Happy Days

[Dramoth]

On the day that I decided that I would put our charcoal pair into the big aviary, I had a look in the nest box and low and behold... they have finally laid an egg in there.

Hopefully now that they have gotten around to it, they will start laying loads more.

[lovezebs]

Dramoth

Congratulations Mark, looks like you're getting on the baby wagon.

[Dramoth]

lovezebs

Cheers Elana,

We have had to sell 9 of our little kids last week and we have 11 fledglings out in the aviary already with another 2 to launch next weekend. In addition to those 13 plus the egg in with the charcoals, we have about another 10 eggs in various nests.

Thats one thing that you can say about Zebs... they are never going to die out as a species.

[lovezebs]

Dramoth

No, they tend to multiply like rabbits, lol.
I've removed all the nests a long time ago, and still find eggs daily. I am thinking that I should hard boil a chicken egg and put in a nest for them to take turns on

[Dramoth]

I don't know whats going to happen next year when I return to the UK to work my butt off to raise the money to buy a house back here in Oz.

My stepdad doesnt really have that much of a clue when it comes to breeding birds and I can imagine that in 18 months time when I come back with the deposit, we are going to have 100 birds in the current aviary because he doesnt want to get rid of any.

While I can appreciate the sentiment, there are only so many birds we can have in that aviary before it starts becoming unhealthy to the birds to keep them.

[lovezebs]

Dramoth

Is your Father elderly, and unable to understand the ramifications of uncontrolled breeding, along with inbreeding, and the problems it will cause? such as weak birds both physically and mentally, disease and so on....

Is there someone else who can help him out while you're away. Another family member, a friend, or a neighbour?

Or possibly sell your birds before you go away, leaving him with a few males, then purchase a few new pairs when you return.

Just a couple of thoughts.....

I know it's not easy, and can be downright difficult at times.

I wish you good luck with the decisions you will have to make.

[Dramoth]

My dad is elderly yeah, but he hasn't really been raised around birds like I have. My mum will be around, and hopefully she will be able to help him out a bit there.

I think that once the breeding season is over, I will hopefully have banded all the birds we want to keep. And then sit down with him and tell him that during the next breeding season (next year), he will have to go through and get all the weaned birds out of the aviary and take them down to the pet store.

There are a few birds that I want to keep so we can keep breeding them. The orange breasted's, the charcoals, our white pieds... I think that I might have to build another transportable aviary with him before I leave and then seperate them out.

The upshot of it is, that when I get the money together to buy a house, it's going to be on about 5 acres of land so we can build aviaries til the cows come home

[lovezebs]

Dramoth

That will be lovely.
Maybe build some aviaries before you go, to seperate males and females, so that he won't have to deal with breeding , other than some particular pairs (that you could make plans with him to breed).

Anyhow, it's 1:15 in the AM here, so I shall say good night.
Have a wonderful day .