Thanks a lot for your response!
Yellow is restless, moves a lot rapidly and nods head. I'm not sure what it exactly means.
About the cage biting and boredom, I tried playing with Yellow and also bought a few toys but not interested in them at all. I also played with the toys next to Yellow and sometimes Yellow would touch them but never again. I will look into the natural toys! Thank you for your suggestion.
It seems like Yellow likes exploring the house but doesn't roam around much either.
Yes, we do some stepping ups, jumping, sometimes flying. I'm not sure if I'm doing it right but just felt right to do so.
About sleeping pattern, I'm not sure yet. Because I live in Japan and here the sun rises as early as around by 5:00 AM or earlier?
And Yellow is energetic and won't go inside the cage until like its 11:00 PM/12:00 AM (night). Also Yellow won't go inside the cage easily. Sometimes it becomes too tiring.
So, at night I put Yellow in a room A and then move to room B because in room A it's occupied at night whereas in room B no one stays (study room).
Yesterday while I was transferring Yellow from A to B, I thought Yellow was in sleep but all of a sudden Yellow starting flapping his/her/their wings and started moving across the cage.
The room B has light that passes through the cover of the cage and also light passes through the room when sun rises.
Today, I'm not sure why but Yellow has been so aggressive! He/she/they won't come to my hand and looks afraid whenever I try to come near. Also, ignores everyone and is constantly biting the cage.
I also realized that Yellow is having water in poop and also just clear-like water droppings. What could this mean?
Thank you for suggesting I will look into the diet. Do you have any recommendations of the pellet/veggie/fruit/seed diet?
Sometimes they just don't know how to play with toys so it can take a little bit to "teach" them to play with toys but I'm glad you're not going to give up!
One thing I forgot to mention before was that Yellow's cage is also quite small. The
absolute minimum is usually 1.5 times the birds wingspan so they can stretch their wing while inside their cage. A budgie's average wingspan is about 12 inches they would need 18 inches at the
minimum. I know it can be difficult to find bigger cages in Japan (or many Asian countries) I've lived in Taiwan before so I've experienced it before.
This cage or
this cage look like good options available on Amazon Japan though.
If the cage is too small then it's also understandable why Yellow would freak out if you try to put toys in his cage because he doesn't have anywhere to hide or put some distance between him and the toys
Also please make sure Yellow has cuttlebone in his cage. This article states why it's important for budgies, especially if he's not getting calcium in his diet right now.
Why Does My Parakeet Use a Cuttlebone?
I think it'll help with the cage biting too
Yes, it's good that you're doing training! I think it's something you should continue to do
For sleeping, 5 hours is definitely not enough for them. My bird goes to sleep at 8:30pm everyday and wakes up at 6:30am. Since it's summer here the sun doesn't go down until 9/10pm so I cover his cage during his bedtime to make sure he goes to sleep and his cage is in an undisturbed part of the house that we keep dark and quiet while we can continue to do our activities (like tv, etc) in the living room or other rooms so we don't disturb him.
I would suggest covering Yellow's cage for bedtime too. Covering his cage would also help him if he is waking up at dawn with the sun. Just from experience though you'll want to make sure it's not too dark when Yellow is covered, maybe just cover partially or have a night light in the room for him because budgies and many birds do get get night frights when they are in complete darkness. Routine is also very important. They should have a set time they sleep and wake up (don't let Yellow stay up late even if he seems like he wants too! It's for his health and well-being to get enough sleep).
Also I would just keep Yellow's cage in room b
before his bedtime then so you can just cover his cage for bedtime since moving him around does disturb his sleep.
Changes in a birds dropping can be a sign of sickness or disease. If you haven't changed Yellow's diet recently and offered more watery foods like fruits or vegetables then I would suggest taking Yellow to an avian vet for a check up.
For diet we have a very good source here on AA in
feathered food court for bird recipes. I feed my bird Harrisons pellet (I'm not sure if you can but it easily in Japan though) and some veggies I feed include: kale, chard, lettuce, sweet peppers, snap peas, carrots, radish, broccoli, bok choy, cucumber, zucchini, etc (some vegetables like avacado are toxic to birds though so I also make sure to google if I'm introducing a new veggie to my bird). Fruits I feed are cherries, grapes, apples, strawberries, blueberries, cherries, guava. Not too much though since fruits are also high in sugar so I do limit them to like 10% of my bird's diet.
My bird's current diet is 40% pellet, 40% veggies, 10% seed, 10% fruits. I am trying to work on trying to make veggies at least 50% of my bird's diet but it still a work in progress. But I think budgies so need more seed in their diet than my bird (conure) so maybe 30% pellets, 30% veggies, 30% seeds, 10% fruits would work?
I think this YouTube channel
is based in Japan and their video shows what foods they feed their budgies which might help you more to source what's available in Japan locally.
Hope that helps! I hope you keep me updated on Yellow's progress, he's a very cute little one!
We also have a section of AA dedicated to
budgies which I would suggest you can also post your questions under since lots of experienced people with budgies post over there
