12/3/11: “Sit. Stay!” All 21 budgie babies perching on the play gyms! Sometimes I feel like an accomplished circus animal trainer :>)

12/3/11: “Ahoy” and “Marina” at home with their new owner!

12/4/11: “Admiral” and his new owner!

12/4/11: “Ketch” and her new owner!

“Skipper” and her new owner! And no, not all the babies went home with young ladies… it’s just that the adults are often too bashful for photos I suppose!

12/2/11: Now that the babies are fledging (weaning off formula, flying), I’m training them to hop onto my hand, even fly to it when called. Their reward? Organic hulled millet and smooches! Note the closed blinds when the birds are out to prevent them from trying to fly through the glass…ouch. (Ahoy and Skipper)

12/2/11: Lassie (center) was late to this “step up” training session and appears to be showing her disapproval towards Admiral (left) and Furl (right) that the millet is gone ;>)

11/30/11: The play gyms and baby flight enclosures are located in our busy home office/homeschooling room. Exposing very young animals to novel, positive experiences helps them learn how to handle stress better and grow to become more confident as adults. And the more time they spend in the company of humans, the more likely they are to include YOU as one of their flock! We take our job seriously, spending 6-10 hours per day caring for and socializing with our feathered charges.

11/30/11: The four spangle siblings lined up from youngest to oldest. (Mars x Erie; English x American Crosses)

11/30/11: A small bird with BIG eyes, “Skipper” loves to snuggle up in my hair while riding on my shoulder. Female green greywing American parakeet from AquaMan x Dijon.

11/27/11: Does anyone else watch Grey’s Anatomy? Doesn’t our “McDreamy” look a bit like Derek? Why, I think so! Dark gray English x American budgie male (Mars x Erie)

“Hey, ma, you lookin’ for me?” 11/27/11: “Ketch”, skyblue greywing American parakeet female (AquaMan x Dijon).

11/27/11: Santa made an early visit to our home. “Meredith Grey” loves unwrapping the gifts! (Opaline gray English x American cross female, Mars x Erie.)

11/27/11: “Shhhh! Don’t wake the babies!” (L to R: Lassie, Barkley and Meredith Grey, all English x American crosses)

11/27/11: “Scooby Doo”: Yellowface skyblue dominant pied cinnamon-wing female American x English budgie cross at 1 month of age. (Ontario x Marley) Note: my flash overpowered her colors — I’ll take another picture soon. She reminds me of a luscious creamy taffy with all the flavors swirled together. Yummy.

11/27/11: “Basil”: Skyblue cinnamon-wing English budgie at 1 month of age.

11/25/11: The rope spiral twister, one of the babies favorite hang outs! Top to bottom: Meredith Grey, George O’Malley, Ketch, Ahoy, Furl, Admiral, Paprika, Nutmeg, Marina, Benji, Barkley, Lassie, RinTinTin, McDreamy.

11/25/11: “Miranda Bailey”: she’s the youngest baby of this round. Opaline violet (sf) spangle. (Mars x Erie).

11/23/11: A ball of fluffiness… “Paprika”: Opaline light grey-green cinnamon wing female English budgie (Patootie x Huron).

11/23/11: “McDreamy”: Dark gray normal male English x American cross budgie (Mars x Erie).

11/23/11: “Meridith Grey”: Opaline light gray female English x American cross budgie at 1 month of age. (Mars x Erie)

11/22/11: Play hard, sleep hard. While in a spacious cage, the babies prefer sleeping as closely as possible. Too cute! Left to right: Benji, Nutmeg, Meridith Grey, Furl, Lassie, McDreamy, Ketch, Barkley, Alex Karev, Paprika.

11/22/11: Some of the youngest of our growing flock waiting for breakfast. Front left to right then back: Miranda Bailey, Skipper, Alex Karev, Scooby Doo, Benji, Vanilla Bean.

11/19/11: The older babies graduated to the nursery cage today! No one is flying yet, but they will be soon! They are learning to perch, play, and nibble on solid foods.

11/19/11: Different toys are rotated into the nursery cage every day so the babies can explore new things. Lassie, skyblue cinnamon-wing spangle English x American (Ontario x Marley)

11/19/11: Seconds before this shot, Paprika was upside down, ball on top of her belly, wrestling the ball. I could watch these funny babies all day long! Paprika: Grey-green cinnamon-wing English budgie (Patootie x Huron)

11/19/11: The babies preen each other to break free the growing feathers from their sheaths. Marina, Admiral, Furl: greywing American parakeets (AquaMan x Dijon)

11/17/11: How do you get a bunch of baby budgies to stay still for a photo? Well, you don’t. You put them in a bowl and keep on clickin’. This is the younger to middle aged group currently being handfed. They look like a bowlful of jellybeans!

11/17/11: (“Skipper” #62 AquaMan x Dijon) Light green greywing American parakeet. She will start hand-feeding tomorrow.

11/16/11: (“Scooby Doo” #71 Ontario x Marley): Yellowface type 2 blue cinnamon pied female English budgie x American parakeet cross at almost 3 weeks of age. You can just start to see the blue feathers showing on her rump. The soft yellow with cinnamon brown is such a pleasing combination!

11/16/11: (“Lassie” #68 Ontario x Marley): Skyblue cinnamon-wing spangle female English budgie x American parakeet cross.

11/16/11: (“Marina” #60 AquaMan x Dijon): Dilute whitewing blue American parakeet at 3.5 weeks of age.

11/15/11: (“Ahoy” #57 AquaMan x Dijon): Recessive pied dark green greywing American parakeet at 4 weeks of age. Very attentive, sweet little thing! She’s always watching me. “Ahoy” is as bright yellow as a canary, but with a gorgeous shade of green on the lower belly and rump — see the photo below to see the green.

11/15/11: Here are the oldest chicks of this round (3.5 to 4 weeks of age). They’ve graduated to a larger brooder with a low perch, a spray of soaked millet and a smorgasbord of my germinated organic food mix to explore. They are still being hand-fed 4x a day with formula. Their brooder is portable and is placed wherever our family is so they can get accustomed to normal household activities.

11/13/11: It’s so fun when the babies’ colors reveal themselves! Here we see a blue spangle (left, “Alex Karev”) and a violet cinnamon-wing (right, “Benji”). They will be lovely when they finish feathering out. There are a total of 4 blue/violet spangles in the nest box.

11/13/11: ( “RinTinTin” #67 Ontario x Marley) I’m hand-feeding the babies every 4 hours now. RinTinTin is a handsome English x American cross boy. In person, he’s looking violet (camera isn’t picking it up well).

11/13/11: (“Admiral” #58 AquaMan x Dijon) “Admiral” looks just like his poppa and feels as soft as cotton. He’s a skyblue greywing American parakeet. We hand-feed our babies with Harrison’s Organic Juvenile Formula (expensive but worth it) and add a pinch of cinnamon, cayenne, garlic and other spices (great antioxidants), plus a squirt of organic pureed vegetables to the mix. Yum, yum!

11/13/11: (“Furl” #59 AquaMan x Dijon) Hand-feeding a darling little green greywing female American parakeet. She looks a lot like her mom, Dijon.

11/9/11: We are now hand-feeding 7 of the oldest chicks! (The remaining 14 younger chicks are still with their bird parents as we handle them daily while they grow. As each chick reaches 3 weeks of age, they will join the hand-fed bunch.) We have a wide variety of colors and mutations represented here. It’s so exciting to see their pin feathers open up, revealing their colors!

11/2/11: As some of the older chicks turn two weeks of age, I start daily handling to habituate them to humans. While it’s very early to be certain, this chick appears to be female — it has a chalky white cere. (Patootie x Huron)

11/2/11: In this nestbox we clearly see the difference a few days between siblings makes! By the looks of it, those sprouting pin feathers look prickly… but the warmth they provide their youngest brother (on top) is perfectly comfortable. (Patootie x Huron)

11/2/11: In this nest box so far I see a yellow with green recessive pied and a couple of blue greywings. Can you find all six babies in this picture? (AquaMan x Dijon)

11/2/11: Marley (hen) is an interesting combination of mutations. I can’t wait to see what her chicks look like when they feather out! So far I see a normal blue (the oldest, top right) and several predominantly white siblings. (Ontario x Marley)

11/2/11: 6 of Erie x Mars’ 8 eggs have hatched so far. One chick hatches about every other day. This is why the youngest pinkie (top left) is so much smaller than it’s oldest hatch mate, top right. The parents feed each chick differently according to it’s age: the youngest are fed crop milk (liquid) while the oldest are fed regurgitated seeds, vegetables, etc. (Mars x Erie)

10/17/11: We have 30 eggs that are beginning to hatch! The hen feeds her newborn chicks “crop milk” — this is important in establishing good health and immunities. The tiny eggs and newborn pinkies are no larger than a thumbnail. They grow quickly, though: Until the 8th day, budgie chicks are naked and blind. Then down feathers appear (a normal marked chick’s down is grey; an opaline’s down is white). Next the wing feathers and then the tail feathers grow. About the 14th day, the colorful body feathers will appear. This is when we are busy figuring out the colors of our chicks! At 14 days of age, we start handling the chicks daily so they get used to human touch. At 21 days, we remove the chicks from the nest box permanently so we can hand-feed and socialize them around the clock.

DAD is “AquaMan”: skyblue greywing male American parakeet. Split for recessive pied. DOB 5/2010. (Pictured here at 5 weeks of age.)

MOM is”Dijon”: SF clearwing dark/gray green female American parakeet. Split blue and recessive pied, possibly dilute.  DOB ~2010.

DAD is “Patootie”, an opaline grey-green. MOM is “Huron”, a skyblue cinnamon-wing. Both are English Budgies.

“Patootie”: Grey-green opaline male English budgie. Split: Texas Clearbody, cinnamon-wing, blue.

“Huron”: Sky blue cinnamon-wing female English budgie.

DAD is “Ontario”, a Skyblue Cinnamon-Wing English Budgie. DOB 2010.

MOM is “Marley”, a yellowface violet-blue combination pied (recessive / clearflight / dominant) spangle American parakeet. Throws dark-eyed clear when paired with recessive pied. DOB ~2009.

Dad is “Mars”, a violet (sf) opaline spangle male American x English cross. Pictured here at 8 weeks of age. Split for greywing; might be split for ino. (Sunny x Rainbow)

“Erie”: Normal gray English budgie. DOB 2010 by Kim in SLC, UT.