Quaker breeding

[Jack]

What is a good sized aviary to HOUSE a breeding pair of Quakers? Ive been researching everywhere and all I get is small cage dimensions to breed them in, not house them.
Also what's the best material to supply for them to build, or atleast build onto their nest box?
Thanks

[avinet]

Quakers will breed almost anywhere, from a pet cage in the house up to large outside flights.

The best breeder of Quakers I know had about 40 pairs, in flights that were around 4 metres long by 1.2 metres wide, 2 metres high. They will do well in smaller flights, but I always believe that the more room a pair has to fly, the fitter it will be and the better at breeding it will be. I would suggest a minimum of 2.5m x 1m and 2m high.

When I have bred them I used a standard cockatiel nest box and made a wire platform on the front of it about 25cm square for them to play with their sticks on. They would make their nest on the wire platform and use the box as the nesting chamber. The idea is they don't take sticks into the nest box and the inside of the box is accessible to you so you can check on eggs and babies and remove the babies easily for hand rearing.

For sticks I collected fallen thin twigs and branches form below eucalypt trees - no thicker than a pencil. I would break them into different lengths from around 10 to 20 cm thick. Some breeders will not provide sticks at all, just have sawdust in the box, but I feel that the activity of making a nest helps strengthen the breeding cycle and hence lead to better results.

The problem with some pairs is that they will take sticks into the nest box and continue to do so even after eggs have been laid, leading to eggs disappearing down within the mess of sticks and not hatching - hence the need to be able to get inside the box and remove any sticks being taken in there.

A cute video of a pet Quaker building his dream house is at

cheers,

Mike

[Jack]

Thank Mike, always a good help!