Is red chard, beets? I tried looking it up on google, but I only saw pictures of beets.

Another question, chick#4 is not growing, the parents are barely feeding him, maybe enough to keep him from starving. I took out the 2 oldest chicks and they just fed the 3rd one . I then took out the 3rd but I wasn't sure if they fed the fourth one at all. If you look at the last picture I posted of him, you can see his crop. It always looks like that. Maybe even a little smaller.

It would be helpful to compare him to the pictures of the other babies at the same age to see if there's a major difference. Many parents won't stuff a young baby as full as they will when it's older. Checking the weight of all chicks daily is very useful. With parent-fed babies you'll never get the "empty" weight of course, and you might see some wild fluctuations from day to day depending on how recently the baby had been fed when you weighed it. But you'll be able to see the general trend, and if a baby isn't developing on schedule you'll know it.

If his weight isn't on track it might be helpful to assist feed some fluids. The parents change the thickness of their "home cooking" as the babies grow, and it's geared toward the older chicks. So it can be a little harder for the youngest chick to digest it.

Red chard isn't beets, although its alternate name is silverbeet. Regular beet greens are very healthy too and also high in sodium. Try looking up swiss chard, that's the official name, and it's very nutritious too. Red chard is a variety that has red stems and red veins in the leaf. The red parts are my bird's favorite parts.

I have that in my house. I will offer it to them.

Chick#4 passed away...

I tried to hand feed him and I aspirated him by accident. He was chirping a little, then he started turning purple, then all of his droppings slowly started coming out and that was the end

Both of the oldest chicks are normal greys : )

I'm sorry that you lost the baby. It's very sad.

I think you said earlier that Bio was cinnamon. If that's true, it's easy to sex the babies. Normal greys are boys. Cinnamons are girls. Don't be surprised though if the pinfeather color seems to change as time goes by. To me at least they tend to look different at different stages of development.

Thank you for the kind words, they really mean a lot.

I am pretty sure these babies are normal greys. They have black pin feathers, and their crests are black.

Hopefully you'll never have to face an aspiration problem again - it's a breeder's nightmare. But if it ever happens again, there is a technique that can help, and it's good to know about it in advance because there's no time to look it up when something is actually happening. Like a lot of the best advice, it comes from srtiels and you can read about it here: http://talkcockatiels.com/showthread.php?t=19342

If only I knew that then.
Thank you so much! I am going to hand feed them extra carefully and slow from now on.

The babies continue to grow

Even the most experienced breeders (like Susanne) will aspirate a baby once in a while. It's an unavoidable risk, and sometimes nothing will help once it's happened. You were handfeeding this baby because it didn't seem to be developing properly, so it was a risk that had to be taken. Unfortunately things went wrong, and I'm sorry. At least you'll be better prepared next time if it ever happens again.

Even the most experienced breeders (like Susanne) will aspirate a baby once in a while. It's an unavoidable risk, and sometimes nothing will help once it's happened. You were handfeeding this baby because it didn't seem to be developing properly, so it was a risk that had to be taken. Unfortunately things went wrong, and I'm sorry. At least you'll be better prepared next time if it ever happens again.


Thank you so much for this. It really made me feel better!