Broomstick and FloatyGimpy know their birds, listen to them. I will reiterate: NO TEFLON. Too many horrible tales from the bird forums. Look out for things like new toaster ovens, muffin tins, indoor grills – they’re putting PTFE in everything these days. And it breaks down into Perfluoroisobutene:
When we had budgies, we dedicated an entire room of the house to be “theirs.” They could wander in or out of their cages and were only closed in for bedtime or serious storms (in case a window broke, we didn’t want them flying off). To ensure that they weren’t ignored in their room, we put my computer workstation in there, so they could sit on my shoulder and chat into my ear while I surfed. Bird-proofing the room was a bit of a trial-and-error process (they will gnaw on wires and paper products, even wood).
I don’t think we’d let the bird fly loose if we were not right there in the room - too many places for him to get lost / stuck / injured in our overly-cluttered open-plan house.
In case anyone was wondering, we are going to hell. My husband suggested that instead of Morty, we name the bird “Spatchcock”.
And a friend then suggested that the bird’s full name would be “Alfred Spatchcock”.
We don’t dare, really - the cleaning lady would probably do us harm… or quit, and we’ve known her longer than we’ve know our kids.
Our local county animal shelter always has budgies in its care – sometimes as many as a dozen to choose from. If you’re not planning to train a hand-raised chick to be highly interactive, these are just as good and you’d be saving one or more lives. We’ve had some very friendly rescued budgies.
Whatever you do, don’t accept anything from a budgie smuggler.
There are budgie smugglers??? For a bird that is so common and inexpensive here as to make the idea of smuggling one completely unprofitable? (or maybe I’m being whooshed?).
If I were getting a bird from any other source than our cleaning lady, I’d certainly look at a shelter.
She’s giving us a cage as well. I’ll have to find out the size - certainly a bird would need a larger cage than the one my canary had when I was 10 - no room to fly at all (we didn’t know any better; back then a flying cage would have been an anomaly, I’m sure). Depending on what she plans, I’ll probably get a larger cage. Any ideas as to the minimum size, with the understanding that Morty will certainly get out-of-cage time as well?
So I take it, if we offer Morty certain types of fresh fruit, it should not be served using an oblong fabric holder suspended from two sides of the cage…
Realy great advice from everyone. I have about “about” 30 budgies, (and 30 conures and small parrots). Mine are outside, but conures are moved to inside cages at night. Budgies get covered and heaters added when it gets below 45F or so.
Just a few thing I would add.
They need regular baths, mostly spray or misting from a bottle, to clean their vents and get rid of that dander.
Although they seem to love to just eat seeds, they NEED greens and vegetables.
What I do: lettuce heads, and leftover veggie scraps, grasses and dandelions are a big favorite. I put safe garden cuttings, orchard and ornamental sticks etc. They will chew them to bits, and it (I feel) makes them healthier and happier.
Most bird sites offer the safe/notsafe food and wood list, or a link. You should research food and general safety as much as possible
There are budgie specific forums that are helpful.
They do like to breed, which is how I ended with 30. That and some rescues. Two budgies will groom each other, and the 2 bird philosophy is how I ended up with…err 30. (we bought friends for the conures too, so its a bit of a compulsion)
When they are happy, and have a little house, they pair off and off ya go! Politics get intense though, with males and females competing and protecting their turf. Not for the faint hearted. They can be…umm little dinosaurs.
OK, I get that teflon cookware is a no-go. What about teflon cutting boards? We don’t heat them up on the stove, but we do wash them in a dishwasher, usually on a heated sterilize cycle. I would guess they’d be OK, but birds are sensitive and I’d hate myself if I were wrong.
Are you sure the cutting boards are Teflon? Teflon is easily damaged by scratching–metal utensils are a no-no. It seems like the worst possible choice for a cutting board surface.
Google “teflon cutting board” and you’ll get lots of hits.
Whether they’re truly the same Teflon that one finds in a frying pan, I don’t know. I don’t think so - some sites say “HDPE” while Teflon is PTFE.
Supposedly the danger zone starts at well above what a dishwasher would achieve:
From here: Many studies have found that PTFE-coated pans must be heated to above 536 F to release toxic particles and fumes, in a reaction called pyrolysis. ? This is a very high temperature, and is rarely reached during normal cooking. Most cooking in PTFE-coated cookware is performed at temperatures between 250 and 400 F.
Unless our dishwasher is a LOT better at the sani-cycle than I’d have expected, Morty should be safe (Typo Knig is my husband and one of Morty’s soon-to-be pets).
What I also just stumbled across: self-cleaning ovens are also dangerous. Better get that sorted out before Morty comes here to live. We can’t get rid of the oven, but we don’t run the cycle all that often anyway, so we’ll have to do so beforehand.
Morty update: Morty might be a still-in-the-egg bird, versus one of the ones that has already hatched, as we can’t take him (her) until early January. Our cleaner asked if we wanted two! I said not unless we find we do OK with one - plus we’d like the bird to want to be around us, as opposed to hanging in a cage with his buddy and viewing us as “feed me, now go away” fixtures in his life. Also - she does clip wings so they can’t fly too far; that’ll be helpful at least at first. She says they’re more tractable when clipped - dunno, as I’m clearly not the expert.
FloatyGimpy helped hand-raise two chicks from eggs that her hen budgie hatched. She did clip their wings before they could fly. She said it made them very easy to handle, but they didn’t lose their independence. They still managed to climb around and explore their environment, and she let them fly once their wing feathers grew back.
This is true - they are more tractable when clipped.
I usually clip young birds for a year or so until they’re fully trained (and I currently have one adult I keep clipped otherwise he starts to lose him tameness). I let the feathers grow out early on so they can learn to fly, then clip them back. I also don’t clip them so much they are unable to fly at all - I want them to be able to get safely down to the floor from a height, and be able to get from the floor to about waist height before they get too tired to continue. You want the bird to be able to exercise, and also not to get hurt. Clipping means they fly slower and it’s more effort so they can’t do so for an extended period of time, not that they’re entirely grounded.
When I researched this, I saw a lot of similar comforting claims. Then my brother, a materials engineer, mentioned that while that may be, the heating element itself of ovens, toaster ovens, and presumably dishwashers gets much hotter than the intended target temperature setting – for a 400-degree bake, the element might get close to 800 degrees. And it might be teflon-coated. Or a teflon-coated pan might contact it accidentally.
I don’t mean to make anyone paranoid, but exercise due diligence with this stuff.
I have banished all teflon products from my house - too dangerous to mess with. All it takes is something cooking and a mild distraction and suddenly all your birds are dead.
One flight feather clipping does the trick with having them fly around safely. As I’m typing I have 4 kamikazes flying from their cages, over my head and back to their cages.
They all just helped me finish off a warm cinnamon bun.
(we didn’t know any better; back then a flying cage would have been an anomaly, I’m sure). Depending on what she plans, I’ll probably get a larger cage. Any ideas as to the minimum size, with the understanding that Morty will certainly get out-of-cage time as well?
Politics get intense though, with males and females competing and protecting their turf. Not for the faint hearted. They can be…umm little dinosaurs.