Despite what several books say, we find that Gouldian Finches are hardier than many would care to beleive that being said,they should always have access to a warm area in which to roost and if housed in outdoor aviaries, adequate care should be provided to protect them from the elements of the English weather.
We house our Gouldians in both cages and indoor flights. Our birdroom is kept at a reasonable temperature to prevent any chilling but we do find that the Gouldians love access to their outside flight and they seem contented to use it irrespective of the weather.
We are currently trying various breeding methods and have several pairs breeding in cages plus some breeding in flights on a "colony" system. We DO NOT have Society Finches on "standby" for fostering as we do actively encourage all of our birds to parent rear their chicks.
Gouldian Finches can be relatively difficult to breed sucessfully in our climate so great care and patience must be given to them during the breeding season.
All our birds are fed a good varied diet of quality Finch seed to which is added equal parts of Canary seed and white millet. In addition to fresh drinking water our birds are given a daily assortment of fresh greens.
We find our birds like apples, carrots, broccoli, lettuce and sprouted millet. We also provide vitamin and mineral supplements and find that "Daily Essentials" from The Bird Care Company seems to work the best for us.
During the moult our birds are given "Feather Up" which is also manufactured by The Bird Care Company as this product greatly promotes new feather growth and to date, we have had little to no problems with moulting birds.
A general view of our breeding room. Barry and Dawn 13th Feb 2003... since this photo was taken we have now updated ALL of our cages and use plastic stock / breeding cages which we find are far easier to keep clean than wooden ones and they also require no painting.
some normal Gouldian chicks in their nest ,the eldest chick is 12 days old. Barry and Dawn 10th Feb 2003.
a section of one of our Gouldian Finch breeding cages - note the pull out nest box chamber to the upper right of the cage,this system is preferred by us as it makes for easy inspection of the nest boxes,these cages offer great value for money and come complete with all feeders and nest boxes they can be purchased from A.R.LANE AVICULTURE (Lincolnshire ) TELE: 01472 751827. PLEASE CLICK ON THE ABOVE PHOTO TO VIEW THEIR OWN WEB SITE. Barry and Dawn 6th January 2003.
click above to read a short article on Gouldian Finch care writen by us as published on "birdsbuddy2002" website. Barry and Dawn. 18th September 2002.
