Catching Finches in the Aviary

Which ever method a person uses to catch their finches, stress is always involved, both for bird and human. One of the best things to do to calm every one down a notch or two is to quietly talk throughout the ordeal. This seems to help the person doing the catching, at least, and does no harm to the finch.

In a small cage, we have simply used our hands to catch our finches.

In flight-sized enclosure, however, there are just too many places for the finches to retreat to catch anybody effectively during daylight hours. In darkness, however, a pen light, with the light well shielded is invaluable to accomplishing the task. To do this, briefly shine the least amount of light on the finches needing to be caught. All that is required is to find their position in the enclosure with the limited light. Make as little noise as possible, reach in and gently grasp the bird.

During daylight, in our smaller house, we'd have gotten the finch out of the aviary to catch it. As silly as it sounds to catch a bird out of its enclosure, it really worked better. Some precautions are required prior to the bird's release. All windows and doors of the house must be closed. Doors to the larger rooms in the house are also closed. The door a small room, such as a bedroom or bathroom are best left open so that if the finch finds itself there, simply close the door and catch it in there.

A few words of caution about bathrooms and kitchens: close toilet lids and drain any water from sinks, glasses, bowls or what-have-you in the sink to avoid drowning frightened finches.   RIGHT: Left, the male white headed nun; right, the female.

Feather Plucking

Feather plucking has been encountered in a few situations over the years we've had our birds. We've narrowed the cause down to three factors:

1. too many finches in a small space. Usually the problems have existed where a male will pluck his mate. Or, it could be that the female will pluck her mate.
2. too many of the same gender of finch in too small of a space.
3. a healthy finch will pluck its sick partner.  Unfortunately, in one situation, our female red cheeked cordon bleu waxbill plucked her sick mate. We separated her from the aviary until his feathers had grown back. However, once she was re-introduced, she continued plucking him. Sadly, as it turned out, the male red cheek did not recover and was eventually put to sleep by our vet.

In some situations, the plucking behaviour showed up soon after we first brought the finches home. In those situations, we were able to return the birds to the bird store.

In situations where plucking begins longs after we've had the finches, we've removed the plucking finch from the aviary and reintroduced it after about six weeks or when the plucked bird's feathers have regrown. As the years passed, however, when feather plucking became a rare problem, we simply left the birds alone and either the plucking ceased or continued.  We did not intervene because it became increasingly more difficult to ascertain who the plucker was.  At one point we had one waxbill who had had a bald, plucked head for years with no ill health resulting from the plucking.

ABOVE: Left, one of our male society finches being preened by a red eared waxbill.

Finches at Large

Finches that get loose are caught with a net that we purchased from a tropical fish supply store.

Finches Fighting With Each Other

Finches fighting with each other warrant someone being removed from the environment.

In the case of the two pair of owl finches we previously had in our care, we closely observed the problem for a day or so to assess who was actually causing the problem and why they might be doing so. As is turned out, our reading suggested that two pair of any finch species is usually a recipe for rivalry, so we removed the more aggressive male and his mate. When the second male owl finch began to dominate the aviary after nests were installed, we removed him and his mate. After the nests were removed from the aviary, one pair of owls were returned to the aviary. All has been peaceful since. In this instance the aggression was the result of typical nesting behaviour for that species, our owl finches. We kept owl finches for several months until they became too aggressive in the community. At that time the remaining male was traded to a breeder in a neighbouring province.

Another reason finches may fight is too many birds in too small a space. When this is the situation, providing a larger cage, flight or aviary is in order. Also splitting the community into two or more enclosures will also reduce fighting and its causes.   RIGHT: Left, our male African silverbill; right, the female.

Sick Finches

Unfortunately, we've had our share of sick finches. Over the years, numerous finches have died. Looking back over the days and weeks leading up to the deaths of the two owl females, I'd have to say that I noticed they weren't as active as the other birds, but did not think to seek treatment for them. And they died. I feel awful about not doing anything about their condition, but, quite honestly, I didn't put two and two together in time to help our little charges.

The male red cheeked cordon bleu waxbill, for instance, had been treated with antibiotic, but did not respond positively to treatment. After a long illness, we eventually had him put to sleep by the vet. His abdomen was quite swollen and the vet who put him to sleep suggested he probably had a tumor of some sort.

Since the owl finch females died, however, we have had finches to the vet on a couple of occasions. Both birds were interred in the hospital cage and given antibiotics, and both birds have since done well.

The hospital cage is a small inexpensive cage picked up at a pet store. It has two perches, food and water dishes, a light for heat and an ordinary room thermometer. Most of the time the cage is in storage. When in use, however, a clean towel is wrapped most of the way around it to hold in the heat from the light. Optimum temperature is between 75 and 80 F. At night when the light is off, a heating pad placed beneath the cage is turned up to medium. A bit of water is spilled onto the cage floor a couple of times during the day to increase humidity.

As the days pass and the bird gets better, the towel is slowly unwrapped to acclimatize the bird back to room temperature. When the treatment is complete and the bird is feeling better, it's let back into the community.   RIGHT: Left to right, the red eared waxbill pair, and one of the male society finches.

Too Many Finches The largest problem we've had to deal with to date was one of over-crowding. Fourteen finches were housed in the small original aviary. Within six weeks, five more finches had been added, an increase in population of 36%. The increase in population was made gradually, but, then, so was the stress, though we did not notice it until two weeks after the addition of the final three birds. One finch in particular, though in seemingly sound health otherwise, began losing feathers and developed a bloody sore spot developed just below her bill. It looked as though someone had been pecking at her, a sure sign of stressful conditions. She was immediately removed to the hospital cage where she was isolated for three or four days. The sore spot improved, but she seemed so depressed to be without her companions. Putting her back in with the other finches under the same stressful conditions resulted in the same situation redeveloping. The ultimate solution to too many finches, of course, is larger quarters for the birds. The larger the space, the better is what we thought, so we built a large indoor aviary.

ABOVE: Left, a St. Helena's waxbill being preened by a rosy rumped waxbill.   BELOW: Left, our male red cheeked cordon bleu, and the female and male gold breasted waxbills. The red cheeked cordon bleu is sick in this photo, poor little guy.

Privacy Issues Lack of privacy in any finch enclosure will cause undue stress to finches. We have placed two perches, at different heights, at both ends of the aviary, providing  many perching options from which the birds may choose.  To increase privacy on all perches, we have hung plastic aquatic plants from the ceiling over each perch so the plants touch the perches.  There are three or four fake plants per perch providing private areas for the finches to either perch together or singly.