Frequently Asked Questions

Budgies are clever; they generally will not breed unless they have the right facilities available to raise a successful brood of babies. That means they need a nest box to breed successfully, and as long as you do NOT provide one, they generally will not breed. It is always possible, although rare, for a female to lay an egg if she becomes hormonal; that is just an accident of nature. If this happens, remove it; it generally should not happen again.

It is ALWAYS better to buy two budgies rather than one; however, if you are determined to buy only one, generally make it a male, as they tend to be slightly more outgoing and active, which they need to be happy in a lone-life situation.

With young budgies of up to 20 weeks old, you can generally buy any gender. Because they are young, you won’t usually have any bonding issues. We always recommend buying one of each, as it’s nice to see the romance between a male and a female; it’s so cute!

NEVER buy a budgie from a place where you cannot see the conditions in which the budgies have been raised, as you need to be able to see if the budgies have been raised in high-quality surroundings by knowledgeable people. You are then more likely to get good-quality budgies with a long-life expectancy. Don’t feel committed to buying just because you visited and spent a little of the seller’s time. Use your eyes and your nose: are the premises clean (especially the bottom of the cages and floors), does it smell fresh, are the cages cleaned daily, are the premises well-lit with good ventilation, is there fresh food available, are the water containers clean and filled with fresh water? If you cannot see where the birds have been raised, chances are it is because you wouldn't like what you would see! Move on – choose carefully, don’t be embarrassed to walk away. Buy from somewhere where you just know its the right place. Check out the seller’s references and reviews on Google; if they do not have references and reviews, guess why that might be!

A baby budgie leaves the nest box at about 6 weeks old, and at that age, it is very difficult to be 100% sure what sex it is. All babies are born with their cere (the bit above the beak where the nostrils are) purplish or pinkish in colour. Over the next few weeks, this purplish pink turns either blue for a boy or white/cream for a girl. After a few more weeks or months, the girls can turn brown, usually when they become hormonal.

In most 8-week-old babies, we can already tell the gender because the colour of the cere has changed enough. In some babies, we can make an educated guess about a budgie's gender based on our experience, and we usually get it right, but there are sometimes exceptions. Some baby budgies’ colours develop slowly, which can make their gender hard to tell. With young budgies, don’t get hung up about the gender; choose the ones you fall in love with!

Yes, you should, but if your existing budgie is older, you need to take a little care. They can become territorial and possessive under some circumstances and may not always welcome a partner of the same sex; however, a partner of the opposite sex is usually welcomed. Here at Whispering Pines Aviary, you are welcome to bring your existing budgie so we can see how it reacts to other budgies. We are great believers in letting a mature budgie pick its own partner, it has earned that right. Nothing will give you more pleasure than leaving our aviary with your lone budgie that is snuggled up against its new partner!

Be kind; give them a little rest. They have been removed from their community cage, inspected, wings trimmed, put in a box, driven home, put into a strange cage in a strange place, and strange faces are looking at them. Give them a few hours to settle in and bond with each other, their cage, and their surroundings before you attempt to bond with them. Start your bonding the next day if you have picked them up late in the day. If you picked them up early in the day, then have your first session with them later that same day. Start the bonding process as soon as possible; don’t leave it for days before you interact with them.

Yes, they are, but there must be control and rules in place. A child, especially under the age of about 5, should not be left alone with a budgie; they do not have the handling skills or the pick-up skills of an adult and can damage a budgie very easily. Budgie legs and wings are fragile, and with normal adult handling, there should never be a problem, but young children do not have adult skills, so be careful. Make sure your children are supervised, with strict rules in place, until they are well practised at handling.

Beware of pet shop toys; the rope of some of these toys will be chewed and ingested and can lead to death. Pet shops know this and still continue to sell them, and that is so shameful. Choose toys that move; they love swings, ladders, things they can show off their agility on. Plastic toys like the ones shown in our Cages & Accessories section are fine but don’t forget that they get just as much fun out of a small handful of hay or grass, small twigs, pine cones, branches with a few leaves etc. In other words, they love natural surroundings, so make your cage more like nature!

Avian scientists and nutritionists have discovered that the best diet for budgies is a fresh diet in addition to seed, which is far better than a restricted diet or just seed. We recommend a ‘chop diet’ that includes vegetables, sprouts, and salads to accompany the low-fat seed (low fat is absolutely essential). A good chop diet may consist of any of the following; try and make it as mixed and varied as the seasons and prices allow…. This is our suggested chop food diet; just pick the items that you normally eat or that are in season. These should be uncooked and washed. Also, please remember that each budgie should eat only 1-2 teaspoons; they can’t eat a whole bowl full!

Broccoli – Cauliflower – Celery – Brussel Sprouts – Capsicum – Chilies (great nutritional value and the bird cannot feel the heat) – Squash – Spinach – Herbs – Sweet Potatoes – Carrots – Bird safe edible flowers – Mixed sprouted seeds – Mung beans – Small amount of non-citrus fruit like apple once a week (budgies are not big fruit eaters) – Hard-boiled egg once every 7-10 days – Fresh hand cut grass

Seeds are important, and although seeds are easy when you are busy, seeds alone will leave the birds nutritionally deficient. You need to be careful; budgies in the wild tend to seek out Spinifex and wild millet grass and feast on those seeds. The thing with Spinifex and wild millet grass is that they have very low-fat content. Most seeds you buy in a shop that are supposedly for budgies are loaded with canary and finch seed, which are high in fat because they are cheap. Although canaries and finches can tolerate that seed, budgies cannot and often fatty liver disease is the resulting problem, and that is usually terminal!

Remember that seeds alone are nutritionally incomplete, lacking vitamins, minerals and protein; they should therefore only be a part of a budgie’s diet and should never be the entire diet. Please realise that a shop-bought seed-only diet is the same as feeding a child 6 burgers a day; be warned, it can be fatal, and although it can be treated, it is expensive and could have been avoided with a balanced diet.

If you offer your bird healthier options from the list of the ‘chop foods’ above, your bird will eventually start eating more of the properly balanced foods to give them a healthy diet.  No to a food item one day does not mean no forever – KEEP TRYING! We sell specially mixed low-fat seed for budgies that is three kinds of millet and is exceptionally low in fat. It is called Budgie Diet Mix, is the best seed you can buy, and costs comparably with shop-bought high-fat alternatives. We can post seed to you when needed if you do not live close enough to us to collect.

What size house is good for humans? This is a difficult question to answer, and it largely depends on whether the budgies will be in or out of the cage for long periods. The golden rule for cages is that the perch length should never be less than 60cm. A minimum size cage for 2 budgies is say 60 x 40 x 40cm and for 2-4 budgies then say 76 x 44 x 44cm and for 4 or more then a larger aviary style cage with a stand is useful say 144 x 61 x 42cm – You will notice that the cages we sell all have a flat top, that is because you can then sit a playground on top so that the budgies have a base while they are out of the cage which budgies love. All of these cages, playgrounds, toys and more are shown in our Cages & Accessories section on this website and there are some amazing bargains for a cage and budgies combined purchase. Check it out!

If you buy a budgie that hasn't been tamed, you may have more work to do than you think. We start hand training our baby budgies from a very young age, while they are still in the nest box at about 3-4 weeks old. It therefore goes without saying that if you buy an untamed budgie from another source, it has missed out on all that early training, and being ‘untamed’ would have become instinctive to the bird. After we hand-tame a budgie, we can put it back in a cage and not handle it for some time; when we take it out, the hand-taming kicks in within minutes because it has become instinctive to the bird. In short, you pay a little more for your budgie to be hand-tamed, but it is well worth the investment, especially when you consider the pleasure your feathered friend will give you over the years.

When you buy budgies from any source, make sure they have been treated for mites, lice, and worms. Re-treat every six months for worms, and every six weeks for mites. For mites, it is very simple: a quick spray underneath the wings (protecting the budgie's nose so it doesn't breathe in the vapour) and for worms, a few drops of worming fluid in its water for 24 hours. It takes seconds and costs very little. Also consider adding vitamin drops to the water every week; it doesn't hurt to keep a jug of vitamin water in the fridge so they get it every day when you change the water. Otherwise, budgies require very little maintenance: a good diet, exercise, basic treatments, and that is it.

If you see anything out of the ordinary, particularly if the bird stops eating, let our treatment rooms at Whispering Pines know straight away; do not delay. Budgies only have a very short illness period. We carry modern medicines for most treatments, and if started early enough, they are very effective.

The cost of a visit to our treatment rooms is just $0, even if you have NOT bought your budgies from us. If budgies need to be kept in for treatment, the cost is just $7 a night if you have NOT bought your budgies from us and free if you HAVE bought your budgies from us.

If you decide to go to a vet instead, make sure it is an Avian vet and get a quote for the visit, treatments and stay so that you do not get a shock bill at the end, you should always know what costs will be in advance.

NO! Do not even think about it! Find a budgie sitter; your budgies deserve the same service with fresh food and water as you do. We offer a full 5* budgie sitting service; see our section on this website, ‘Holiday Time Bird Sitting’. Let them be totally spoilt while you are spoiling yourself on holiday! The cost for two budgies in their own cage is just $7 a night, $40 a week, or $140 a month, and they get a free health check while they are here! Our rates include all food and cage hire is available if you prefer to bring your birdies in a travel cage.

In most cases, yes, we can. Make an appointment to pop in with your budgie and we will show you how you can fix the problem.

Take a look at our ‘Cages, Playgrounds & Accessories’ section of this website; you will see pictures of cages that are all exceptional budgie cages, of the correct proportions, with the correct length of perches, with the correct access and door sizes for hand-tame birds. Do not be tempted to buy from the internet or a pet shop where little or no knowledge and advice is available. PLEASE come to see us first; you will be so glad you did. We have the right cages at the best prices around, all set up, tried and tested and ready to use. It is a very sad customer indeed who visits us after buying their cage elsewhere, only to realise what they have missed out on.