| The WOES of finding a breeder |
[Mar. 2nd, 2008|10:27 am] |
Silly me. I have to develop an irrational fondness of one of the most uncommonly kept birds in American aviculture: the slender billed corella.
There are, at best, a few dozen breeding pairs of these birds in the country. I've found less than a dozen people who've worked with the birds, and already two of them have told me 'I don't work with them anymore.' Including the woman I really would have liked to get a bird from: Nancy Speed. Another man who's supposedly a big name in breeding (Rick Jordan) also contacted me to let me know that he has also given up his pairs, and had this interesting tidbit to add about my request for a co-parented or parent-raised bird: 'I don't know anyone who parent raises their birds because SB2s who are parent raised are prone to killing their mates. But I'll look into it for you.'
Now, it's refreshing to have someone not try to tell me what I want in a bird... but parent raised SB2s kill their mates? I've heard that it's hand raised birds that're more prone to problems like mate-killing. And how big could his sample have been that helped him come to this conclussion, given their scarcity?
So. While I don't know that any of us have any direct experience in this area, I'm curious for feedback. How and why would parent raising increase mate killing? Parent raised birds are socialized to be birds and know how to interact with other birds. I've always heard that one of the benefits of parent raised or co-parented birds is that they make better breeders and exhibit fewer reproduction-related behavior problems such as mate-killing.
I'm not going to be breeding my slender billed at any point, by the way. I'm just looking for a bird that's had a perfect start in life. That knows it's a bird, and knows how to interact with other birds (as I plan on getting it a companion), even if that means I have to work hard to tame it and establish a relationship. I want a bird that has every opportunity to be happy with both people and birds.
A little background on co-parenting for curious folks: http://www.companionparrot.com/Importance%20of%20Co-Parenting.htm
http://www.birdcompanions.com/_FCA%20Co-parenting%20with%20Companion%20Sun%20Conures%202005%202.pdf
http://www.the-oasis.org/articles/rearing.php
The third article contradicts things I've heard in the past. But it's not fair for me to put just articles that support my views and opinions. ;)
Anyways. Anyone with comments on parent raising, co-parenting, or reproduction related behavior problems (such as mate aggression) have at it! |
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| Horny Parrotlet |
[Mar. 2nd, 2008|10:40 am] |
The following was posted on ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) parrotlets but I did not get a response. The story goes that some weeks ago I realized that due to his coloration, my Kuchi might not actually be a boy:
The last time I posted was with some queries about weather or not my blue pacific is a boy or a girl. We've continued on assuming he was a boy, a subspecies with less vibrant colorations in males. He acts very male so that's what we went with.
Just now when I took him out of his cage he was feeling very wiggle-necky and I usually have a better shot at preening off the feather casings on his head than I do at other times. As I preened him, he hunkered down in a "presenting" position and wiggle-necked quite a lot. His cloaca was constricting in time with his wiggle necking, so it would seem he is feeling exceptionally amorous right now.
However, this presenting his rear-end thing seems very much a female thing. He's never done it before, nor has he ever expressed any other overtly sexual movement other than wiggle-necking.
I posted this originally a week ago and he has become more amorous, wiggle-necking at me every time I get near his cage and every time he's on my finger his butt's up in the air. He's even letting me scritch him behind the neck, something he never does unless I turn him over as if to clip his wings and coerce him into it. Is this something I should make a vet visit for? If he is female what sort of precautions against egg binding should I be taking? |
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| Zucchini's plumage |
[Mar. 2nd, 2008|06:00 pm] |
So I was looking at Zucchini today, and noticed the following:
( Read more... ) |
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