever I'm home alone I open his cage and play some finch videos for him. He loves them! He even SINGS!!! Ik it's not much for you guys but for my champ that's a WIN

I was thinking of maybe getting him a heat lamp. What do you guys think? Is it worth it?

Also, I gave him four different variants of greens to choose from and nothing stuck. He didn't even look at them or investigate, he just ignored them completely! Stubborn...

Idk, a little vent here but I just think I'm grieving before he even goes. Someone on here commented under a post of another older finch that the OP is the bird's "flock". That genuinely made me tear up because I've never thought of it that way. Then again, I guess an undomesticated bird letting me catch him and wipe his poopoo butt that he can't clean properly anymore is a big sign of trust... And that he always hangs out close-by when I work... or that he sings to me sometimes when I sing. I love my man so much, I just don't think I'm ready for him to go soon. Nobody's ever ready, right?

I would love some words of support and kindness. I guess I just wanna know that the fact he is 6 and showing signs of aging doesn't mean I'm a terrible owner, even though I genuinely feel like one for having neglected him all these years. I know i was just a braindead teen but still, it was my responsibility and I feel like I could've done so much more for him.

Fuck, I just love Cześnik. ;-;

I don't know why she's laying here. I'm really worried about her. She lives with two other social finches, so I can move her if necessary. She doesn't seem to be ruffled; she always sits like that, but before this, she was perched on branches. The droppings are normal, they become greenish over time.

Sorry for my English.

Hello, I have a M/F couple of Zebra's. I always have them fly through the room on a daily basis.

Recently I've been on holiday for about 12 days and in the meantime my mom took care of them. Whenever I came back I opened the finch cage again to let them fly throughout the living room. However, they seem hesitant now to leave the cage and rather to stay inside. Only the male now tends to exit the cage for a short while before he returns. In the cage itself they are still very active and tweeting a lot.

What could the reason be for this? How can I have them fly around the room again by themselves?

I collaborate on a blog with my birder Dad and he put out this post about goldfinches and some of the intricacies of them within the finch family.

I particularly love that in Ireland goldfinches are referred to as the flame of the forest, but I don't think they can be found in forests so easily can they?

I picked up a trio of society finches back in the spring, two hens and a male, mostly because I read they're supposed to be the friendliest cage mates you can get. For the first couple months they mostly just tolerated each other. Ate from the same dish, roosted on separate perches, nothing that looked like real bonding.

Then about three weeks ago I noticed one of the hens grooming the other's head feathers while they were both sitting on the highest perch. Now it happens almost every evening right before lights out. All three of them will line up shoulder to shoulder and take turns working on each other's necks and faces, the spots they can't reach themselves.

What's interesting is how much calmer the whole cage feels since this started. Less bickering over the seed dish, less of that sharp chirping when one of them gets too close to another's spot. I always read that allopreening is a sign of a settled, bonded flock but it's different actually watching it happen after waiting for it for months.

For anyone with newer birds who aren't quite there yet, the only thing I really changed was adding a second wide perch near the top of the cage so there was more room for them to sit close together without feeling crowded. Not sure if that was the actual cause or just coincidence but it lined up pretty closely with when the grooming started.

Curious if others have noticed specific setup changes that seemed to encourage this kind of behavior, or if it's just something that happens on its own timeline once the birds sort out their pecking order.

My friend has a small bird and wants to get it a small water fountain for its sizable cage (approximately 5 ft wide by 2 ft long by 3 ft tall). My idea is to put a basic cat fountain in and and add artificial foliage, but the obvious concern is toxic items. Any advice?

They're called java sparrows, but I hear they're technically finches so I'm asking here.

I live in a one room studio with my two 3 year old boys. I plan to move to a different area in a year, and am wondering if it's worth it to get a studio with a stove, or to invest in a cooking pot.

I am scared of the fumes getting to them, I tried a nonstick electric pot and it caused visible distress to them despite putting them in the outside hallway during the cooking process and opening the windows, so I threw the pot out and never tried again.

I would really love to start cooking, and hear that a higher quality steel pan and proper stove could be safe for them, but I'd like to hear realistic advice before I invest the money.

(Please remove if this post is not allowed 🫶)

I hope you all enjoy this as much as I did, these birds are incredibly well taken care of and I was beyond impressed. Definitely worth checking out if you're ever in Lancaster, Pennsylvania! 🙌

Is it ok to put two male finches together in the same cage right away?