G'day

[BlackCobra]

Hi & welcome
I hope you do get more into finches again, I am just getting back into finches again after a couple years break, begalese is one finch I really enjoy, even when I have aviaries full of the higher quality birds, for yourself I think you will love them & breed tons, I just bought 17 & already got 5 or so nests & 8 babies.
Just be careful with some exotic finches they do need more protein than others, like the cordons, if you don't give some live food or substitute at about 8 days old the young start to die.
Goodluck

[ColouredFeathers]

Welcome to the forum

[David2406]

Welcome to the forum

[finchbreeder]

Welcome to the forum. Do what I do. Have all the Zebs accept 1 pair in 1 avairy. And the 1 pair you wish to breed at the time in with the exotics and canarys. Keep no nests in the Zeb avairy, so they don't get out of hand. That way once your chosen pair of Zebs has bred twice you remove them and their young to the main Zeb avairy, after ringing with a "family colour" ring. Then in goes the next pair of Zebs you want to breed. Doing it this way I have no trouble keeping Canaries, Gouldians and Zebs together. Good luck with your renewed enthusiasm.
LML

[montall]

Thanks for the tip, sounds like a good idea. I might try that, although I have a bit of a problem catching them because I have trees in the aviaries and they can duck in amongst the branches making it hard to catch them in a net. I might take this question to the general forum to see if I can get some hints on how others go about catching birds in planted aviaries. I guess there would be more traffic there, although I'm blown away by how many people popped in to welcome me here. I must admit I was beginning to lose interest in my birds but it's been revitalised quite a bit already by this forum.

[BlackCobra]

I use to use curtain material, net looking type one, I would put a few hooks across between the front & my enclosure, I would hook up half the net/curtain & once you chase all out front hook up the rest of the net, I went to a guys place recently & he took forever trying to catch some finches for me, so in the end I had to go in there & help, but the aviary was about 10ft long & in 2 parts, so when he went one end they flew to the other end,so all he has to do is put the net in the middle & he would have all in one end.