Budgerigar: maintenance and care at home. How to teach a budgerigar to talk

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

Noisy, agile and cheerful budgerigars can be found in many homes of Russian bird lovers. These cute birds are ideal for keeping at home. They become attached to the owner, considering him a member of the pack. The care and maintenance of a budgerigar is not difficult, it is only important to know about the characteristics of these babies.

A bit of history

The first time these little funny birds were described by George Shaw in 1805. Around the same time, G. Nodder, his closest friend and colleague, painted this bird. D. Gould brought budgerigars to Europe in 1840. Due to non-compliance with the elementary conditions of transportation, many birds died. Exotic lovers are interested in breeding budgerigars in captivity.

After 49 years (1854), an article by Jules Delon was published, in which he wrote thatFrench bird lover Solny managed to successfully breed parrots at home in France. Four years later, Karl Bolle reported a similar success with German bird lovers. Budgerigars were brought to Russia from Western Europe. A little later, birds began to be bred in the main Moscow zoo, and then at home.

External Features

These are small birds: the length of their body does not exceed 20 cm, the tail reaches 10 cm, and the length of the wings is 9.5 cm. The maximum weight of a parrot is 45 grams. Visually, the bird seems a little larger due to the rather long tail.

Plumage

The colors of budgerigars are quite varied. The main plumage is painted in protective colors. The throat and front of the bird's head are covered with yellow feathers. On both sides of the head there are purple oblong spots. Under them, on both sides of the throat, there are three black spots. On the yellow background of the occipital part of the head of the parrot, as well as in the upper part of the back, there is a brown waviness. It becomes coarser and wider from head to back.

In the tail are the two longest feathers, painted in dark blue. The remaining tail feathers are colored greenish-blue with a fairly wide stripe in the center. The first order of flight feathers on the wings is colored in green tones, while they have yellowish hues on the outside, and the ends are outlined with a black border. Yellow spots in the center form a strip at the bottom of the fan.

Second and third orders of flight feathers brown-yellow with yellow trim. In adults, the beak is yellow with a light green tint. In young individuals it is darker. It is quite easy to determine the sex of a budgerigar by the color of the wax located above the beak: in the female it is often colorless or brown, and in the male it is deep blue.

How to choose a feathered pet?

If you are planning to get such a charming feathered pet, then it is better to go for him to the nearest pet store or to a well-established breeder. The option of purchasing budgerigar chicks in the bird market can be considered as a last resort, since no one will give you guarantees about the he alth of the bird.

Even in a pet store, you should carefully consider the choice of a pet. Pay attention to how the birds behave: in their normal state, they are energetic and mobile, chirping merrily. If a beautiful and bright baby sits, ruffled, indifferent to everything that happens around - this may indicate that he is unhe althy.

The eyes of a parrot should be clean and shiny. The beak and the skin area between the head and the beak (cere) are clean, without growths and signs of peeling. The feathers of a he althy bird are shiny, even, without bald spots and bald patches. Look at the baby's paws: they should be clean, with tight scales, without growths.

Budgerigar: maintenance and care at home

In order for your pet to please you for a long time with excellent he alth and good mood, you must observesimple content rules:

• Do not disturb the bird during daytime sleep. In the evening, cover the cage with a thick cloth, but leave the front of the cage open.
• For parrots, air humidity of at least 60% is required. It is especially important to maintain this parameter during the heating season, when the air in the room becomes too dry. It can negatively affect the appearance of the bird, lead to a decrease in immunity, which will eventually lead to respiratory diseases.
• Feed and change the water in the drinking bowl should be daily, regularly clean the house for budgerigars. Sometimes you can let your pet out of the cage so that he can exercise his wings a little.

Now let's look at the basic content rules in more detail.

Cage and accessories

Today, pet stores can offer their customers a wide range of cages and accessories. The cage for the budgerigar should be spacious. The best option is a rectangular shape with a retractable plastic tray, which greatly facilitates the cleaning process. For one parrot, the minimum size of the cage is 50 x 30 x 50 cm, the distance between the bars should be no more than 12 millimeters.

The budgerigar cage should be completed with:

• hanging feeder;
• drinker;
• wooden ladder and perches, swings;
• mineral stone;
• bell, ball and other toys.

Budgerigars have a negative attitude towardsfrequent moving from one place to another, so a permanent place for the cage should be determined in advance. It is better to place it in the living room, where all family members gather. Place the cage in a corner or along a wall at eye level. It is not recommended to place it near heating appliances, in a draft, and also where direct sunlight falls.

Feeding

Keeping and caring for a budgerigar requires proper nutrition. Breeders most often feed cheerful pets with ready-made mixtures, which include seeds of onion herbs, sunflower, millet, canary grass, and oats. In addition to ready-made food for budgerigars, it is useful to include the following foods in the diet:

• Porridge (oatmeal, buckwheat, barley, rice, corn, millet). Porridge is boiled in water without sugar and s alt.
• Sprouted grain.
• Greens (beet leaves, radish, young grass sprouts, dandelion, plantain, clover).
• Fruits (oranges, bananas, peaches, kiwi, apples, apricots, plums, pears).
• Berries (rowan, currant, raspberry).
• Vegetables (cucumber, carrot, radish, tomato, pumpkin, bell pepper, zucchini).
• Cottage cheese.
• Eggs.

Budgerigars are strictly forbidden to give:

• cilantro;
• basil;
• sorrel;
• dill;
• parsley.

All of the listed herbs are overly spicy for parrots. Vegetables and fruits are given fresh or dried. They must first be washed and thoroughly cleaned of stones. Particular attention should be paidfree access of the pet to clean drinking water. Tap water is not recommended. It is better to give your feathered friend purified bottled water. Every day it needs to be changed and the drinker cleaned.

Vitamins

How to organize the maintenance and care of a budgerigar so that your little friend feels comfortable and he althy? It is necessary, in addition to the main food, to place mineral supplements - mineral stone and sepia. Birds need them to fill the deficiency of minerals and sharpen the beak. For normal digestion, parrots require purified river sand. Special vitamin complexes for parrots should be added to the drinker - Beaphar Vinka, Radostin, BEAPHAR Trink + Fit Birds.

Bathing

Budgerigars are very fond of water treatments. The maintenance and care of such pets will be complete if you purchase a special bath for bathing. You can adapt a plastic tray or plate for this purpose. The water level in the tank should be only a few millimeters. While swimming, you must follow the basic rules:

• you can't force a bird to bathe;
• water temperature in the bath is about +25 °C, air temperature is not lower than +20 °C;
• don't let your parrot drink dirty bath water;
• remove the bath immediately after the procedure.

Some parrots like to bathe in wet leaves. To do this, put plantain, dandelion or lettuce leaves in the bath. Foryour pet it will be great fun.

Temperature

The budgerigar feels comfortable at a room temperature of +15 to +25 °C. Such pets are not afraid of coolness, but they do not tolerate sudden changes in temperature and drafts. In summer, sunbathing should be arranged for the parrot. Such procedures begin with a five-minute stay in the air and gradually increase the walking time to half an hour. This should be done during non-hot hours - after 4 pm and before 10 am.

Communication

Little budgerigars are endowed with an excellent memory, they are very inquisitive. They are well trained, quickly understand how to open and close the cage. If you want your pet to learn to talk, get active young chicks at the age of 3 - 5 months that chirp very loudly.

Experienced feathered owners who know how to teach a budgerigar to talk are advised to start classes with simple and harmonious, melodic words. After they have been mastered by your pet, you can move on to small suggestions. Training is carried out in complete silence, in a calm atmosphere. Take care that the bird is not hungry, irritable or sleepy so that the baby is not distracted.

When you are sure that everything is conducive to the lesson, you can begin. If you don't know how to teach a budgerigar to talk, advice from experienced owners will help you. Training is conducted daily, for 15 minutes, preferably at the same time. The wordsyou should speak with intonation and slowly - this is very important.

It is quite easy to find a common language with such a pet, for this you just need to spend more time with the baby. After acquiring a chick, it is necessary to give him two or three days for him to get used to the new place, then you can begin to gradually accustom the bird to your hands, speak affectionately with her, and not make sudden movements. Gradually, the baby will begin to trust his master and show him signs of attention.

Reproduction

Probably, everyone who is going to have such beautiful and sociable pets in their home is interested in how long budgerigars live at home. It depends on how competently the care is organized for them. On average, life expectancy ranges from 5 to 15 years. Offspring can appear in birds starting from the age of ten months.

Budgerigars breed easily in captivity. To do this, you must have a young heterosexual couple (10 - 12 months). It is important that the birds are friendly to each other. For successful mating, daylight hours are extended to 14 hours and the birds are provided with a special diet - every other day they are given a protein "mash" - a mixture of carrots, chalk and eggs.

A nest box is installed in the cage. The female will prepare the nest herself, after which the laying of eggs will begin. There are from 4 to 12 of them, depending on the age of the parrots.

How to care for a chick?

Budgerigar chicks are born naked and blind after 17 to 20 days. Throughten days the first feathers appear, and at the age of three weeks the chicks already look like adult parrots. At first, the chicks feed on the mother's goiter milk, then she gradually transfers them to adult food. A month later, the babies leave the parental nest and learn to eat on their own, at which time they are transplanted into a separate cage.

Diseases of budgerigars

In the absence of proper care, immunity weakens in parrots, which provokes the development of various diseases. Knowing how long budgerigars live at home, it should be understood that it is often the owners who are responsible for the poor he alth of their pets.

Veterinarians note frequent poisoning of budgerigars with household chemicals, chemically treated herbs. For treatment, crushed activated carbon is used, which is diluted in a small amount of water.

Budgerigars often suffer from various neoplasms. Due to the rapid metabolism, tumors in parrots quickly increase in size and can appear in different parts of the body. They are treated quite difficult by surgery.

Many diseases of budgerigars occur due to poor cleaning in the cage or in the room where the parrot lives, due to an unbalanced diet. These birds are prone to colds, especially if the cage is in a draft or the temperature is very low.

Content flaws

Before you decide to purchase a budgerigar, think carefully about this step. With the obvious advantages of such a pet(energy, talkativeness) it also has disadvantages. Budgerigars chirp quite loudly, and "talks" can start as early as 5 am. These birds may not get along with pets (cats in particular). Family members may be allergic to bird feathers.