(I tried putting this up through my phone on tapatalk, but couldn't find my thread afterwards...)

Hello everybody,

I'm new to the forums here, 36 years of age and a relatively new bird owner.

I started out with one aviary and picked up three species from a local pet store specializing in birds.
Although I thought I read somewhere not to put budgies in with other birds the store owner assured me putting them together in my aviary would not be a problem. (My aviary is 3 by 5 meters and 2 meters high) I picked up 3 females and one male from each species, pointed out to me by the store owner: Canaries, zebra finches and budgies.

Soon after I started my hobby an uncle came and dropped his 2 budgies off, he didn't want them any more. So my collection grew.
The zebra finches got off really fast with breeding, I didn't even put up a nestbox and we were august already, but 2 chicks survived.

The canaries turned out to be 2 males and one female, so I went back to the store to pick up another female. Only this one turned out to be another male...

No longer trusting the pet store with sexing birds I went to a local breeder and got 10 females for my canaries and all was well...

...until I noticed some of them bleeding (well, only 2 of them). I seperated the wounded birds untill they were better but during this period one of my zebra finch chiks was found dead.
I started looking a bit better at the behaviour of all the birds and came to the conclusion that the budgies were the agressors.

The budgies are now seperated, I devided up my aviary and put the budgies in a 1,5 by 2 meter area. Only shortly after moving them the 2 my uncle brought in died.
At this point I thought of getting rid of the budgies altogether, but since my wife and kids like them the most, I kept them anyway. I even had succes in breeding this year! (I'll put up pics somewhere else since I'm not sure what the gender of the 3 new ones is) Only the father of the chiks was sold to me as a female...

I'm amazed at how easely the finches breed, but I'm going to keep their number at 4; one male, three females, and only because I like to look and listen at/to them. They will remain in the aviary with 12 female canaries and one goldfinch. I'll take out 2 male canaries and separate them to breed with (I'll select 2 females per bird to breed with from the aviary and put them together in a large breeding cage)

Later this month I'm deviding the aviary again, since the son of a colleague of mine has no interest anymore in keeping and maintaining his birds. That means I'll add some budgies to the budgy-aviary and I'll have a separate aviary (I get from the colleague) 1m by 2m60 where 2 male cockatiels will stay. I'm told cockatiels will mix in with the canaries and zebra finches, since they are both male I would like to keep them separate to add females later. (or maybe trade one male for a female, which I think will be plenty of birds for the small amount of space my aviary has become)
After looking at how the bugdies do I think I'll select 2 males and 2 females as pairs to breed with and, much like I'll do with the canaries, keep them in separate cages. The aviary will surve it's purpose as flight for the offspring.

Any thoughts or suggestions/comments are welcome, advice on how I'm doing is even more appreciated!

Björn
P.S. Don't break your tongue on my name, just call me Bob if you want, I'm used to that

Welcome to the group! In order to keep out spammers, we have to set the forum so that the first posts of new members don't appear until they have been approved. But you are obviously not a spammer, so now it's been set so your posts will appear immediately.

You must be a true bird lover to take on so many in such a short time!

If budgies want a nest that's occupied by a bird from a different species, they will aggressively take it over if they can, often destroying eggs and killing chicks in the process. I'm not sure how often they do it to another budgie, but it's best to minimize the risks. When you're colony breeding with budgies, it's a good idea to not mix species, provide several extra nestboxes, and make all nests look equally desirable as much as you can (for example hanging all of them at the same height) to reduce the risk of competition and fighting.

Thank you very much for aproving of me !!

I always wanted birds as a hobby, to listen to while gardening and to enjoy them while out in the garden. At first the breeding wasn't on my mind very much. I just put up enough nestboxes and let nature go it's way. But seeing how things go I want some more 'control'.
Specifically to avoid inbreeding. So I don't know if colony breeding is the way to go (since I only started out with 2 cocks and a hen in the budgy aviary) I do like the yellow (or lutino) color though.

I didn't have the nextboxes up yet when the 'fighting' began between the budgies and the others, and I'm glad I separated them when I did!

Welcome to the community, Björn!

I saw your other thread, your budgies are precious!