Hey

[Avalon_Princess]

Hi, my names Emma, I'm 15 and I live rurally in NSW, Australia. At the moment technically I don't have any birds, the three budgies we have are my Mum's, but she's finally agreed to let me get my own bird to handtame (the budgies are crazy, I spent four months trying to handtame before giving up), as long as I tried to use as much stuff as we already had and made most of the required things (cage toys etc), I'm good with my hands and love making things, so it's pretty good.

As of yet I'm still researching and wavering between a budgie or cockatiel, so figured I'd join to find out more. I've built the cage, it's large enough for a tiel, with small enough spacing for a budgie, so thats all good. Its 26"x 26" x 29" Tall, I've also made a little fleece cozy type thing which will hang from the roof, and am planning other toys as well.

Anyways that's about it.

Emma

[Bea]

Welcome to the forums Emma! :D I think you'd love a pet cockatiel, they're much more hands on than budgies (in a cuddly sense).

[birdieness]

Hi there and welcome. I own both tiels and budgies and i can't say i would choose one over the other. Mom has nothing to do with my birds. She didn't Even notice that peanut was in another cage.

Getting a tiel is a great choice. I just love sitting down with hugs or slush and talking to them. Call me odd but i'll talk to them like they understand.

Sounds like a great cage. Have any pics?

[Avalon_Princess]

LOl yah, that seems to be the overall sense I'm getting, I hope so Mum's budgies have given me scars all along my fingers from their bites LOL, I never even thought such little beaks could draw blood.

This is the cage, there's no sharp bits or anything, have gone over it like ten times LOL, the grids are powdercoated and it's lined with aviary wire as well so it's all safe.

http://i108.photobucket.com/albums/n12/cutencoolcages/suncoralnewcage017resize.jpg

[Bea]

I never even thought such little beaks could draw blood.
LOL!! Some of my worst birdy bites have come from the girl budgies in my aviary. They sure know how to chomp and hold a finger. :p

[birdieness]

http://i108.photobucket.com/albums/n12/cutencoolcages/suncoralnewcage017resize.jpg

I'n not to sure on that cage. looks like the same stuff i used to make my rabbit run. My budgies easily pop right throught it to each toys i have in a small 1 cube box.

lined with aviary wire as well so it's all safe.



might help if i read this part. The grids alone are not safe fora bird cage though. To big of spacing. i seen one of my budgies go right throught it

[xxxSpikexxx]

Welcome :) If the bird can't get its head stuck in the square holes and its bird safe wire (not galvanized) It should be good. Looks abit hard to clean though. I would go with a cockatiel, they are great :love:

[nic bike]

Welcome emma enjoy the forums.:D

[Avalon_Princess]

The wire was called avaiary/bird wire and I know when I first got it I triple checked on the net it was safe, so it should be fine.

LOl yah I like how it looks like it has bigger spacings the it does, easier to see the birds, I just used the grids as I couldn't find any piping to make a frame from.

Cleaning shouldn't be hard, I'll suspend it over a tray so everything drops through the wire, then it's just a brush down inside to get all the poop out.

[birdieness]

i think its a great idea. i have some of the girds myself. Used it as a rabbit cage but it was to messy for him. Now i use it for storage and whats left over is in the closet. Anyone(canadian) looking to use it for storage can find some of it in wal mart (so i;ve been told) or home depo (where i got mine). Mine like to use the box i have made with a bunch of toys in it as a play area. Quite often you will see budgie bottoms over at it lol.

Also, feel free to post pictures of them budgies in the other pet section. I would love to see them

[Avalon_Princess]

LOl will do when their looking at tad healthier, three solid weeks of rain hasn't been good for them, they don't live outside but just the humidity and dull days seems to have caused illness in all our animals, at the moment we have one healthy budgie, one with scaly face and one recovering from a URI.

Yah the grids are actually for my guinea pigs, their my throw together quarantine cages, but I recently bought some better quarantine cages which can be sterilized far more easily then the grids could be so I figured I'd use these grids for a bird cage, I still ahve like 50 left LOL.

[Laura]

Hi Emma welcome to the forum :)

[Aly]

Welcome Emma.

[Avalon_Princess]

Jeepers just noticed the price people are paying for their teils, $60+ is way out of my price range, though I noticed there are breeders advertising birds for as little as $15, so maybe I'll manage to find a breeder near me... Will be stopping at the pet store tomorrow so will check out the prices there.

[Bea]

If you want a good pet you should look for a handreared baby. :) They start at about $40 from breeders. A $15 tiel would be an adult, aviary bred, wild, normal grey bird and not a good pet if you're wanting to be able to get it out of the cage and play with it.

The initial cost of getting a bird is usually the cheapest part, if you can't afford the bird will you be able to take it to the vet if it gets sick? :)

[Avalon_Princess]

Vet bills are paid by my parents, and they do pay for them, we recently ran up a $500 bill for a rescue guinea pig that had been dumped. But I'm expected to pay for initial set up costs and the animal itself. The teils that were $15 were just weaned budgies, they were aviary birds, but I thought if I got them young, as in just weaned I still had a good chance of taming them? I only want a normal grey, there the colour I definitely want...

[Bea]

I would look for a hand tame one if you can. :D Trust me, it would be worth the slightly longer wait to save up the extra money.

[Avalon_Princess]

Mmm maybe, but it'd end up being like a three- six month wait, as i still need to get feed bowls etc and I don't exactly make much money. I can't wait till I can get my drivers licence, then I can finally get a job LOL. Am advertising on a few sites, so maybe I might be able to get a mature tamed budgie, from someone rehoming there's, have seen them advertised quite often, just not in my area. Theres like 5 budgie clubs here, and sales etc, am really surprised theres no cockatiel breeders here.

[Avalon_Princess]

I am SUCH an idiot, Mum just mentioned there's a sign in our local town for a breeder that sells Quarrions, I never even thought they may have another name LOL, I just googled it and all the sites that came up were for cockatiels, blah nitwit LOL.

[Bea]

In case it comes up they are also called weiros! :p I can't say in all honesty that i would've realised the sign was meaning cockatiels.

[Avalon_Princess]

LOl but I knew that quarrions looked like cockatiels, it just never connected that they were the same bird LOL. Well we'll stop at the guys place on Friday to have a looksie, all he has is a sign on his gate saying quarrions for sale, nothing else, no phone number, will feel rather strange dropping in unannounced LOL. Still wavering over getting a budgie though, we used to have the sweetest male budgie, we got him when he was just weaned he still wasn't flying properly and was as sweet as pie during his quarantine period, then turned into an evil little biter once he went in with the evil little biting females.

[Bea]

Budgies are awesome! It just depends on what you want from a bird. Budgies are hyperactive and clown like. They're always moving and chatting away. Tiels are more quiet, but the males can pick up all kinds of sounds and whistles. Both sexes are generally really cuddly if you get a handraised baby and loves to sit with people and have their head scratched.

[Avalon_Princess]

Yah, I just have to work out what i want LOl, I think it'll just end up coming down to availability, I know for a fact I can get a nice hand reared budgie in whatever colour/mutation I want, but whether or not I can get a hand reared normal tiel I don't know...

[Sophia]

Welcome Emma :)

I have a Tiel & A budgie, they are both very hand tamed, but Earl(the tiel) is more cuddly and likes people more, he was not hand raised he was in an aviary, but he was only 6 weeks old when we got him, so he was quite young :D Little Bill was also not hand raised he was took from his mum and dad once he was old enough to eat on his own :)

Both tiels and budgies are great pets, budgie's are hyperactive, and are quite loud, and tiels are cuddly, and females are quiet. Male tiels are noisy, when they want to be, they can pick up many noises :)

[Avalon_Princess]

Well went to the store today, the handreared tiels from there are absolutely out of the question, for one their $120, and 2 their absolute ferals, their owner/handler was there and he tried to take them out for me and they just kept biting and attacking him everytime he reached in the cage. They did have the normal grey tiel I'm after though $30 for a three month old... Sounds more like what I want. We're also going to visit a place that has signs about quarrions for sale tomorrow.

I also got an email from a guy about a hand reared tiel he has for sale, it's cracking seed and eating veggies, and is a pearl pied (ummm whats that?) and they think maybe a male...

I think I definitely will get a tiel, even if it just one of the $30 ones from the pet store, I do want a normal grey, but I have no idea what a pearl pied is, so can't say if I like them or not LOL.

[Bea]

This is a pearl pied cockatiel.
http://www.flatratewebsites.com/sites/outback/photos/cockatiels/pearlpiedsplitwhiteface.jpg
If you can get that handreared one for a reasonable price i think you would really enjoy it more than a parent reared one.

[Avalon_Princess]

Oooh pretty, hmm I like LOL. Yah the price is fantastic, and I will make sure he's trustworthy first, it's a three week wait though LOL, oh well more time to make more toys. Will find out more about the birdie first though.

[Bea]

Three weeks wait for a bird that could be your companion for the next 20 years is nothing at all! :p I had to wait 5 weeks for Bailee to be weaned.

[Sophia]

You are right Bea 3 weeks isn't long, we had to wait 3 weeks for Earl, and I couldn't wait but like Bea already said, they will be your companion for a long time ahead. :D

[Solace.]

Welcome & just a warning, don't ever get a 'tiel from a pet store. My mum got my tiel "Dipsy" from the pet shop, and they said she'd be able to be tamed and etc, but it's been 3 months and she still won't let anyone touch her without chucking a huge hissy fit.. :rolleyes: She was thrown into an aviary with all the other birds, and she hadn't been touched so that's why she is really skittish.

Then I got my second tiel from a breeder, she had advertised in the newspaper that she was selling baby tiels that had already been tamed and were ready to go.. I have had no problems with her, and then I got another baby tiel off the same lady and had no problems with that one either.

But both budgies and tiels are great pets, whichever one you decide to get I hope you enjoy it, they are a lot of fun, and good company too. :)

[Aly]

[I]Welcome & just a warning, don't ever get a 'tiel from a pet store.

I have to disagree with this. Although they certainly don't get the attention that breeder babies get, you shouldn't write them off just because they're in a petstore. I got both of my tiels and 7/8 of my budgies from a petstore, so 9/10 birds were petstore birds. They are all trained and tame and EXTREMLY sweet, the tiels esspecially. Every bird needs a good home. You'd be suprized how a little TLC can change a bird's attitude.;)

[Avalon_Princess]

I wouldn't go to a pet store I didn't trust, but the breeder of the birds also owns the store, so he's around for help, but not to happy with how skittish they "hand reared" birds were though, am aiming to find a breeder though.

[Solace.]

I'm not trying to write off any pet stores. I meant that if I was Avalon, I wouldn't go to any pet store that she didn't trust, as she has said herself she wouldn't. I have been to a lot of pet stores, and my mum just happened to go to this one that seemed a bit iffy, and what do you know it was.

But anyhooo.. good luck finding a breeder, there's a fair few, so without a doubt you'll find one before you know it.