# Five New Members of the Flock!!



## SftWrmRain (Sep 8, 2009)

One of my daughter's teachers called me last week and offered me five cockatiels and a heavy duty cage for them. Apparently she has several birds of her own and recently took the cockatiels in when her father passed away. She works full time and was feeling overwhelmed with the responsibility and guilty because she wasn't spending time with them.

Even though I don't NEED five more cockatiels, LOL I was excited to see what she had. I picked them up today along with the cage. Brought them home, gave them a shower (badly needed) and put an array of new interesting toys in their cage.

According to the past owner, there were three and then there were five. LOL The woman's father had put a nestbox in and at some point later there were two more cockatiels in the cage but she didn't know which of the 3 were the parents. Being a genetics fanatic, I went to work right away trying to figure out which they came from. She didn't know gender or anything other than which 3 were the original adults.

Here's what I got:

Adult Cinnamon Female
Adult WF Cinnamon / Pearl Male
Adult Lutino Female

Child Cinnamon Pearl / WF Female
Child Grey / Cinnamon and WF and (possibly) Pearl Male

I could see the offspring were split to WF due to the heavy white marking or "ring" around their face. And clearly, with 2 females and 1 male there isn't much guess work to be done as to their father. LOL

I determined the Lutino to be the mom due to the male offspring being grey. If the cinnamon female had been the mom, all offspring would have had to be cinnamon but one is not. I determined the WF male must be split to Pearl to have had a pearl daughter.

Anyway, on with the pictures!! All seemed to have small nicks and superficial abrasions causing a little blood on a few of their bodies, along with poop and generally a need for a shower and a little space. Otherwise all appear to be in great shape after their shower:


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## dude (Mar 29, 2010)

Wow ! They are all so different. Amazing ! What lovely new cockatiels you now have....lol
All are beautiful !!! I just want to cuddle them all... 

I love how they just grew in numbers, and they weren't even aware the original 3 had babies... that's the funniest thing ever. Hehehe


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## Cheryl (Dec 27, 2008)

Wow! Congrats on all the new members. They are very pretty.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

Congrats!!! They are so adorable!!!


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## cinnamon (Jul 16, 2009)

They are very nice looking. You are blessed!


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## SftWrmRain (Sep 8, 2009)

Thanks everyone! I just think they're great!! I took some better pictures of them yesterday once they had a chance to get settled enough to want to come out on top of the cage for play time. I printed them and took them over to the woman who gave the birds to me as a keepsake. Enjoy!


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## dude (Mar 29, 2010)

Pretty !!! Do they have names yet ???

They are all so very pretty.


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## AlbyPepper (Apr 3, 2010)

What a lovely gesture, to give her pictures as a keepsake. I'm sure she appreciated that very much. And brilliant pics they are. Your new birds look gorgeous.


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## SftWrmRain (Sep 8, 2009)

dude said:


> Pretty !!! Do they have names yet ???
> 
> They are all so very pretty.



Thanks again! The only one with a name so far is the cinnamon female. My younger daughter wanted to call her hers, even though she will live with the flock under my care, so she got to name her Ginger.

I will have to come up with names tonight though so that the names will begin to stick. I always put off naming new birds because I want to see their personalities a little but sometimes with my parakeets they end up never getting a proper name!! I don't want that to happen to these lovely cockatiels so off to find the name book!


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## SftWrmRain (Sep 8, 2009)

AlbyPepper said:


> What a lovely gesture, to give her pictures as a keepsake. I'm sure she appreciated that very much. And brilliant pics they are. Your new birds look gorgeous.



Thank you   My daughter actually made her a card too, and we printed a picture of "Ginger" to place inside. She wanted to express how generous her teacher had been in giving us the birds - she's become incredibly bonded to this little female already and has been very grateful. She's just ten but has a heart of gold. 

Thank you for the picture compliment too - natural light is sometimes hard to use with active birds because it usually requires they be fairly still or you get blur. I was lucky to have a nice sunny day, a big window and tired cockatiels!!  Oh, and yes the woman was appreciative - she cried. She's happy they are going to a good home, but said it was just another piece of her father moving on so it was a little sad.

I told her to call me if she changed her mind and I'd be sure she got them back. I hope she doesn't though because I'm getting attached!


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## Malorey (Jul 23, 2008)

Congrats on them! They are so so beautiful! Just love them!


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## nikol witch (Mar 2, 2010)

wwuuhuuu they are beautiful tiels,i love them,yesterday i got a lutino also.


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## Cassie (Jan 7, 2009)

Wow! Five new additions. That's so great. Congratulations; they are all beautiful and they are very lucky to be now living in such a great flock.


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## Berdnerd (May 20, 2010)

Gorgeous birdies! I love how they all look different. Are they all buddies? I wonder if the other hen helped the mama and daddy raise the babies! Do the birdies all seem healthy? I noticed that some of them seem to have red nares.

Also, I'm definitely the same way with names- my Little Bird ended up with that silly "name" because I took too long to name him and then nothing seemed to fit. Luca was called Yellow Bird for the first 5 years until I finally found a good name for him! I've since learned not to let a pet go for more than a week or so without a name.


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## SftWrmRain (Sep 8, 2009)

Thanks everyone! I appreciate the nice comments. Berdnerd - I love that they are all so different looking too! I figured I'd get over there to find 4 normal greys and one whiteface.  I'd love them the same but it is nice they have different mutations. They do seem to get along *OK* but when I got them home and examined them better, they all seemed to have minor cuts and scratches on their faces and wings. Nothing huge but enough to make me wonder if they had been fussing at each other, or if maybe their environment was too small or cramped. I gave them a shower as I do any new flock member and once they dried off they looked 100% better. Any dried blood was gone and their scratches were reduced to mostly not noticeable.

I have been observing their interaction with each other and have found that the clutch's parents the whiteface and the lutino fuss at each other quite a lot but also preen and sit next to each other. The lone adult female has paired with the male "child" of the WF and Lutino  and the single younger female stays off on her own, or sits near her male sibling. I haven't seen any obvious squabbles so I'd have to say they have managed to get along good. I noticed the red nares too but they have since returned to a more normal color thank goodness. All seem healthy and weight is good on them. I took weights the day they came home to compare with later.

STILL need to name them! Ack!!


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

They are adorable!!! I'm so glad that they are all ok and seem to get along ok. Having so many different mutations is awesome!!! Good luck with them all...


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