kaks

[jusdeb]

I now have a pair of kaks a male pied and a female cinnamin both 9 months old .
Couple of questions please ..how old is a good age to begin breeding them ?
Will they be OK to breed in summer or should they not breed in the hot weather ?
Any tips ? They sure do bring the aviary to life .

[avinet]

Yes, Kakis are certainly active birds, always doing something. Great fun to have around.

They can start breeding at a young age - certainly by 9 or 10 months, but it isn't a good idea to let them breed through summer. The babies are born with a lot of thick down and they can easily overheat if you are not careful. I would suggest putting in a nestbox around Easter, and you should have winter babies. By then they will be 18 months and a good age to breed.

I always used a standard cockatiel box, but I sometimes felt a deeper box would have been a good idea since the babies tended to leave the nest earlier than I was comfortable with - they are so curious! A deeper box can mean it is a day or two longer before they can manage to climb out. In my SE Qld climate it was often already hot when they were breeding in the spring and I would put the box on the ground where it was cooler, so it didn't matter if they did get out a little early - they weren't going to fall far.

Just a comment on the male - I can't see any pied feathers (yellow feathers). Is he supposed to be a visual pied or split to pied?

cheers

Mike

[jusdeb]

Id say split , there were others from the same clutch with more visible yellow wing feathers but I wanted one that looked normal .
What colour types would they throw ?
I use tiel boxes for all my parrots , my partner makes them a bit bigger and deeper for me so that will work out fine .
Thanks for the tips.

[vankarhi]

Wow aren't kakarikis pretty. They are quite small too aren't they?? Like budgies? or a little bigger??

[Laraine]

I've got a Cinnamon and a normal, but haven't tried to breed with them yet, haven't had the room to separate them, is it still breeding time for them?

[avinet]

Nov 25, 2010 22:51:57 GMT 10 jusdeb said:

Id say split , there were others from the same clutch with more visible yellow wing feathers but I wanted one that looked normal .
What colour types would they throw ?

Pies is a recessive gene so both parents have to carry the gene, either as splits or visually. So, assuming the female is not split to pied, and the male is not split to cinnamon you would get normal, green babies. If the male is split cinamon then 50% cinnamon babies would result, and if the female is split pied then 25% of babies would be pied.

Kakarikis are a little bit smaller than average cockatiels - about the size of a small cockatiel.

Kakarikis can breed almost year round, but by now in Sydney Laraine you would have to watch for hot weather. The only time they will not breed is while in the annual moult.

cheers,

Mike

[jusdeb]

i was surprised at their size once they were in the aviary , bigger than i thought they would be . thanks avinet for that info , i quite like the normals so hopefully they arent carrying too many coloured genes .
just a question please ...if they throw normal coloured chicks are they really normal ie ..would they be considered to be genetically equal to a wild kakariki ?

[avinet]

Nov 26, 2010 12:25:19 GMT 10 jusdeb said:

just a question please ...if they throw normal coloured chicks are they really normal ie ..would they be considered to be genetically equal to a wild kakariki ?

If the male is a pure normal with no splits and the female is a pure cinnamon then any female babies they have would be genetically pure but the sons would be split to cinnamon and hence visually like a wild red-fronted kakariki but genetically not pure due to the split cinnamon. This arises because the cinnamon is a sexed-linked gene which the mother can pass on to her sons but not her daughters.

However it is possible that the male you have is split pied since you mention that others in the nest had yellow feathers so some at least of the females would inherit a split gene. Any bird carrying a split gene cannot be regarded as a genetically pure wild-type bird, eve if they look visually like a wild bird.

Just a note on size - the red-fronted are larger than the yellow-fronted Kakairikis. It is quite common to see birds that are obviously crosses between the two subspecies and while your male looks pure red-fronted, I'm not 100% sure about the female - need a close-up of her head to be sure. I am under the impression that the cinnamon mutation appeared in the yellow-fronted subspecies and was cross-bred into the red-fronted, but it is a few years since I had much to do with kakarikis - I was breeding them in the 1990's when the only cinnamons I saw were yellow-fronted.

I co-wrote an article about them back in 1997 at www.birdsnways.com/wisdom/ww11eiv.htm (the last paragraph I would re-write these days but the rest of it still applies pretty well. A photo of a baby Kak is attached - all my good adult photos are from the 1990's before digital and I can't quickly find them tonight.

cheers,

Mike

Attachments:

[jusdeb]

Thanks Mike , it all gets away on me when it comes to genetics , sadly pure normal Kaks are hard to find around here .

[jusdeb]

Just read your article ( very good read ) and am now concerned about the other birds in the aviary , the Kaks are in with 1 pair Bourkes , 1 pair scarlets and a pair of Quarrion ..the aviary is 3 m x 3 m x 2 m high .
No one has nest boxes at the moment and they are all getting along however I know this can change at breeding time .
Dont know what to do know , I dont want to lose any of the birds .

[Karen]

I had my kakariki in a mixed aviary in breeding season and the only issue was with the male kaks. They left the other birds alone.
I agree with you Mike about the cinnamon being a yellow fronted mutation. Cannot remember when they were crossed to the red but think it was the late 90's when people experimented.
Personally I am not that enamoured with the cinnamon mutations. Much prefer the normals.
Much like the Red Rumps, while the mutations are pretty, nothing can quite match Mother Nature's original masterpiece.

[jusdeb]

Totally agree Karen , even though I am being a bit of a hypocrite by owning them .

[Karen]

I wouldn't call you a hypocrite, they are an extremely entertaining bird to have.
I loved mine to bits when I had them. Even the not hand reared ones tame down easily and you walk in the aviary and they are investigating every bit of you. Pockets are especially liked. I am sure they think there are treats hidden in them!
Absolutely love their sounds too.

[jusdeb]

They are delightful little birds , glad I got them now .