u/FrozenBr33ze

Young Master Shamrock had a blast this afternoon.

Someone saw a photo like this and started causing panic on Facebook, urging owner to go to the vet ASAP for a life threatening emergency. And I was scratching my head thinking, are people not familiar with varying moult patterns? Also, what was a vet going to do about it? Pull the immature feathers and suture the scalp closed and put a bandaid on it? Some bird people are really extra. 😂

Anyway. Clover is going through a moult with lots of new feathers growing on his face. He looks rather dapper with the sensitive immature spikes on his face right now. 😏

Athena (Cinnamon Blue female, exhibition budgerigar) is 3 days old today. She's from the very first clutch of her inexperienced parents (Bobby and Ador).

First-time parents can often be unpredictable. Contrary to popular belief, nature doesn't always know what it is doing. Both parents come from lines of excellent parents, and while there's a genetic influence on what kind of parents certain birds grow up to be, for some, it's a big learning curve.

Initial problem with this pairing was that the mother hen never learned that she needed to sit on her eggs consistently to maintain viability. This was remedied by letting her practice sitting on dummy eggs while her eggs were incubated artificially.

Athena was the first to hatch, who was immediately accepted by her mother. Unfortunately, one of the parents (and the hen is usually the culprit) has assaulted Athena after around 30 hours from hatch. I was at work at the time.

The right lateral side of Athena's head sustained several superficial injuries, along with bruising over the right wing, and over the cere. When discovered, Athena's cere was bluish in colour instead of translucent pink - indicating hypoxia from blood loss. Interestingly enough, her mother was still incubating her and she was very well fed. Generally when parental assault occurs, abandonment goes hand-in-hand. While I cannot say with certainty who or what caused the assault, I hypothesize that unexpected movement may have triggered a fight response from an inexperienced parent.

Athena was critical but demonstrated fighting spirit in spite of injuries and blood loss. I've taken over her care exclusively and have been monitoring her round the clock. She had to travel to an event with me in her incubator because I couldn't be in two places at once.

She's on her way to be 4 days old pretty soon, and her recovery looks promising. I am concerned about injuries around her eye and ear causing permanent disabilities with development, and she's too young to be assessed for anything at this time. Her eyes haven't opened yet.

She has a minor case of ruptured air sac from trauma, which leads to accumulation of air in and around her crop, but with careful husbandry, this should resolve in a few days to a week. At this time, I have to manually make her burp all the air out prior to a meal.

In about 30 hours from now, if she's still here with us, I'll be doing a more thorough wound cleaning with betadine. I am choosing to wait so that blood clot isn't dislodged, leading to more bleeding at this time. Most of the wound should have closed by then.

Handraising neonates (and chicks in general) is risky. Death by aspiration is very common in neonates. Even with a lot of experience under my belt, raising neonates makes me nervous.

I'm preparing another very experienced foster pair in one of my breeding enclosures who will most likely adopt Athena and take over her care, and of her siblings who are due to hatch starting next week. Her parents were released back into the flight cage as I'm not comfortable with them raising any more chicks any time soon.

Wish us the best of luck, and I hope to provide more positive updates on Athena over the coming days.

^(l am an experienced aviculturist who specialises in budgerigars. I show these birds competitively in the United States. A lot of knowledge and specialised skillset are required to safely navigate through the breeding process. As always, I strongly advise against breeding without mentorship and veterinary technical skills. I document and share the good and the challenges with utmost transparency. I share our stories on) ^(Reddit)^(,) ^(TikTok) ^(and) ^(Facebook)^(.)

Chance (Opaline Cobalt) is our special needs budgie who comes to work with us daily so we can help him potty. Each day, we bring a different budgie to accompany him. Today, we brought Mister Salt (Yellowface Anthracite) to tag along with us and he had a good time hanging out with his dads in between dog surgeries and preparing documentation.

Salt is one of our aviary birds who was purchased from a Champion breeder and judge from our national budgie club. His sweet disposition and genetics makes him really good asset to our family. I've never had to do any kind of training with him. He's just naturally trusting of the hands that feed him.

We're so blessed to be able to make so many memories with our zoo each day!

Chance (Opaline Cobalt) is our special needs budgie who comes to work with us daily so we can help him potty. Each day, we bring a different budgie to accompany him. Today, we brought Mister Salt (Yellowface Anthracite) to tag along with us and he had a good time hanging out with his dads in between dog surgeries and preparing documentation.

Salt is one of our aviary birds who was purchased from a Champion breeder and judge from our national budgie club. His sweet disposition and genetics makes him really good asset to our family. I've never had to do any kind of training with him. He's just naturally trusting of the hands that feed him.

We're so blessed to be able to make so many memories with our zoo each day!

Chance (Opaline Cobalt) is our special needs budgie who comes to work with us daily so we can help him potty. Each day, we bring a different budgie to accompany him. Today, we brought Mister Salt (Yellowface Anthracite) to tag along with us and he had a good time hanging out with his dads in between dog surgeries and preparing documentation.

Salt is one of our aviary birds who was purchased from a Champion breeder and judge from our national budgie club. His sweet disposition and genetics has been a really good asset to our family. I've never had to do any kind of training with him. He's just naturally trusting of the hands that feed him.

We're so blessed to be able to make so many memories with our zoo each day!

I breed and raise Exhibition quality budgerigars that you won't find at pet stores. I show them competitively and raise them as pets. The only one in the USA who does this. My birds aren't going to be cheap.

But I was being extra apparently. There was no way she was going to get anything after the first couple of messages with that attitude.

I show exhibition budgerigars competitively with Budgerigar Association of America and its affiliated clubs locally in Texas, and we made a 2 hours drive (one way) today to participate.

Nox, my Anthracite cock placed FIRST in the Rares division, where exhibitors of all levels show their birds that are classified as rare varieties (mutations). He showed off like a champ, and no surprise considering we practiced and trained so much. He was not only stunning, but he beat his contenders who were much bigger and closer to the standards solely by virtue of his showmanship skills. The judge was very impressed by how well he displayed himself with poise.

Secondly, my boy Avon got us our first win as Intermdiates by placing SECOND BEST! No surprise there, because he has been amazing and getting me several wins when we were competing as Novices the last 3 years.

My other kids did very well too. But miss Tufty managed to fly away and annoy me while I was very busy doing my secretary of the show duties. We got her back in and she beat the other 3 crests she competed with!

We had a great start this year's show season! Looking forward to taking it easy this weekend while the kids get their favourite treats.

^(l am an experienced aviculturist who specialises in budgerigars. I show these birds competitively in the United States. A lot of knowledge and specialised skillset are required to safely navigate through the breeding process. As always, I strongly advise against breeding without mentorship and veterinary technical skills. I document and share the good and the challenges with utmost transparency. I share our stories on) ^(Reddit)^(,) ^(TikTok) ^(and) ^(Facebook)^(.)

Budgerigar Association of America's show season of 2026 is about to commence this Saturday, in Temple, Texas. I've selected these 12 to participate as our first time as Intermediates. We ranked up from Novice in 2025 after getting the required number of national wins over the last 2 years, and the competition is about to get tougher!

The kids and I did some mild show box training this evening and they did wonderful. For some of these younger ones, this is going to be their debut! With experience, they'll get better and displaying themselves without reacting to their environment. This is a piece of cake for our Avon, who has competed over the last 3 years and had an excellent winning streak, helping me place in the national top 10 every year we've exhibited. Will he start a new streak in Intermediate division? I sure hope so!

Wish Nelson, Birch, Avon, Adira, Forest, Peri, Akira, Vincent, Vera, Ducky, Tufty and Nox the best! We're ready to have fun with our club. Come visit us if you're in the area! Reach out for details.

^(l am an experienced aviculturist who specialises in budgerigars. I show these birds competitively in the United States. A lot of knowledge and specialised skillset are required to safely navigate through the breeding process. As always, I strongly advise against breeding without mentorship and veterinary technical skills. I document and share the good and the challenges with utmost transparency. I share our stories on) ^(Reddit)^(,) ^(TikTok) ^(and) ^(Facebook)^(.)

Could they make it any more obvious that they're siblings? These two were reunited again today after we brought Chance home from his god-aunt's care while we were away on vacation. Chance needs round the day care, so he has to spend time away from home when we're away; and Shelagh spends her days with the big flock.

Chance has definitely missed his emotional support sister, and he doesn't hesitate to ask for more kisses when he feels neglected. These two warm my heart every day. ❤️