Week of 05/23/2011
It’s been 5 weeks since I set up my breeding cage, and not a lot has happened. My breeding cage set up is Laurel and Hardy’s cage with a few minor changes. You can read about that here.
Since that first week, I have made several changes to the setup, based on my birds’ reactions as well as information I gathered since then. *I have photos of the new set up, but my husband accidentally left our camera in my friend’s car. In San Fransisco. 😦 *
The first change made was to get rid of that blue crinkly paper. Neither of my birds would walk on the bottom of their cage while that stuff was down there. They didn’t want anything to do with it, and their hesitation definitely made eating and drinking quite a show. Since my goal is NOT to stress them out, I modified the cage lining to pine bedding. Several websites noted that these wood shavings (chips, not dust!) were created for birds, but I found the brand I am using in the hamster area of the pet store. I made sure that the wood shavings were safe for birds, and the bag specifically noted bird breeding suitability. My husband wasn’t too happy with all of my purchases, but I was able to convince him that it wasn’t so bad.
Sometimes I think that Laurel and Hardy are the messiest birds ever! I don’t know how they get food and stuff in their water, but it is a constant thorn in my side. They are adorable though, so cleaning up after the two of them is worth it. In order to keep soaked wood chips to a minimum, I removed the wire lining from the bottom of the cage. I laid down newsprint on the plastic bottom and covered the newsprint with the wood chip bedding. The newsprint helps me keep the plastic cage bottom cleaner as well as assisting in the easy removal of the wood chip bedding.
The wood chip bedding also makes a great lining for the breeder box, so I no longer needed the cotton nest stuffing or lining string. I know that budgies nest in the hollow of trees when they are in the wild, but I didn’t realize that they don’t build nests. To make the wood chips safe for a nest environment, I had to do a few things which I’ll share in another post.
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