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True Experience With Birds

The 2006-Breeding Season

By G.A. Abbate Hillside New Jersey

In the last couple weeks I had several phone conversations with fellow fanciers in many parts of the world.  Unfortunately many of them lament of problems they are encountering during this 2006-breeding season.  Recently, many breeders have been experiencing high mortality among the young Canaries.  Many said "I am losing baby Canaries at age 7,8, and even 10 days.  They are dying in the nest with a crop full of food."

Even though Gouldian Finches and similar other species of birds breed in nest boxes, mortality of the young could occur, it happened to me too.  During the month of January 2006 I had several nests of young Gouldians in the bird room, my timer that controlled the light and the dimmer malfunctioned, as a result the main light went out all of a sudden and I assume that several pairing Gouldians were unable to return to the nests for the night.  Even though the temperature in the room was maintained at 70 degrees F, the nests that contained two or three youngsters simply died from the cold.  However, the nests which had five, six, or more youngsters, even though the birds were chilly, they survived the night. 

These mortalities definitely have occurred and caused by the cold.  In my opinion the number one reason for the mortality caused by coldness could be because the artificial light in the bird room went out suddenly and no dim light was available to allow the female or females to safely return to the nests to keep the youngsters warm for the night.  The temperature at night is much cooler than during the day and the youngsters, without protection of the warmth from the mother, will die from the cold.  It is a good idea to frequently check the lighting system in the bird room.  For example, in my bird room if the main light goes out at 8 PM and the dimmer light is available in the room for an additional 30 minutes, it is and will be just a sufficient amount of dim light to allow the females to return to their nest and settle for the night.

Other reasons of mortality of youngsters with a crop full of food could be because of the feeding of garbage not fit for caged bird consumption or spoiled food that are fed to the feeding parents.  Soft food and soak seed spoil very rapidly, especially during the warmer climates.  Feeding rancid nestling food, even if it smells like candy, will definitely harm and kill the young Canaries and other caged birds; it can even make the adult birds very sick too.  I suggest to everyone, to be very careful in feeding the birds, avoid the feeding of food that you would not eat yourself; this will assure the survival of the youngsters and the adults as well.  In our bird room we feed a small amount of soft food each feeding and in the PM hours we feed sufficient moist food that will be totally consumed before it gets dark or before the light goes out.  The feeding parents first thing in the morning should receive fresh, not spoiled, soft food.  In our bird room we make sure that nothing is left from the night before.  Feeding birds including Gouldian Finches and other similar species, Canaries, Carduelan Finches, and others can safely feed their youngsters with good, non-spoiled, dry seed alone.  To minimize the possibility that the young birds and as well as the adult birds feed on unspoiled food, every double breeding cage and all of the cages in our bird room has a bottom grill, so therefore, there is no chance that the birds, young and old, could eat spoiled food on the bottom of the cage.

Another reason that causes high mortality in youngsters is because the high infestation of avian parasites.  High infestation of these critters will weaken the vitality of the youngsters, unable to receive food from the parent.  To minimize this possibility, we continuously clean all their nests.  We remove the built nests and the nest pads and place them in very hot water and all the avian parasites will go to hell.  We rebuild every nest with clean, sterile, parasite free nesting material and the youngsters keep on growing healthy and strong. 

The above are simply routines that we follow and as a result we enjoy watching young birds that grow healthy and full of vitality.  It doesn't take an excessive amount of work to do the above-mentioned chores.  However, doing a good job, we enjoy the reward of the success in breeding healthy caged birds. 

I mentioned these above procedures many times but I believe that repeating hopefully will encourage everyone to take better care of our feathered friends. 

Some people enjoy showering and bathing every day; birds love to keep clean and would love to bathe everyday also. By supplying bathing water to all birds and to the feeding parent at least every couple of days, it will keep the birds happy and clean and therefore, they will continue to feed their youngsters with tender love and care.  Every time we give a bird a bath, we add to each gallon of bathing water one tablespoon of apple cider vinegar OR one tablespoon of Listerine OR occasionally a tablespoon of Epson Salt, this will keep all birds clean, happy, and healthy.

Good, genuine, wholesome, fresh food will keep human and birds as well healthy, strong, and disease free (As the old saying goes "An apple a day keeps the doctor away").  In my opinion, in this day just an apple a day will not do it. All of us humans know we have choices to better food to stay healthy and disease free.  We humans cannot live on bread and water alone neither can birds live on dry seed and water alone.  All seed eating birds in their wild state have access to a bountiful supply of natural food such as seeding in the milky stage of wild grass and weeds, a variety of fruits, plus some species of birds devour insects and their larvae.  Using good common sense we supply our birds in our bird rooms with various supplements to try to duplicate the bird diet, which they have access to in their wild habitat.

We, the people in my household, eat a variety of nutritious food to help keep us healthy and sickness free.  We consume an enormous variety of vegetables and a variety of seasonal fresh fruit as well.  We minimize the consumption of red meat or any kind of meat for that matter.  We can get good protein various legumes such as lentil, variety of beans, soybeans and soy bi-products such as tofu, we also eat of a lot of yogurt, and we take supplements of vitamins and minerals.  Every one of us knows that all the soil that produces our food for many years have been depleted of most nutrients, therefore, we humans must supplement our daily diet with various vitamins and minerals tablets or capsules, the same should be supplied to the birds in captivity.

The same nutrients can successfully be offered to our birds in our bird rooms.  Our nestling foods that we feed to the birds as well as our birdseed diets contain all of the above-mentioned ingredients plus much more.  The food is scrupulously prepared fresh daily and offered to our birds.  In my opinion, by doing a good job in properly feeding our birds we could be enjoying the daily chore without stressing ourselves in performing the work.  When good work is properly done it becomes easy and pleasurable.