A yellow budgerigar with black eyes

Last Sunday, March 10, I went to shopping to buy some food for my pet birds.  

 

My husband usually drives me to get there, but he had to work that day, so I went there alone by trains.

When I arrived at the pet corner, I noticed there was a yellow budgerigar with black eyes.  I had some yellow budgerigar with red eyes before.  They were cute, however, budgies with red eye seems to be weaker.  In my experience, they tend to have shorter life span compared with those  with black eyes.

I wanted to take the yellow budgie at home that day, but gave up at the same time because my hands were already full after shopping.  I also had to go back by train so I was afraid the young bird which weighs only about 30 grams might die or crush inside my bag.  Actually I had to walk to the station for 20 minutes, get on the train for 5 minutes, wait on the platform for 15 minutes, get on another train for 10 minutes, and cycling for 10 minutes.  That also may mean the young bird cannot tolerate the cold temperature outside at 15 degrees Celsius these days. 

 

I told my husband about the unique yellow budgie that night, and he got interested to see it.  He drove me there two days later when he had a holiday.

 

Immediately after seeing it, he liked the color, and we brought it to our house.  It was only 15 minutes from the pet shop by car.  It was also warm enough for the bird inside the car. 

 

I felt lucky because I have never seen the combination of colors, fully yellow feathers and black eyes, before throughout my 20-year experience as an owner of budgerigars.  When it came to our house,  it weighed at 32 grams that day.

 

I'm not sure whether this bird is male or female, but my husband guessed that it is a female bird.

She has fully yellow feathers.  But when we look at her carefully, she has some light green feathers.

 

 

The color of budgerigar’s nose determines its gender.

After six months or so, the nose color will be clearer to determine the gender.

 

Bright pink budgerigars would be male while pale pink would be female.

My white bird, which is male, has pink nose.  The yellow one looks just like the same.

 

 

I monitor her weight every day to see if she is eating proper amount of food;
less than 25 grams means budgies has serious condition to recover.

 

 

At the pet shop, I noticed that she likes to bite the straws which were placed for making the floor warm.  We also bought a pack of straws at the pet shop and placed some in her cage.

The next day after we brought her, she weighed only 28 grams.
 I have been checking the temperature because young budgerigars easily dies
when the temperature is too cold, which causes them to lose their appetite.

Budgerigar's body temperature is about 40 degrees, and we are supposed to keep
young birds in a warm place such as 28 degrees or so.  I put a pet warmer device beside
the cage when she came to our place, but I was thinking if this is enough.  
I'm worried about it.

 

I often use stick type food to my other birds (one cockatiel and two other budgerigars), so I tried to give her the stick type food and food in a plastic container. 

 However, she didn't realize that the stick was her food for the first 2 days.  

Maybe she thought it is another kind of straw.  

 

Finally, I found that she ate the stick voraciously on the third day.

Maybe she finally noticed it was her food. 

I was glad to find that she weighed 30 grams today.

 

The picture shows comparison of the stick type seeds: before and after eating.

We hope that she will gain more weight as much as 35 grams or so because that is the budgerigar's average weight.