Typhoon Wind Fall

31 Oct 2009, 12:55

Here in central Luzon we are continuing to mop-up after typhoon "SANTI" (MIRINAE). It didn't dump as much rain as the ones earlier in October but it had a lot more wind. Lucky for us too as the slope behimd our house collapsed last time and my main aviary is just on the other side of the fence and that's only 5m from the bedrooms!

With lots of leaf, twig and occasional trees actoss the road I thought now's the time to collect some wind-fall bottle brush as it's the only think that keeps its leaf here. I found more than enough to rebrush the aviaries so I hope there's enough regrowth by the next time I need it. My diamonds have built their fourth nest this week and some stars might also have a nest so I'll have to be careful.

31 Oct 2009, 13:07

Glad to hear you got some benefit from the storm, but it must have been worrying too especially after the back of your block collapsed last time!

31 Oct 2009, 16:05

At least your birds will be happy with the new brush.The only thing we have to contend with is volcanoes in this area.And its been 5000 years since the last eruption.

31 Oct 2009, 16:40

Well I suppose you're relatively safe although you're overdue for an eruption I hear. We live on Mt Makiling which hasn't erupted for at least 100 000 years and is considered inactive by geologists and extinct by realestate agents.

Even after the rebrushing my Diamonds continue to add to their nest which is good - I even sighted the male doing a nuptual dance with grass in his beak. My alledged "star" nest looked to be abandoned and had mixed species eggs in it - some with dead embryos. Another pair of stars is nesting in a palm and they seem to be unaffected by my disturbance. I just hope that this stimulates things to breed. In another aviary I have cut-throats in with Philippine hanging parrots. The cut-throats may have abandoned their single 3 week old chick after the storm as it's crop was empty when I rebrushed their aviary. Normally they don't readily abandon nests so I hope I'm wrong. I used a crop needle to give it some soft food and I guess it's wait and see.

02 Nov 2009, 08:56

Gomer I hope you had your fingers crossed when you typed about the volcanoes?

02 Nov 2009, 10:23

As Greg said we are over due for an eruption down here.

02 Nov 2009, 10:40

you have volcanoes of a different type there Gomer, they exist in the captal city of each state. but when they erupt (which feels like ir happens daily) all they spew forth is bs. the correct name for these new volcanoes is politicians

02 Nov 2009, 19:04

03 Nov 2009, 15:04

Well I may have gotten the windfall of new aviary brush but my luck hasn't improved. The cut-throats have definitely stopped feeding their baby and have started laying again in the same nest as the youngster. Their baby always has an empty crop when I look so I feed him with soft food through a crop syringe once a day but at least he's warm and they haven't chucked him out. I've never managed to sucessfully hand rear a finch and the new eggs are covered in feces so I I'll probably get nothing.

07 Nov 2009, 21:21

With a bit of luck if you leave the little one there and feed it when u can mum and dad might also give it the odd feed.
Fingers crossed for you.
LML