When I was a little'un, I kept....

[natamambo]

Inspired by crocnshas' complaint about *me* mentioning budgies in a finch forum, I thought it would be interesting to find out who kept what and when in the beginning of their birding. What was the first species you seriously kept for breeding, did you concentrate in that species or go for the Cadbury Favourites aviary - just a few of everything - and at what age? How did the disease spread from there?


For me it was budgies, I was about 15 when I finally convinced my parents to let me have the aviary instead of just two birds inside. They were all I kept until my first pair of "grassies" - red rumps - after we got married. More parrots arrived soon after that, but for 25 years the finches were my wife's and the parrots, all sorts of them, were mine. Apart from the inevitable geneticist's foray in to zebbies 25 years ago (couldn't afford to feed them so I gave that away again) I didn't keep finches until getting in to Gouldians at Christmas in 2010 after tiring of our our modern small backyards restricting aviary space for the last 10 years.

[vettepilot_6]

I started with helping Dad and his Canaries, then my own Zebs and Society Finches moved on to RedRump Parrots and went back to Finches in a huge way once I was earning a living, but that was 40 yr ago now a little more concentrated on species I like....

[Red]

I started with a pair of budgerigars I got when I was 12 years old. Then came King quail which are always fun for a kid to watch.

[Misso]

Started with a pet budgie for me, when i was 10 or so, then when i was a teenager a lone canary flew into our shed, which i caught, so of course i had to get it a friend from the pet shop, turned out both were males, whist at the pet shop i also got a pair of zebs.

was given an small classic aviary from a highschool friend and threw them in their, zebs bred like mice...

when i was 17 i had a knee reco, so being couch bound i was on the laptop, somehow i guess when searching zebs i came across gouldians, so off i went to a bird market/petshop, got 1 male gouldian, then sold off a few zebs to go towards buying a gouldian hen from another bird dealer ( lets just say it all snowballed from their )

misso

[finchbreeder]

As my father was a breeder of Cockies and Parrotts and Mum is Budgiebreeder, and has been for my entire life. I don;t actually remember a before birds time. So arround the above for over 50yrs, then when i got married and moved out at 20 had a few birdless years while we rented. Then 1st house about 1980 and the avairys started going up about 2 years later. Hubby took a little gentle convincing. My first avairys of my own contained canarys, quail, zebs and diamond doves.
LML

[maz]

Budgies and pigeons since I can remember and before I was around, then budgies and zebra finches and quail from 10yo until I moved out of home at 19. then I just had pets of varying parrots until the last 3 years when I am settled enough to have my aviaries back (oh I did have galahs in aviaries for 10 years before the kids but never had them breeding)

[Tiaris]

A pair each of Cordons, Ruddies & Auroras were my first finches at 6 years old. They were $12pr, $6pr & $6pr at the time (bought from George Peters at Cessnock in the early 1970s). Dad built two aviaries for my brother & I & these were my first birds. The Ruddies were the first to breed in a low small hollow log using stringy bark as the main nesting material - a clutch of 3. I later swapped that same hollow log with a mate for a budgie cage which I thought was a great deal.

[casehulsebosch]

The Common linnet (Carduelis cannabina) was the very first bird given to me. Wild caught and flighty he managed to escape from his cage early in the piece.
He was replaced by Zebbies and Bengalese as my mentors wanted me to start "from the ground up" in bird keeping. Having managed these species to the satisfaction of my elders I progressed to Longtails and Gouldians in the mid sixties. I cage bred these species successfully but I must say it was more of a struggle than, that is is now.
I also had a mixed aviary with Australian and African bird species. I bred Pekin Robins at a time that they were Fl. 10 (Ten Guilders)
Some of my follow hobbyists bred Pekin Robins at that time and opened the aviary door once they had young in the nest so they could forage for food.
One of my friends recently e mailed me saying that some of the older members in his club still let the Pekins out when they have young in the nest.

Cheers, Case, Tauranga, New Zealand.

[finches247]

I started when I was 4 I got a budgie when I was at the vets when the enemy(cat) was put down.Then we went to pet shop a week later got 3 other budgies and a pair of quail and then a year later Zebs and Canaries breeding well.My first exotic finches were a pair of cordon,fires,gouldians,Cubans and Cutthroats I got when I was 10 years old.The last 2 years have got larger with finches due to my younger brothers and dad becoming more interested.

[mr.fox]

When I was 7 an old local finch breeder 'gave'' me 4 pairs of Zebras. All pure normals too, and continued to breed true for many years, unlike today's sad situation. I had one of those 5'square gardenmaster kit aviaries and they bred like flies in it!Those beaut little finches taught me the basic rules of birdkeeping and of course I've been hooked ever since. Progressed to budgies( frustrating buggers) to Cockatiels, Red rumps and later to keeping all the Psephotus, Northiella and most of the Neophema parrot species, which are my main interest to this day. And because this is a finch forum you will be glad to know that I also keep Painted firetails, Diamonds, Stars and Gouldians.