winter temperature

[alicat]

hi, my cag lives in my sitting room in a large cage, not in any draughts, i live in the uk.
i currently have central heating on from 4pm till 11pm and 6am til 930 am.
i was up at 230am this morning and on talking to poppy i noticed his chest shivering and his feathers were puffed up. although the heating had gone off i was wandering about in there in a pair of pyjamas and i wasnt cold.
i overode the heating clock and put it back on and gave him a drink of warm blackcurrant and went back to bed, happy he was now comfortable, but im wondering, what do others do, do you keep the heating on? is he being a woose? could it be cos hed been asleep? if it was freezing i could understand, but thewn it wouldnt have happened cos the heating would have still been on.
when i got him earlier in the year i bought him a cosy tunnel but he viewed it with contempt and refused to go near it even after several weeks so i took it out.
he doesnt appear to be ill having been bright as a button all day yesterday, all day today and singing and whistling while i was up during the night. letting him get up that time of night isnt normal, was a bit of a one off.
any comments id be grateful.

ali

 

[Redballoon]

I asked this question some time ago and I actually live in Australia, so the coldest nights wont hurt my birds, but In England it is another story.
If you go to a pet shop, you can buy a breeding box for your bird and put it in his cage at night. Make just a little bigger than the bird. The reason for this is that the birds body heat cant warm up a whole big cage, so if he has a box to go in if he is really cold, he will use it. When in the box, he will use his own body heat to warm the area around him which will be like a tight warm little hole for him. If he is not too cold, he wont go in it. If he is freezing and unhappy, he will be brave and investigate this "hole" and find its a warm refuge. You can take it out in the day so it doesn't take up too much room and get poo-ed on all day. I would at least try this. He will be afraid of it at 1st, so let im find it one morning and explore it in his own time. Maybe put a treat inside so he will go in and make sure nothing scary happens the 1st time he gets to know it.
If you give him the box and he wont use it, he cant be too cold. He is not dumb. If there is a warm place to be in his cage and he needs it, he will find it. If you sneak up on him and he is shivering and out of his box, you have done all you can and he is not cold enough to need it.
Suck it and see is all I can suggest.

In the wild he would huddle in a hole in a tree with his mate.

You have make it right for him.

 

[alicat]

thank you, i will try him with the snuggle tent thing again, maybe now its cold hel give in and try it and il look at boxes.
do you put any bedding in the box like paper or a little fleece or leave it empty?
youl probably work out hes my first bird, id never even had a budgie before this. its the first real probem iv hit since i had him at 12weeks in may. the rest has been easy enough.
he has a 5 sided box in his oudoor aviary and he sits in there sometimes (its for shade cos only goes out on nice days)and has only 5 sides cos it isnt finished yet .

 

[TexDot33]

We keep the place here between 68 - 70F all winter long here in New England ... and I assure you in the UK there is nothing like what we get here all winter ...

We just make sure that we cover Ham and Mac at night, and they sleep all cozy in their Happy Huts ... and they seem to be fine.

 

[changogab]

Birds will ruffle their feathers and appear to be shivering but that is how they adjust their own body temperatures. Birds will adjust well to slow temperature changes and of course no drafts. Just like us if we go from hot to cold and back and forth quickly we can catch cold....slow temperature changes are easier to adapt to. My Timneh grey sleeps in her nest box every night...that might work for you. You can also cover the cage with a blanket. I don't like my birds to be in tempratures lower than 55 F. I use space heaters if I think it will get too chilly for them.

 

[TexDot33]

My ACV told us that the key to temperature change is acclimation ... allowing your parrots to slowly become used to a change in temperature ...

To my understanding parrots are less tolerant of sudden, drastic changes in temp (which if you think of it, makes a lot of sense, temps in the tropical regions where our parrots come from don't change drastically from day-to-day, the more align themselves with the seasons). I have also been told, that if allowed to acclimate, temps down to 55* F can be tolerated for a short time ...

So, I guess a good rule of thumb should be, if you are comfortable, your parrots should be too.