Video, Ham, tame gouldian 1st molt, eggfood brand?

[Babs _Owner]

Okay, you can see my tame gouldian "Ham" being, well.......a ham. And she is molting very early as you can see the black pin feathers coming in on her face. These are all siblings, about 3 weeks after fledge **edit** (3 weeks since WEANED). Being these are my first gouldians, I am excited and NERVOUS about their health during this crucial time.

Heres the narrated video. https://youtu.be/cLZGcd68dlY

I am feeding them Lafebers food. I would like to know if this will meet their nutritional needs for their first molt. They are handfed every morning at lights ON and eat it like crazy all piled into my hand. And they get a bit at night (as you can see in the video). They dont eat as much at night due to eating all day.

And TRUST me, you dont wanna hear me making a video in the morning when my voice sounds aweful.

Stay tuned for the end of the video, you get to see where Ham really enjoys (and demands) rubs and scratches. When she is this territorial, her siblings give her plenty of space, she will get downright nasty if they get close to me.

Is it normal to molt this early? Is Ham just a happy porker?

[Babs _Owner]

Forgot to tag folks, Here's your babies Aunty Elana.

debbie276

lovezebs

Sallythis is for your comment on when they where being weaning and you said "you are the momma!" Yes indeed it seems so. I feel honored THEY chose me. *smile

[lovezebs]

Babs

Enjoyed the video Babs, they are just adorable.

In regards to Hammy, why are you thinking 'girl'?

As for starting to colour early, some colour earlier than others, so I wouldn't worry about it. One of my three, from Jaxom and Mirrim, is colouring up, the other two, nothing.

Usually this is a sort of pre-moult colouring. Soon you'll have little grey feathers all over the house .

Just offer the most nutritious diet that you can (or that they will eat? Do your Societies eat hard boiled eggs?

[debbie276]

The head is the last to molt so I would suspect some feathers were pulled/plucked out accidentally. Maybe some formula got stuck around her mouth and when you cleaned her mouth pulled some feathers? There used to be a few breeders that would pull out head feathers to get an early glimpse into their adult colors. I believe for the most part this practice is no longer done.

I would definitely get them used to hard boiled eggs, you can't beat the nutritional value of an egg. During their molt and breeding is the time to up the egg amount.

They all look very well, congratulations

[Babs _Owner]

lovezebs

Two of the juvies are starting to sing and hop back & forth to each other in a male display. Two of the juvies do not sing or try to. Hammy seems to be one of them that has never tried sing or hop. So I am pretty sure she is a female (although not positive of course).

debbie276

You are absolutely right about the food getting stuck in the corner of her mouth way back when, and when I wiped it with a wet tissue some feathers came off just in that area.

However (impossible to see with my camera) Ham is getting while pin feathers coming up all over her head. Please dont tell me she is molting abnormally

[Babs _Owner]

lovezebs

I just reread and noticed your comment about the premolt. That might be whats going on One of the other juvies has a blue tail feather already.

This weekend I am going to put eggs in the dehydrator and try it completely dry. Working long hours, I have to be absolutely sure that the eggs dont go bad in the cages. And with my schedule during the week Im terrified I will forget and leave rancid boiled egg in a cage overnight and have sick/dead birds the next day.

Due to the anxiety I havent been consistant enough with egg yet

[debbie276]

I've never heard of pre-molt, interesting.
I spread the egg thinly on a plate and leave it all day changing it out in the morning. Trick is to dry it with handfeeding formula or the like and only give enough for the day. I give about a tablespoon per pair and most times it's gone within a couple hours.

[debbie276]

Here's an article on Ladygouldian that explains the molt very well to help you understand what's going on. There are different types of molts such as compressed molt and delayed molt.

https://ladygouldian.com/content/why-my-gouldian-bald

[Babs _Owner]

debbie276

Thanks for the link Debbie. That will be helpful. Thats what I am doing wrong! Im putting too much in at a time. Thats why it won't dry out. I was putting out like 1/3 cup per cage . Eeek!

[lovezebs]

debbie276

Hi Deb.

I mentioned some colour showing up 'pre-molt', as I have noticed different chicks showing up colours, before they've actually molted (so I dubbed it pre-molt colouring).

I'm surprised you've never seen it .

[lovezebs]

Babs

Good morning Babs.
Do your Societies, eat hard boiled eggs?
Iffin' they do, put a couple of them with your Gouldi babes for a while (monkey see, monkey do:-)).
I've had Gouldians, Societies, and Canaries, eating mealworms after they watched Parrot Finches, wolfing them down with gusto (normally they would look at the little wigglies, and go eeuu eeuuew, and not touch them with a ten foot pole).

It's worth a try and just might work.

[debbie276]

I have seen times when a feather was plucked/pulled accidentally be replaced with a feather of the adult color. Like I said years ago breeders would pull head and breast feathers on newly fledged chicks just to see what they would color out to be as an adult. I never thought of that as a pre-molt, guess because it really has nothing to do with the annual molt.

[Babs _Owner]

lovezebs

Thats what I am noticing. Ham is getting some red feathers in her face as well as a few black. Just little spots of them here and there, plus the pin feathers coming up all over her face and head.

Not noticing any feathers coming in anywhere else.

[Babs _Owner]

debbie276

Ouch !!! Thats horrible pulling out their feathers !

[Babs _Owner]

lovezebs

My societies are hit/miss with boiled egg. They LOVED it when the first batch of babies exploded. Then not much interest after that.

The Juvies have copied their bathing addiction, which is great!