Little Beaks

Making them work for their food… 😏

But seems they're enjoying the challenge!

Hanging their celery means they get to climb, balance, pull, reach, and work out how best to get at it.

Do you give food in any creative sorts of ways? Feel free to share - never too many ideas for enrichment 😊

video description: A large bunch of celery hangs upside down inside the aviary, among some hanging branches. Several budgies and weiros gather around it, climbing onto the leaves and stems and nibbling as it sways beneath them. Birds come and go throughout the video, while other budgies and weiros perch on nearby branches in the background.

Is she trying to make a nest? 🤔

Maybe.

Female budgies can investigate and modify potential nesting cavities, including gnawing at the inside.

But wild budgies don’t normally dig burrows. They’re cavity nesters and typically use existing hollows in trees.

So while this very determined excavation could be related to nest-seeking behaviour, we can’t know that’s why she’s doing it.

At Little Beaks, there’s a balance. We want the birds to have a complex, natural environment where they can dig, forage, explore, and make their own choices. But we don’t provide nest boxes or deliberately create opportunities for breeding.

So she can continue her mysterious excavation. We just won’t be furnishing it as a nursery. 😅

Her male companion, meanwhile, seems much more interested in her than she is in him. He hangs around, tries to interact, and eventually gives up and preens beside her instead.

She has a hole to dig.

Video description: A female budgie with a slightly dirty beak and dirt-stained yellow feathers is hard at work digging a hole in the aviary floor. A male light green and yellow budgie stays close beside her, watching and occasionally trying to interact with her. She remains focused on digging and largely ignores him, so he settles nearby and begins preening himself while she continues her excavation. Near the end, she suddenly jumps out of the hole and lands in front of him, mid-preen, almost looking like she's saying hello, but he turns and waddles off-screen, and she returns to her digging.

Parrots have a sweet tooth… right? Ours might disagree.

Fruit can be part of a varied diet, but for the birds here it’s treat food rather than an everyday staple. Perhaps surprisingly, it's not generally as popular as vegies.

Why? Possibly a variety of reasons.

Texture, familiarity, individual preferences, foraging opportunities and even what the rest of the flock is eating can all influence what a bird chooses.

That’s why vegetables can be surprisingly popular - crunchy stalks, leafy greens, and other vegetables they can tear apart offer more than just nutrition.

Apple still gets plenty of attention. Just not necessarily as much as you’d expect.

Video description: A few chunks of cut apple sit on the ground of an aviary. Budgies and weiros, and a couple of kakarikis, approach and investigate it, with some nibbling at the exposed flesh.

Morning waddles and nibbles ❤️

video description: a close up view of a small flock of budgies gathered closely around a large bunch of fresh curly kale on the aviary floor. They waddle about and enthusiastically nibble at the leaves, with different budgies moving in and out of the group as they eat.

What's your birds' favourite vegie?

These guys did not take to kale the first time it was offered. How times change 😂

Some changes are coming here too... more on that soon, but I've been slack posting recently so wanted to make sure I gave you a video.

Thanks for all of your ongoing support ❤️

video description: Several budgies gather around a bunch of leafy kale hanging among a few low branches in the aviary. They nibble at the leaves while moving around one another, changing positions and joining or leaving the group. Pudge the plumhead is also present, grasping a branch and reaching forward to the top of the kale just below.

How long does it take two budgies to decide whether they like each other?

Too many times I’ve seen people conclude that their bird is antisocial, or simply doesn’t like other birds, because they’ve tried one or two companions and they haven’t gotten along.

But there’s a problem with that conclusion: while budgies need companionship, they don’t automatically like every other budgie they meet.

So, how long does it take?

There isn’t really a set timeframe.

Bird relationships become apparent through patterns over time: who they choose to approach, sit beside, preen, avoid, or repeatedly interact with.

And there’s a whole spectrum between “I choose you” and “please go away".

That’s something worth remembering when we talk about “getting another bird as a friend".

Budgies need the companionship of other budgies. But that doesn’t mean any two budgies will automatically become friends.

We can give them opportunities to form relationships; we can’t choose those relationships for them.

Sometimes good welfare means giving birds choices, then paying attention to the choices they make.

video description: Two budgies sit together on a branch resting on the aviary ground. At the beginning, the male places a foot on the female’s back as they gently interact with their beaks. He then flies away briefly before returning to her. They resume their beak-to-beak interaction, and he nibbles at her shoulder for a brief moment.

Bird psychology is seriously underappreciated.

We can’t ask a bird what they’re thinking, but we can study how they learn, remember, make choices, solve problems, and respond to other birds.

Bird minds aren’t simply smaller versions of ours. Their cognition has been shaped by their own evolutionary history and the problems birds need to solve.

And that matters for welfare.

If birds have preferences, relationships, and individual ways of responding to their environment, good care is about more than food, water, and shelter. It means opportunities to choose, explore, forage, socialise, and behave like birds.

It’s why we encourage people to look beyond common or traditional practices when making decisions for their birds.

'Common' doesn’t necessarily mean best - or even good - for their behavioural and psychological needs.

video description: visible in the background through a gap fresh leafy branches in the aviary, two budgies preen each other on a separate branch. Another budgie on a higher branch nibbles at the bark and goes upside-down occasionally. More budgies slightly more hidden lower down interact and preen each other. One weiro sits calmly on a branch higher up above the rest. At the end, a second weiro flies in to the further end of the branch, and the first weiro waddles down the branch to meet them.

When one budgie preens another.... what’s in it for the bird doing the preening?

You might already recognise this as allopreening.

The benefit for the bird receiving it is fairly obvious: another beak can reach feathers around the head and neck that are difficult to preen alone.

But why spend your own time grooming somebody else?

For social birds like budgies, allopreening is about more than feather maintenance. It can also:

• reinforce social relationships
• help maintain established bonds
• strengthen affiliation between birds

In other words, the grooming isn’t necessarily just a favour for the other bird.

Humans aren't the only ones with ulterior motives 😝

video description: Two budgies sit closely together on a natural branch on the soil ground of an aviary. At first, one gently preens the feathers around the other bird’s head and face. About halfway through, the allopreening stops and both birds begin preening their own feathers while continuing to sit side by side.