by Pajarita » Fri Sep 04, 2020 9:22 am
Yes, there is a lot of conflicting information out there, isn't there? I can tell you one thing: I've been doing this for a loooooong time - even before there were internet forums (we used to get together at the bird supply stores and compare notes, ask questions from one another, etc and we also had clubs with meetings, seminars, workshops, etc) and there is one thing that is always constant: people lie through their teeth because we all want everybody to believe that our animals are perfectly happy and healthy and, very often, it's not even that people lie, it's that they really do believe their birds are happy! It's VERY hard to read a bird, they don't make 'faces' (no cheek muscles, no eyebrows) and each species displays differently. The truth of the matter is that it is scientifically impossible for a parrot to be happy in captivity. It doesn't happen. Not to my parrots, not to your parrots, not to anybody's parrots. You can't take an undomesticated animal that belongs to a species that has complex emotional and physical needs (as parrots do) out of its natural habitat, put it in a human's home, feed it the wrong diet and keep it from congregating socially as they evolved to and expect it to be happy. Anybody who thinks they can achieve this is either arrogant or uninformed.
But no, it's not a matter of even or uneven numbers - well, let me rephrase that: it is but only up to a certain number. The smallest flock you can have is three pairs but, after that, you can have uneven numbers and it's OK. Can a kakariki and a cockatiel bond? Yes, they can. We see all kinds of interspecies bonding in captivity. Parrots (like all animals) are very pragmatic and the 'if you can't have the one you love, love the one you are with' is very common with them because they NEED the constant company and attention they evolved to have and which is always lacking in captivity. The problem is that you can't really bet on it so, in my mind, the best solution is always the one that is most likely to succeed: thus, my recommending a mate of their own species.
As to breeding... well, the problem is that it's not that easy to get zero infant mortality when you have no hands-on experience. There are many things that you need to take into consideration - like humidity in the environment, for example, which is something that most people are not even aware of as a requirement. If the environment where the birds are kept is too dry, you will get DIS (Dead In Shell) babies. See, the babies need a certain amount of humidity which is specific to the actual species of bird, not more and not less, because the eggshells are very porous and allow the humidity to reach the developing baby which needs to move around the egg. If it's too dry, the baby kind of gets stuck to the inside of the shell and dies before it can be born. Then you have the special diet for conditioning (prior breeding), the one for nesting (when the male will feed the female in the nest) and the one for raising babies (which is different from the other two). And the extra D3 and calcium you need to give to the female before it starts laying and after each egg ) PLUS when they are feeding the babies. You can't do too much or too little. And, if the mother or father get sick or stressed out, you will need to handfeed babies - and believe me when I tell you that this is NOT something you want to do! For one thing, it's something that requires experience or the babies end up aspirating or getting a fungal infection - and, for another, it's HARD because you need to wake up every couple of hours during the night when they are teeny tiny and even when they are a bit bigger, you still need to feed them once every hour for days and days and days during the daylight hours. I used to breed Timbrados and other purebred canaries but I learned under two mentors for years before I even attempted it. I no longer do it because it's very hard to find good homes for them even though it's super easy to take care of canaries! Budgies are in super overpopulation and considered disposable birds (people still put them out with the garbage when they no longer want them) so producing more of them is not the kindest thing to do...