Am I doing alright with Orangebreasts?

[noah.till]

I have heard a lot, and I mean a LOT of people talking about deficiencies of orange breast chicks when they come out of the nest with white feathers
I had 2 come out of the nest a couple weeks back (Unfortunately I lost both of them after a cold spell at night) and had no white feathers whatsoever.
Does this mean I am doing something right? My diet isn't very special but it consists of: Seeding grasses, finch mix, spinach, corn, carrot, sprouted bean mix, cucumber, apple, charcoal, shell grit, cuttle fish bone, egg and biscuit mix, egg shells, termites and parrot pellets for the neophemas which I have seen the finches picking at

[finchbreeder]

Sounds like a pretty good alround mix of everything necessary.
LML

[Craig52]

That's a very good diet but you hit the nail on the head about feeding termites. Although OB's don't take much livefood if it's there they will partake in it. Imo termites are the gold/dessert in livefood if you can feed them for protein.
It is the breeders that can't or don't feed a high protein diet that deficiencies in the wing occur but,in saying that some breeders of OB's supply every thing just like you and still get the dirty white wing stripe because the birds don't eat what is supplied and just stick to one component to feed their young. Craig

[arthur]

I am a bit wary of this 'diet deficiency' thing

Often some chicks from the same clutch will have the white and some won't

And the white often disappears, with no change to the diet

And young from other species in the same aviary don't fledge with the white

[Craig52]

That is what i was trying to say, if it doesn't appear to be dietary then what causes it. The white in wing does disappear after a moult or two so is it an internal organ thing like kidney or liver complaint. Not much has been done on the cause probably because it corrects itself after these early moults in life. So in my opinion, let's blame blame diet because it is easy to say.

[noah.till]

Thanks everyone, all of your comments have sparked some better understanding

[Tiaris]

I'm convinced diet does have something to do with it.
When I am feeding plenty of termites, OBs breed very well for me and white flighted fledglings are very rare (sometimes the runt of a large clutch).
When I have OBs fledge young when termites are not being fed (far fewer young than when termites are offered), white-flighted fledglings comprise a high proportion of those young. In this instance it is unusual to not have white-flighted fledglings and it is often the entire clutch. Same applies to Strawberry Finches but rarely other species and all white-flighted fledglings lose any trace of it by the time they attain adult plumage.

[noah.till]

Must be the magic livefood

[starman]

I've not experienced the white flight syndrome (yet). My current OBs have only produced 3 clutches of 2 over two years.
Their ordinary diet consists of selected millets, seeding grasses, mineral mix, cuttlefish bone and eggshell.
They will accept meal worms for live food at any time, but this is only after the Green Singers have done the slicing and dicing for them. Their consumption of meal worms peaks when they are feeding chicks.

[noah.till]

Had a successful clutch of 4 orange breasts, all fledged without any white feathers
All hail termites, the magic livefood!
Thanks
Noah Till