For the first days of their life, budgerigar chicks receive goiter milk from their mother. But situations often arise when chicks are left without parental care. And you have to make every effort and skill for artificial feeding.
Comfortable conditions for chicks
If budgerigar chicks have not yet fledged, it is necessary to create and maintain optimal temperature and humidity. The air temperature in the nesting site should be about 33 ° C. Such conditions can be created by wrapping the house in a thermal blanket or placing it on a heating pad with warm water. Check the nesting temperature regularly to avoid overheating, which can kill chicks in just a few minutes.
To maintain optimal humidity, spray your house with warm, clean water from time to time.
Feeding chicks
Until the seventh day of life, use a special mixture (available at a pet store) to feed budgies. If this is not available, you can use dairy-free baby food, which must be diluted to a liquid puree consistency by adding a couple of drops of carrot or apple juice, a small piece of boiled egg yolk (crushed).
The temperature of the mixture should be about 39 ° C, be sure to check it with a thermometer before feeding. The low temperature mixture is not absorbed, food remains in the crop and begins to ferment, as a result, the chicks die of hunger. The high temperature mixture will burn the goiter. Take the budgerigar chick in your hand and place it on its back. Using a small brush, take a drop of the mixture and bring it to the chick's beak (side). If the parrot is not weak, it will be able to swallow.
There is also another way of feeding. Fill a syringe with the mixture and squeeze out the contents of the chick in small drops from the side of the beak. At a time, you need to give 1-2 milliliters of the mixture. Feeding should be done every half hour or hour. Chicks may at first refuse the mixture, but hunger will take its toll, and they will begin to feed in a similar way. Increase your feeding breaks and formula each day.
The hungry chick raises its head up and begins to squeak.
After a week of age, you can stop feeding chicks at night (from 00:00 to 6:00). Daily feedings should be done every two hours. To the nutritional mixture of two-week-old chicks, you need to add a liquid porridge from crushed millet, which includes half a boiled quail egg and half a calcium gluconate tablet. Every day the porridge can be made thicker. After another week, include in the diet finely grated carrots or apples, beets (in turn).
From three weeks of age, teach chicks to feed with a spoon inserted through the door. During this period, parrots begin to fledge, so they do not require additional heating. After a month of life, accustom the chicks to adult food, put cereals in the feeder, offer dry grain feed and sprouted grains.
