Budgie behaviour help!!

devilhunaid · Jan 21, 2019

Hello everyone I am back with a new question.
My two budgie Neon( male ) Tina ( female) but I am not sure about their gender because they are 8 months old.( I am even not sure about their age)
From days I was looking at the Neon courting Tina. He is bobbing his head, taping his beak on her and all but Some day ago I saw Tina doing same thing with Neon, even she was putting one leg on Neon back I can't understand why she is doing this.

What is the reason behind this behaviour can anybody explain?

EllenD · Jan 21, 2019

Can you post a photo of both of your Budgies for us to see? My guess is that this is sexual behavior and their genders are not what you think...

Budgies can become hormonal and actually mate/breed anytime from 6 months old and older, they don't necessarily have to be a year old or older to breed...Also, it's very common for two males or two females to be hormonal with each other as well...If you do have a male and a female you need to learn about taking the steps to prevent them from breeding, and what to do with eggs if they are laid, because the last thing you want is a chronically-breeding pair of pet Budgies...

devilhunaid · Jan 22, 2019

EllenD said:
Can you post a photo of both of your Budgies for us to see? My guess is that this is sexual behavior and their genders are not what you think...

Budgies can become hormonal and actually mate/breed anytime from 6 months old and older, they don't necessarily have to be a year old or older to breed...Also, it's very common for two males or two females to be hormonal with each other as well...If you do have a male and a female you need to learn about taking the steps to prevent them from breeding, and what to do with eggs if they are laid, because the last thing you want is a chronically-breeding pair of pet Budgies...

Here are they Teena is more whitish and littile shade of blue cere. Neon has blue cere.
Edit : The pics I had uploaded previously are blur now they are much better and I think there is something pink or brown color too on Tina cere .

Laurasea · Jan 22, 2019

Sorry, pictures didn't post.

devilhunaid · Jan 22, 2019

Laurasea said:
Sorry, pictures didn't post.

I was uploading clear pic . Please look at the new onw

noodles123 · Jan 22, 2019

I'm no parakeet expert, but it sounds sexual--especially the foot on the back. There are also birds who will be sexual even when genders are the same. That having been said, if either of these is a female (or both) then you risk egg-binding (which can be deadly). A female parakeet can lay an egg without a male and if it forms internally but can't be expelled, she can die from it.

ChristaNL · Jan 22, 2019

2 girls then?

(waiting for Ellen, she is a lot better at this)

devilhunaid · Jan 22, 2019

noodles123 said:
I'm no parakeet expert, but it sounds sexual--especially the foot on the back. There are also birds who will be sexual even when genders are the same. That having been said, if either of these is a female (or both) then you risk egg-binding (which can be deadly). A female parakeet can lay an egg without a male and if it forms internally but can't be expelled, she can die from it.

Are they both female and what should I do?

devilhunaid · Jan 22, 2019

ChristaNL said:
2 girls then?

(waiting for Ellen, she is a lot better at this)

You also think that both of them are females.?

EllenD · Jan 22, 2019

The one on the right (more yellow) is definitely a female as you can clearly see the white rings around each nostril on her blue cere, and she is also the older of the two by a few months...The one on the left (the much greener one) could go either way, I think this one is too young to tell as this one is probably around 8 months old or so, and even though it has a blue cere, you can see that there may be some lightening coming-in around the nostrils. If the one on the left, the green one, has it's cere stay about the same color, a SOLID blue color and no lighter rings come-in around it's nostrils, then it's a male...If white rings come in around each nostril in the next 3-4 months, then this one is also a female...

Either way, the behavior you're describing is definitely hormonal, and as both of these buys are over 6 months old then that's your explanation...They issue you're having is that you're trying to look as a bird's hormonal behavior and compare it to that of human-beings, and it doesn't work that way...With birds, they often become very hormonal very early while they're still babies/juveniles, and their genders do not at all have anything to do with what "sexual roles" they take-on, especially if you have two birds that have been together from very young and are the only two birds in the cage...They are both approaching puberty or are already going through puberty right now, and they are clearly bonded to one another, so they're hormones are taking over...

You definitely have at least one female, and since she is being hormonal right now it's quite possible that you're going to find some infertile eggs in the bottom of the cage. So you need to make sure that they have BOTH a Cuttlebone and a Mineral Block inside of their cage at all times so that they have extra Calcium and they don't become egg-bound. Also, you need to be feeding them fresh veggies and lots of dark, leafy greens such as Bok Choy, Collard Greens, Mustard Greens, Turnip Greens, Arugula/Rocket, Romaine Lettuce, etc. Just hand a large piece of the dark, leafy greens inside of their cage from the bars next to a perch they like to sit on with a clothespin or a chip-clip...Also, please do not put any type of nest-box or any other boxes, tents, "Happy Huts" or "Snuggle Huts", no cardboard boxes, no towels, no blankets, no types of bedding like wood-chips or shredded paper, nothing at all that could be used as "nesting material", and absolutely no small, dark, warm places that they can get into or underneath. These things will only encourage the female or females to continually lay egg after egg after egg, and if the other one is a male then you've got an issue...

If you do find an egg in the cage, what you need to do is this:
1.) Immediately remove the egg from the cage floor, food cup, or wherever you find it
2.) Boil the egg on the stove in water, just like you would boil an egg to hard-boil it; boil it for about 20 minutes
3.) Remove the egg from the pot of boiling water after about 20 minutes and let it completely cool-down to room temperature again
4.) Immediately put the now-hardboiled egg back on the bottom of the cage, right on the grate...Do NOT make any type of nest for the egg to sit on, just put it right on the grate
5.) Do this same procedure for each additional egg you find
6.)***After she lays at least 2 eggs, sometimes 3, she'll start laying on them. Just let her lay on the hard-boiled eggs for as long as she wants to. If they happen to be fertilized eggs they won't hatch since you boiled them all, and if they are infertile eggs they won't break now that they are boiled (at this point you don't know if the other bird is a male, it likely is, so that's why you have to boil them all)...At some point the female will realize that the eggs are not going to hatch, she'll get bored with them, and she'll suddenly stop laying on them. Once you're certain she's no longer laying on the eggs at all, then you can remove them all and throw them away...Do this procedure for any and all eggs she lays from now on..It will ensure you don't end-up with a bunch of unwanted babies and an inbreeding situation, and by allowing the female to lay on the eggs for as long as she wants to, this usually deters them from laying another clutch right away, which is what would happen if you just removed the first egg and threw it out.

****Be aware that your female's cere will most-likely soon change from the blue with the white rings around each nostril to a very dark, chocolate brown color, and it will also get very thick, rough, and crusty looking. This is what happens to the females when they are in "breeding-season", meaning they are extremely hormonal and their ovaries are ready to produce lots of eggs for the male, and is a sign for the male, if there is a male, that she is ready to breed. Again, your birds are both still under a year-old so you'll probably see the female's cere change color this coming March or April...It will eventually change back to blue again once she comes out of breeding season, and this happens regardless of whether the other bird is a male or not. Just make sure you do everything you can to discourage them from being hormonal and laying eggs, because not only do you not want a ton of babies, but also it's extremely hard on the female Budgies to continually lay eggs...When people continually allow their female Budgies to lay clutch after clutch after clutch of eggs (and sometimes allow them to also hatch so that the mother also has to constantly feed babies too), the females often become very thin and sometime emaciated, and they become so Anemic that you can see the color of their beaks turn to a dark blue. This is because they are so malnourished and undernourished that they don't have enough red blood cells to carry oxygen through their blood...So that's why you don't want to encourage them to be hormonal at all...So if they already have any "Huts", tents, boxes, towels, blankets, etc. in their cage, you need to remove them ASAP and not put them back in...And be sure to get them both a Cuttlebone and a Mineral Block at the pet shop ASAP as well, along with lots of dark, leafy greens.

devilhunaid · Jan 23, 2019

EllenD said:
The one on the right (more yellow) is definitely a female as you can clearly see the white rings around each nostril on her blue cere, and she is also the older of the two by a few months...The one on the left (the much greener one) could go either way, I think this one is too young to tell as this one is probably around 8 months old or so, and even though it has a blue cere, you can see that there may be some lightening coming-in around the nostrils. If the one on the left, the green one, has it's cere stay about the same color, a SOLID blue color and no lighter rings come-in around it's nostrils, then it's a male...If white rings come in around each nostril in the next 3-4 months, then this one is also a female...

Either way, the behavior you're describing is definitely hormonal, and as both of these buys are over 6 months old then that's your explanation...They issue you're having is that you're trying to look as a bird's hormonal behavior and compare it to that of human-beings, and it doesn't work that way...With birds, they often become very hormonal very early while they're still babies/juveniles, and their genders do not at all have anything to do with what "sexual roles" they take-on, especially if you have two birds that have been together from very young and are the only two birds in the cage...They are both approaching puberty or are already going through puberty right now, and they are clearly bonded to one another, so they're hormones are taking over...

You definitely have at least one female, and since she is being hormonal right now it's quite possible that you're going to find some infertile eggs in the bottom of the cage. So you need to make sure that they have BOTH a Cuttlebone and a Mineral Block inside of their cage at all times so that they have extra Calcium and they don't become egg-bound. Also, you need to be feeding them fresh veggies and lots of dark, leafy greens such as Bok Choy, Collard Greens, Mustard Greens, Turnip Greens, Arugula/Rocket, Romaine Lettuce, etc. Just hand a large piece of the dark, leafy greens inside of their cage from the bars next to a perch they like to sit on with a clothespin or a chip-clip...Also, please do not put any type of nest-box or any other boxes, tents, "Happy Huts" or "Snuggle Huts", no cardboard boxes, no towels, no blankets, no types of bedding like wood-chips or shredded paper, nothing at all that could be used as "nesting material", and absolutely no small, dark, warm places that they can get into or underneath. These things will only encourage the female or females to continually lay egg after egg after egg, and if the other one is a male then you've got an issue...

If you do find an egg in the cage, what you need to do is this:
1.) Immediately remove the egg from the cage floor, food cup, or wherever you find it
2.) Boil the egg on the stove in water, just like you would boil an egg to hard-boil it; boil it for about 20 minutes
3.) Remove the egg from the pot of boiling water after about 20 minutes and let it completely cool-down to room temperature again
4.) Immediately put the now-hardboiled egg back on the bottom of the cage, right on the grate...Do NOT make any type of nest for the egg to sit on, just put it right on the grate
5.) Do this same procedure for each additional egg you find
6.)***After she lays at least 2 eggs, sometimes 3, she'll start laying on them. Just let her lay on the hard-boiled eggs for as long as she wants to. If they happen to be fertilized eggs they won't hatch since you boiled them all, and if they are infertile eggs they won't break now that they are boiled (at this point you don't know if the other bird is a male, it likely is, so that's why you have to boil them all)...At some point the female will realize that the eggs are not going to hatch, she'll get bored with them, and she'll suddenly stop laying on them. Once you're certain she's no longer laying on the eggs at all, then you can remove them all and throw them away...Do this procedure for any and all eggs she lays from now on..It will ensure you don't end-up with a bunch of unwanted babies and an inbreeding situation, and by allowing the female to lay on the eggs for as long as she wants to, this usually deters them from laying another clutch right away, which is what would happen if you just removed the first egg and threw it out.

****Be aware that your female's cere will most-likely soon change from the blue with the white rings around each nostril to a very dark, chocolate brown color, and it will also get very thick, rough, and crusty looking. This is what happens to the females when they are in "breeding-season", meaning they are extremely hormonal and their ovaries are ready to produce lots of eggs for the male, and is a sign for the male, if there is a male, that she is ready to breed. Again, your birds are both still under a year-old so you'll probably see the female's cere change color this coming March or April...It will eventually change back to blue again once she comes out of breeding season, and this happens regardless of whether the other bird is a male or not. Just make sure you do everything you can to discourage them from being hormonal and laying eggs, because not only do you not want a ton of babies, but also it's extremely hard on the female Budgies to continually lay eggs...When people continually allow their female Budgies to lay clutch after clutch after clutch of eggs (and sometimes allow them to also hatch so that the mother also has to constantly feed babies too), the females often become very thin and sometime emaciated, and they become so Anemic that you can see the color of their beaks turn to a dark blue. This is because they are so malnourished and undernourished that they don't have enough red blood cells to carry oxygen through their blood...So that's why you don't want to encourage them to be hormonal at all...So if they already have any "Huts", tents, boxes, towels, blankets, etc. in their cage, you need to remove them ASAP and not put them back in...And be sure to get them both a Cuttlebone and a Mineral Block at the pet shop ASAP as well, along with lots of dark, leafy greens.

Thank you so much. I want babies but not too much as you mention. According to you I shouldn't allow egg to hatch until I am not sure about male. Right?
There is sad news that when my father gave me this birds, in cage the nest was already installed.
Thank you so much again for the answer.

noodles123 · Jan 23, 2019

Babies are not as simple as they sound-it is a ridiculously complicated process--it isn't like the parents just do all of the work ..Just recently, a mother parakeet killed her baby on this forum, so there are many complications, like weaning the babies after a certain point, or stepping in if the mother bird isn't feeding, or keeping chicks warm in an incubator with a proper humidity if rejected by the mother, special diet, medical complications, and then there is the weird behavior that happens in the mother/father bird and their desire to lay even more eggs. I used to think that eggs were straightforward--they are anything but!

The act of making any egg, fertile or non-fertile is risky for a bird (once eggs are laid, it increases the likelihood that it will happen again, and with that comes the risk of egg-binding, which can be deadly)...Until you have researched this more thoroughly, remove any hormonal stimuli to decrease the likelihood of eggs (fertile or non) .

Again, do not try for fertile eggs unless you are highly experienced with hand-feeding babies etc (which is more complicated than it sounds).

EllenD · Jan 23, 2019

Noodles is absolutely correct, you DO NOT want to breed your birds!!! First of all, Budgies very often breed and breed and breed and breed and breed and won't stop once they start, and it's not as easy as "Well, I want "SOME" babies but not a lot"...Birds aren't at all like dogs, they don't work that way.

I am going to say this as forwardly as I can...You're new to birds, and parent birds don't just raise their babies and everything is okay...They often kill them, they often kill each other due to the babies, they often push them out of the nest and refuse to feed them, etc. So the owner of the birds needs to be very experienced, educated, and skilled at both hand-feeding/hand-raising babies and be ready to take-over at any second, but they also must know how to stop their parent birds from continually breeding...And in addition, if you want these two Budgies to be your pets, then you shouldn't breed them, because that is going to change your relationship with them completely, and they will no longer be "pets", but likely just birds in a cage that continually breed.

*****You MUST remove the wooden nest-box from their cage ASAP!!! If we had known that there was already a nest-box inside of the cage, we would have already told you that this is why your birds are prematurely going into puberty...This is very bad practice already, as it's very dangerous for a female to lay eggs prior to being over a year old, and you should NEVER put a nest-box in with 2 baby Budgies! All you are doing is creating a bonded breeding pair of Budgies that is going to continually mate and lay eggs until the female dies of egg-binding or of emaciation, and you are not going to have pet Budgies at all...

You have to get that nest-box out of their cage immediately, you've pushed them into puberty at way too young an age, they are already being extremely hormonal and wanting to mate, and this can very well kill your female bird. Please remove the nest-box, and don't put it back in or attempt to allow ANY eggs to hatch until you do a TON of research, you educate yourself about hand-raising/hand-feeding, you buy a proper Brooder and all the equipment you'll need to take-over raising baby birds, and you find a local pet shop or breeder who will allow you to mentor with them so you can gain the know-how and not just end-up allowing tons of baby birds to hatch only to have them all die or be killed...It's a huge deal, it's not easy at all, it's feeding them every 2 hours for the first 3 weeks including overnight or they'll die, so you set an alarm and wake-up every 2 hours and heat-up/mix new, fresh formula and feed them all, and it's having the know-how to STOP THEM from breeding...You have baby Budgies well under a year old inside a cage with a nest-box in it, and this has pushed them into puberty and hormonal behavior long before it's safe for them to do so...Not your fault because you didn't know, but that's the point, you didn't know...

Laurasea · Jan 23, 2019

I think the one with blue is a male, and the one with white nose is a girl.
But I defer to Ellen as she has more budgies experience.

EllenD · Jan 24, 2019

Laurasea said:
I think the one with blue is a male, and the one with white nose is a girl.
But I defer to Ellen as she has more budgies experience.

They are both still under a year old Laura, you can tell by the still-remaining black bars on their foreheads and how far back they have receded...The one on the right in the photo, which is the more yellow bird, is the older of the two, judging from the black bars on her forehead I'd say she's about 8 or 9 months old...And her cere is blue with very definitive/visual white-rings around each nostril, so at 8 to 9 months old her cere has already changed from initial white or pink to blue, and then the white-rings come in last, so this one is definitely a female...The one on the left in the photo (the more green bird) is the younger one, I'm guessing around 5-6 months old, and it's cere is has changed from the initial white or pink to solid blue...But I don't think this bird is quite old enough that I would say that it's definitely a male, as white-rings could still appear around each nostril, which would make if a female as well...If that's going to happen, it will happen within the next 5-6 months; If 5-6 more months go by and it's cere is still solid-blue, then it's definitely a male...

The most confusing Budgie Cere colors are definitely the females that have the bright blue ceres with the white-rings around each nostril; most people see the bright blue cere and automatically think "Male", and they don't realize that if white-rings appear it's a female...And the white-rings around each nostril is the absolute LAST color-change to happen to their Ceres too...The other confusing Budgie Cere color pink...A solid-pink Budgie Cere means it's a male, but the problem is that ALL BUDGIES are born with either a white/cream or pink colored Cere, and they either change colors within the first year of life, or they stay exactly the same...

Most people don't know to wait long enough to sex their Budgies by their Cere colors, as their Ceres can continue to change colors until they are a year-old, and I've even seen a few Budgies where they were born with a white or pink Cere, had it change to solid blue or purple around a year-old, and thought "Okay, it's a boy", and then at 1 year and 2 or 3 months old the most obvious white-rings have appeared around the nostrils...So if you're going to sex your Budgies using only the color of their Ceres, you have to make sure that you're waiting until they are at least 1 year-old to make a determination, and even then you have to keep an eye out for further color changes...

I've had several Budgies throughout the years that had their Ceres change colors multiple times during their first year of life, like 3 or 4 times! So it really is necessary to wait until they are at least a year-old to make a final determination on their genders this way...EXCEPT for the females that have a blue Cere with white-rings around each nostril, i've NEVER SEEN a female's Cere that changed to blue with white-rings around each nostril change colors again after the white-rings have appeared...Never say never though...

Budgie behaviour help!!

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