Bringing home 2 Princess Parrots, how to settle?

[Pajarita]

Yep, it's the blue beak and the head markings that say this is a baby that make me believe it's a female.

[InsanityShard]

Males have blue beaks, females have brown beaks, the those head markings are the markings all babies have and lose when they first malt? The beak is pink until they near their fist malt, then they start changing colour, and even today it's more blue.

[InsanityShard]

Mum said she'd give me money to get another budgie tomorrow since Chitters isn't too happy by himself. He didn't have any toys, only other budgies, so he mostly sits still and stares at me rather than using the swing or anything. So, I'll have two budgies- Chitters and Chatters. =D

[Pajarita]

Males have blue beaks, females have brown beaks, the those head markings are the markings all babies have and lose when they first malt? The beak is pink until they near their fist malt, then they start changing colour, and even today it's more blue.

Yes, adult males have, usually (they can have white and even flesh colored ones, too), blue ceres but only when they are adults, when they are babies, they have a bluish pink/light violet cere without a white ring around the nostrils. Adult females can have a pink, white or flesh colored cere. It's only when they are in breeding condition that they have brown ceres, the rest of the year they have the 'normal' color BUT they can also have blue ceres (I had two seafoam females that had blue ceres during the resting season -they were sisters). When females are babies, they have wide blue rings around the nostrils and, as she is still one (I went with the head markings to determine this), it looks as if this bird is a female. Basically, male babies will have a pinkish cere and female babies will have a blue cere -the opposite of what is common in adult ones.

[InsanityShard]

Alright, it's just Chitters beak is going more and more blue every day. It's almost entirely blue now. As for the females not always having brown beaks, I didn't know that- our females always had brown beaks, except one that turned blue and stayed blue the rest of her life. Chitters beak looks like the photo now, even though it's only been 5 days, except it's pink where it shows brown, the whole upper half is blue, not just rings. My mum used to breed budgies, she reckons it's a male, that's mostly why I thought it was male. But her vision is very bad.

[Pajarita]

You will have to wait until after the juvenile molt, then you will know for sure. As to your previous female budgies always having brown ceres, this is because they must have been kept at human light schedule and/or fed too much protein all year round - breeders normally do this so as to get more babies but it's real bad for the birds.

[InsanityShard]

They were outdoor budgies in a large cage with a basic seed/high nutrient feed mix. The ones I have now will still be on a natural light schedule, but indoor instead and even now they're out of the cage, chirping at the rainbow lorikeets in full stereo chirps.

[Pajarita]

Well, there's your answer: the high nutrient seed mix they were fed was the reason why - budgies are highly opportunistic breeders, give them high protein all the time and they will produce sexual hormones all year round.

[InsanityShard]

Now that I've got two they both just skitter away from my hand when I try to get them to step up. Chitters was going onto my hand before... Is this because I have two now? Chitters is a lot happier with Chatters, at least.

[liz]

Good name for budgies.

Chitters will step up again when he is sure Chatters will not go away. They do have each other and don't need you as much but with two they are braver. Just treat them like scared babies.

I did some rescues of birds that I thought would never trust a human again. The worst one, Gimpy, only has one leg and it is twisted. I got a big surprise this morning when he landed on the food tray first and while I was still putting the food on it.

My little refugees are trying to get the nerve to make contact with me. Chitter Chatter will come around. It won't be long before you are their best perch.