Budgie Care 101 with Abdullah Al-Sheikhly (804)
My budgies I’ve owned a lot of budgies over the past three and a half years and I wanted to share how to care for this very interesting, playful and unique parakeet species. What is a budgie? For anybody who does not know, a budgie is a small, long-tailed bird in the parakeet family (which is in the parrot family).
Are budgies easy to tame? Since budgies are prey in the wild, they are naturally skittish and you have to put a lot of effort into taming them.
Do budgies need toys? Yes, budgies need toys and not just plain old plastic ones. They need engaging, enriching toys that help them forage and shred because as I mentioned before, they are intelligent.
How many budgies should I get? Budgies are flock animals so they prefer to live with other budgies. However, you can own only 1 budgie if you give it a lot of extra attention to make up for the lack of budgie friends but if you notice they are lonely (lonely budgies do things like singing to their shadow and reflection) then get them a friend.
How to tell a budgie’s sex?
Can budgies talk? If you put in a lot of effort by constantly and frequently repeating phrases you want them to learn, then yes. Also, it is easier to teach budgies how to speak human if they don’t live with any other budgies because budgies mimic those around them and when there are lots of budgies around them they mimic the other budgies, but when it’s just humans, they mimic the humans.
How can I tell the age of my budgie? It’s really hard to tell once they turn 6 months old but you know they’re under 6 months if they have a pinkypurpley cere rather than their gendered cere.
This sometimes doesn’t apply for mutations but generally, male budgies have a blue cere and female budgies have a brown cere.
What type of environment do budgies need? Try to buy the biggest cage with ½” Are budgies loud? bar spacing you can afford. A cage Budgies are quite vocal and while size of 20 x 18 x 18 is the minimum for sometimes they sing beautifully, oth- 1 budgie. Try to keep the cage clean er times they scream at the top of by scrubbing the entire cage their lungs (usually for a reason (including perches) with warm water Are budgies low-maintenance pets? though). If you cannot handle chirp- and soap weekly and changing the Budgies are often advertised as low- ing becoming basically a permanent material you put on the base (black maintenance pets but that is not the background noise in your home, then and white newspaper, paper towel, case because that’s not a thing. All don’t get a budgie. or scrap paper) every other day. pets require care and attention, even Budgies prefer the same temperafish! So it’s unsurprising that budgies, Do budgies bite? tures as humans (20℃ to 24℃). Also who come from one of the smartest Some budgies do occasionally nip make sure you have an environment animal families (parrots) can’t be fingers but only if you are that is safe for budgies to fly in since locked in a annoying them (by doing they need daily flying time out of the cage and things like touching their cage. stuffed in a feet, back and tail or grabcorner of a bing them) and because What type of food do budgies need? room all budgies are so tiny, their This a highly debated topic, but in my day. bites can’t hurt you. opinion, try to feed them a 60:40 raAre budgies parrots? Even though budgies are small, they are parrots. What this means is that budgies are very intelligent and they require a lot of attention and enrichment.
tio of pellets to seeds and make sure @theHelm ~ page 12
