Bulbul questions.

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mattymeischke
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Joined: 25 Jul 2011, 20:25
Location: Southern Tablelands of NSW

Hello everyone.
My red crested bulbuls have fledged three young this week (Hooray!).
They are very cute with little bumps where their crests are growing.

I understand that they have to be separated from the parents at some point as the cock will kill any male young if not separated.
At what age should they be separated?
Any tips for sexing young early?

Thanks in advance,
Matt.
Avid amateur aviculturalist; I keep mostly australian and foreign finches.
The art is long, the life so short; the critical moment is fleeting and experience can be misleading, crisis is difficult....... (Hippocrates)
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Craig52
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Location: victoria

mattymeischke wrote:Hello everyone.
My red crested bulbuls have fledged three young this week (Hooray!).
They are very cute with little bumps where their crests are growing.

I understand that they have to be separated from the parents at some point as the cock will kill any male young if not separated.
At what age should they be separated?
Any tips for sexing young early?

Thanks in advance,
Matt.
Seems nobody wants to answer you Matty so well done on breeding your Bulbuls.I had them many years ago but never bred them,i don't even know if they were a pr and petty sure they were wild ones and wild they were so i got rid of them so i can't comment.I know Uringinthus? concentrated on them for a while. Craig
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iaos
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Location: Newcastle, NSW
Location: Newcastle, NSW

Congrats Matty.

Nothing to add, but do you know if yours were wild caught?

Cheers Ian
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mattymeischke
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Location: Southern Tablelands of NSW

I have a wild caught cock and a captive-bred hen. They built a nest last year but didn't get on with it.
I have been told that DNA is the only way to reliably sex them, and to separate them a month after fledging or when the parents start chasing the chicks.
They had been model aviary citizens until the chicks hatched; they have since turned into murderous psychopaths.

I think the thing that sent them to nest was regular provision of moths (in addition to the mealies and fruit they had been having all along).
Now I have to rearrange aviaries to find places for the young after separation.
Avid amateur aviculturalist; I keep mostly australian and foreign finches.
The art is long, the life so short; the critical moment is fleeting and experience can be misleading, crisis is difficult....... (Hippocrates)
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TomDeGraaff
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Location: Melbourne

mattymeischke wrote:Hello everyone.
My red crested bulbuls have fledged three young this week (Hooray!).
They are very cute with little bumps where their crests are growing.

I understand that they have to be separated from the parents at some point as the cock will kill any male young if not separated.
At what age should they be separated?
Any tips for sexing young early?

Thanks in advance,
Matt.
Hello Matt.
I bred red-whiskered bulbuls for a few years in the 90s.
I actually left one lot of young with them while they raised another brood. I don't recommend this as I figure they compete with parents for food. I don't think they hit the crickets since they are largely frugivorous unless rearing young. They do eat some all the time but this radically increases when nesting. I think they are opportunistic in what they eat. The aviary was 1.2m X 3.6m. They had the flight to themselves because I couldn't bring myself to trust them. They used to pounce on chestnuts that landed on the wire between flights. I have since kept them with finches but with no finch breeding at the time. I suspect that when nesting a newly hatched finch would not be much different to a cricket!!! Especially cup-nesters such as canaries or jacarinis.

They are quite amazing, even primitive-looking birds when they first clamber out of their nest! Quite unique! I reckon the young I left in the flight with the parents may have been hens (which might explain the father tolerating them) since they are very hard to sex when young if not impossible. I reckon it's worthwhile getting them dna tested. The price for aviary-bred birds makes this a fair option. I noted in an article I wrote in 1995 that I thought they were feeding confidently at three weeks out of the nest.

Anyway, I hope this helps a bit. There are others who have bred them since then. An article appeared in ABK about 1995. Nobody really cared about them back then. Wouldn't mind trying them again one day. Lovely birds. Cheers Tom
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mattymeischke
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Location: Southern Tablelands of NSW

Thanks, Tom (and Craig and Ian).

Mine are in a 5x8m aviary with a pair of strawbs and a pair of skylarks.
I have been gradually reducing my collection over recent months, and these guys will probably have to go in coming months, so if anyone wants a proven pair or some aviary bred young....

As well as being striking to look at, they sound lovely in the aviary.
Avid amateur aviculturalist; I keep mostly australian and foreign finches.
The art is long, the life so short; the critical moment is fleeting and experience can be misleading, crisis is difficult....... (Hippocrates)
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E Orix
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Location: Howlong on NSW/Vic Border 30km from Albury
Location: Howlong NSW

Matty
I have bred them over the years, generally I removed the young ones when independent.
They were removed because they consumed too much live food needed by the parents who were generally down
on the next clutch.
The only reason I do not keep them these days is because (apart from their fruit need) of the huge amount of livefood required to rear a full clutch.
They are a specie with a lot of really good points, by the way when ever anyone breeds a full clutch of Softbills, their management
must be pretty good. Well done on getting 3 from the one nest.
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mattymeischke
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Location: Southern Tablelands of NSW

Update on the bulbuls:

The first clutch were killed by the parents.
I checked them in the morning before work and there was no sign of discord. This was between four and five weeks after they hatched.
I got home in the evening and there were three dead young on the ground: a brutish business, they were scalped.
The next morning I found the second nest, the chicks were at least seven days old (pinfeathered).

I removed the second clutch of three young as soon as they were feeding themselves, determined not to have a repeat massacre.
They survived and were shipped last week with the parents to a forum member in Melbourne with some prior experience with bulbuls.

After removing the young, I found the third clutch.
We have handreared these three and they have done wonderfully well; they are now flying but requiring feeding.
It is an extraordinary thing to see how quickly they grow, and my children are delighted to have little birds that fly to their finger and beg for crickets.

The nests were simple affairs: fine grass and coco fibre with a minimal lining of a few feathers.
The livefood requirements when they have young are substantial.
This morning, the three week old babies took 6-8 crickets, several chunks of orange, 6-8 mealies and several mL of Wombaroo insectivore mix at 6.25, then the same again at 7.15.
I'll post photos when I get a chance.
Last edited by mattymeischke on 16 Feb 2014, 07:07, edited 1 time in total.
Avid amateur aviculturalist; I keep mostly australian and foreign finches.
The art is long, the life so short; the critical moment is fleeting and experience can be misleading, crisis is difficult....... (Hippocrates)
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finchbreeder
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Location: Midwest of West. Aust. Coast
Location: Midwest of West.Aust.Coast

Congratulations on your husbandry skills, and the success they have bought you.
LML
LML
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Diane
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Congratulations on hand rearing, not an easy task but I, like your children, was delighted to have some finches fly to my finger to be fed. Such trust!
Diane
The difference between Genius and Stupidity is, Genius has it’s limits
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