Bird World - Part 4
The Reed Warbler Acrocephalus scirpaceus, shown here feeding its young belongs to a group of birds which even experienced birdwatchers have difficulty in identifying by sight, and the various Reed Warblers and their song. This is probably also the main way in which the various species identify their mates. Reed Warblers are only found in the Old World where they live in a wide variety of marshy habitats. Bird-lovers delight in the brilliant colours of the small finch-like tanagers of the New World. There are over 200 species and they nearly all retain their dazzling colours the whole year round. In the tropical jungles of South America the most vivid of these compact, active birds vie in colouring with the gaudy parrots as they fly through the trees.
The diversity in colour of the tanager family is amazing. Many species, such as the lovely Emerald-spotted Tanager Tangara punctata and the Black and Green Tanager Tangara nigrovirdis (bottom left), build open cup nests in bushes and trees, but there are also some species which build covered nests. Typical tanagers have short, stout beaks. One specialized group of nectar-eating tanagers, however, have long slender beaks which they use to hold and pierce flowers. Some tanagers are quite competent songsters while others, the blue tanagers among them, can scarcely sing a note.
The blue tanagers are busy little birds with a huge appetite for fruit and berries. They also eat insects which they catch, with amusing dexterity, on the wing. Their nests are shallow cups in trees or bushes and after mating a pair of blue tanagers nearly always stays together for the rest of the year. Frequent visitors to parks and private gardens, they are probably among the best known of all the tanagers. The picture is of the pretty Blue-headed Tanager, Tanagara cyanicollis.
Other well-known birds of the New World are the seed-eating cardinals. Perhaps the most popular of all the cardinals is the Red Cardinal Pyrrhuloxia cardinalis which is very common in the United States, where it is affectionately known as the 'red bird'. A handsome bird, with its bold scarlet colouring, distinctive crest and stout conical-shaped beak, it is a familiar sight on the outskirts of cities such as New York. The female is easily distinguished from the male, as she is more brown than red.
Most cardinals build shallow cup nests which are similar to those of many of the tanagers, except that they are usually found on or very close to the ground. The three birds illustrated here are among the most colourful of the species breeding in North America. They are quite unrelated and have very different habits.
The Yellow Warbler Dendrica petechia is a summer visitor, arriving in North America when the apple trees are coming into blossom. The male is a loud and persistent songster, singing for most of the day and leaving the female to get on with building the nest. The Yellow Warbler is often parasitized by cowbirds but, unlike many other birds, Warblers will often build another nest over the top of the original if it contains the egg of a cowbirds; as many as six grow rapidly, leaving the nest about a fortnight later. Shortly afterwards the Yellow Warblers will set off on their journey south.
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what do i do if my birds beak is too long?
i have a parakeet and its beak is really long what do i do is there a toy for him to scrap his beak on?
Cuttlebones are something a bird plays with more than is beneficial to them. There's more of a marketing structure in place in petshops that makes people believe a cuttlebone solves all beak and calcium problems because it doesn't. None of my 300 plus budgies or birds have cuttlebones and I dont have any with overgrown beak issues or calcium deficiencies.
You wont fix an overgrown beak with a cuttlebone...end of story. It will need to be clipped and filed by a vet who know exactly just how much to cut and the shape it should be. The more important thing to talk about is WHY the beak is the way it is. Overgrown beaks aren't a natural occurrence just due to lack of cuttlebones or perching types. Overgrown beaks are due to health issues. They are part of french moult birds, birds with beak and feather disease, and birds with liver issues or specific vitamin deficiencies. For all these things you need the bird vet to consult with and put a plan of action in place so you aren't having to have the beak trimmed as often and so you don't end up believing a cuttlebone will solve everything.
I recently visited a friend who is new to budgie keeping. She had a budgie in a cage with a beak that had grown so long he couldnt eat properly and she thought it was ok to leave it that way. It wasnt. Animal cruelty to leave it like that, but my friend is brain injured and doesnt know any better. So, with my vet nurse training and years with birds I was able to trim and shape the birds beak for her and tell her that it means the bird has "issues". Lucky bird I came by that day as it wasnt able to eat much with its beak like that. BUT I must say, dont do it yourself without expert knowledge as it would be very easy for the bird to bleed to death.
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