Bird Breeding Business Guide

By Addy N.

About The Author:

I had always heard that if you wanted to go into business that you should pick something that you were passionate about, something you really liked and interest you or turn a hobby into a business. So I was highly interested in birds and it had already become hobby of mine so I decided to turn my bird hobby and infatuation into a bird breeding business.

I went to a bird show and won to zebra finches as a door prize. When I purchased my entry ticket to get into the bird show it was also used as a raffle ticket for door prizes. They had a drawing and had called my number off of the other half of my entry ticket and I won these two cute finches.

I still have both finches and they are healthy little birds I keep as pets. I do not breed them because they are not the type of birds I am interested in breeding. They are very common and do not bring much profit.

My next bird I purchased was a parrotlet which made a great pet and are easy to care for. I had considered breeding these birds but as I went to more bird shows I had realized that they were easy to breed, expensive and everyone seemed to be breeding these little parrots. I also noticed most of them were not being sold because there were so many to choose from. I decided that I needed to find a different bird for breeding and I would just keep my parrotlet as a pet.

We got their early and started looking at the items they were going to auction. They had a bunch of boxes with all kinds of different items and then they had some items individually marked on tables. The auction was about to get started so we watched. The individual items they auctioned off piece by piece but the boxes of stuff they auctioned off as a box lot. The boxes were going for a couple of dollars for the whole box where the individual items would sell for much more. It was really interesting and we did have a lot of fun.

While we were driving home I started thinking that what if we purchased some of the box lots and had a yard /garage sale to sell them. I stayed awake all night thinking about it. Two days went by and I received my paycheck from working at the Hallmark store as a cashier. I took $25.00 from my check and decided to give the auction another try. We ended up bidding on and winning something like 15 or 20 box lots. We loaded up the truck with our boxes of junk and headed home.

We started going through the boxes and it was a lot of fun looking through another person’s junk. We cleaned everything up and gave it a price. That weekend we had our first yard sale and we made around $150.00. That was all it took we were now hooked.

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What Bird to Breed:

I came across a little bird called a Lady Gouldian Finch they were absolutely beautiful and I hadn't recalled seeing to many of these spectacular birds at the bird shows I had been going to. I stood and watched for a few moments and realized a lot of people were purchasing these birds and they were quite expensive for such a small bird. I could hear people talking and realized many people could not find the lady gouldian they were looking for. They come in a variety of colors and the females were hard to find for sale. So I realized there was a good demand for the bird and you could Gouldian Finch fetch a good price for them. I knew I had found the bird to breed.

If you take some time going to different bird shows just be observant to what is selling and what people are saying you can get a good idea of what type of bird you should start breeding. Of course how much money and space you have available is the first thing you need to consider. You also want to find a bird you truly love because this will help you become successful and make the work seem a lot easier. When you are starting out keep in mind some birds especially some parrots are very difficult to breed. To give you an idea of why you need to do some research before choosing a bird to breed consider this, when I started looking people were breeding parrotlets and they were selling them for $500.00 but so many people starting breeding them they now sell for $50.00. The lady gouldian finch that I started breeding is a much smaller bird and the basic or standard color bird sells for $50.00 and goes up according to color mutation and rarity. So by the time you get done raising a parrotlet the profit margin is very little compared to the cost of raising a lady gouldian finch.

Gouldian Finches are about 130-140 mm long. Both sexes are brightly colored with black, green, yellow, red and other colors. The females tend to be less brightly colored. This is thought to be so that they are less noticeable when sitting in a nest, while a colorful male can distract predators away from the nest, thereby ensuring the survival of the young. One major difference between the sexes is that the male's chest is purple, while the female's is a lighter mauve color.

Gouldian Finches' heads may be red, black, or yellow. People used to think they were three different kinds of finches, but now it is known that they are just color variations. Selective breeding has also developed mutations (blue, yellow and silver instead of green back) in body color and breast color.

What they Eat:

Finches require a high quality small sized seed. I also feed them millet which is another type of seed which many different breeds of birds will eat. Egg food is another staple in their diet egg food is like a grain type product that uses egg mixed with an assortment of seeds and grains to form a dried crumbled bread type product. Egg food is high in protein which helps replace the insects they would normally eat in the wild to help satisfy the demanding appetite of their babies. Some of the finches will eat worms and protein fruit you can also purchase bird pellets that is meant to be a complete diet type food.

I feed them broccoli, chopped boiled eggs, rice and they really like the grainy breads. You need to have a good water source for the birds. Most all city water has way too much chlorine for these little birds so I strictly use bottled water only and I will add vitamins and minerals plus calcium supplements for the females when they are laying eggs. They have a product called calcium grit that I use also.

Licensing

To sell birds from your home you do not need to have a license, when I started I had a lot of contacts who owned pet stores and some who were licensed bird breeders that sold at shows and this is how I sold my birds. If you stay with bird breeding like I did you will eventually want to become a licensed bird breeder. The national standards that you need to meet to be licensed are outlined in the Model Aviculture Program (MAP).

What is MAP?

The Model Aviculture Program or MAP is a voluntary aviary inspection and certification program for aviculturists. MAP is a non-profit service organization, not a private business. It has been in effect nation-wide since 1990. In the early eighties a plan was proposed for a model state program for pet birds, the National Cage and Aviary Bird Improvement Plan (NCABIP). NCABIP was promoted and discussed within the poultry industry, the pet industry and the aviculture community. Aviculturists noted that the plan would be administered by state agencies and would require rather strict control over purchases and sales, even over advertising.

The aviculturist's facilities as well as the birds and records were to be completely regulated by state agencies or their appointed agents. NCABIP did not address the real concerns of the aviculturists, but rather the concerns of the state and the poultry industry. These concerns centered around disease control and transmission. As a result of this proposed NCABIP, concerned aviculturists decided to work together to design a program which would be beneficial to aviculture. If you would like to learn more about the MAP guidelines you can download the PDF here or go to their link below. Below I have listed some links to further help you in your quest to becoming a bird breeder.

Is It Profitable:

It will take you some time to recoup your initial investment. When getting started you have to invest in your flock, which are the birds you plan on breeding so this can be a considerable expense depending on how many birds you start with. You will have to purchase cages and nesting boxes, nesting material plus the everyday up keep and feeding to maintain your flock and their babies. It is necessary to be able to separate your finches into different cages. I have a separate cages for my male, female and babies. I also have smaller cages with nest boxes attached for when the birds become fertile so I can separate them for breeding. The cages need to be large enough for the finches to fly and get exercise. I would recommend at least a cage that is 5 feet in length so they can fly from perch to perch and I would not put more than 8 birds in a cage that size. You will invest a lot of time in your birds making sure they get what they need to be healthy productive breeders.

The profit is somewhat determined by higher powers. What I mean by that, is you do your best to breed different color birds to try and produce the rarer color birds that will demand more money when it comes time to sell. The problem is this doesn't always work sometimes you will get the more standard colors which are still absolutely beautiful but since they are in more abundance they do not sell for as much as the more unique birds do. So since it cost you the same amount to raise each bird no matter what the color your profit margin goes way up if you can manage to have more of the rare colors versus the standard color ones.

Some breeders will keep their birds together and let them mate in flight and choose their own mates. They believe it is more natural behavior for their birds. The problem is you will lose control of trying to produce the more favorable colors and it is more likely to have injuries to your flock because of the jealousy or curiosity of the other birds.

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About the Mating:

All birds are different but I will explain to you about my lady gouldian finches. The very first bird that hatched for me was the color silver which happens to be the color that brings the most money of the lady gouldian finches. So I felt immediately this was a sign of good things to come. Ok back to the mating, after the birds mate the hen will start laying a clutch in 5 days. They will lay one egg a morning until they have 5 to 9 eggs. The older birds will lay closer to 9 and the younger ones closer to 5 eggs. After the clutch is completely laid they start brooding which is sitting on the eggs. They will brood for 15 to 16 days and then the eggs will start to hatch. When the babies are born their eyes will be shut and they are so small they can't even lift up their heads. The parents have to feed them in the nest until about three weeks go by. After 3 weeks the new babies will have had their feathers come in and their eyes will have opened and they slowly become alert enough to get curious and leave the nest. At this time they can usually fly.

When it comes time that the birds are fertile and ready to mate I choose the birds I want to pair up and put them in their breeding cages. Now this pairing doesn't always work sometimes you will have to choose another male because the two just won't mate. The male will jump up and down and sing this beautiful song to start the courtship. Once the male starts his courtship you can tell if the female is accepting it or if she is simply ignoring it. If she is accepting it pretty soon you will see them go into the nest box because they are very private little birds and will not do anything out in front of you if you give them a nest box. The nest box has a whole in the front so the birds can get in and another whole in the back for you to inspect and keep up with what is going on. You put nesting material in the box and the birds will make it their home just like they would in the wild with making a nest.

Nest Box Society Finch Society Finch

You will run into some problems when breeding lady gouldian finches. First you must have some society finches. Because sometimes the lady gouldian finches do not make good parents you will need the society finches to step in as foster parents. Sometimes the parents will not sit on their eggs or they won't feed the babies so you need to move them to your foster finches that will. Society finches love to raise babies this is what they do so they never have a problem taking over the rolls of parenthood when the biological parents are not capable. These society finches will line up outside the nest box and wait their turn to feed the babies. It is pretty amazing how every living creature has a purpose and society finch's purpose is to be foster parents.

When a lady gouldian finch is born they are basically grayish tan in color and because of this you cannot tell the males from the females when they are born. It takes 5 months to a year before they color up and you will be able to see what you have. If you sell them before they color up which some people do you could be selling a silver that goes for anywhere from $125.00 at the bird shows to $300.00 at the pet shops for $50 dollars. So most people wait to sell their lady gouldian finches until you know what you have.

Selling Your Birds:

The easiest way starting out to sell your birds is either by running an ad in the paper or team up with someone that you have met at the bird shows who already sells birds. You would sell them through this licensed breeder on consignment. The bird shows are not as profitable but they are fun to go to and you get a lot more action so you may make more money selling in a pet store or from the newspaper but if you need to sell quantity you will need to sell at a show. Obviously until you have your own table at the show you will have to share a small percentage with the breeder who is selling your birds for you. But if you are eventually planning on getting licensed to sell at these shows you should start making connections as soon as possible so you can learn the in and outs of selling at a bird show. You will see many people at these shows only sell supplies and feed for different birds. This is another path you can take if you are interested in birds but would rather not breed them. The bird shows in the long run are a much more affordable way to sell your birds. Even though you may receive less for the birds you do not have the overhead of operating a store or running ads every week and setting up appointments to meet people at certain times to show the birds, this becomes a headache after awhile. At the bird show you rent the table for a day or two depending on the show and a few thousand people who are interested in birds will be walking by your table. They have about 20 shows a year here in my area and the tables run between $25 and $50 dollars. If you join your local aviary associations they will keep you updated with each show's time and location. I belong to the National Finch Society, The Suncoast Aviary Society and the Exotic Bird Society. There are many organizations and publications you can join or subscribe to that will give you a wealth of information on bird breeding.

The lady gouldian lifespan is about 10 years. Most people cannot tell how old a finch is because they will appear to be the same from the day they are old enough to sell to maturity. Some birds are closed banded which is a band they put on their leg and this will have their birth date stamped on it. The band also lets you know that the bird was breed in captivity and not a wild bird. This helps people from stealing birds especially parrots from the wild and risking their lives by shipping them to the US to sell. Finches do not have a problem with this because they do not sell for the kind of money that a Hyacinth McCaw would which can be worth upwards of $10,000 dollars. Because the combinations and variations of colors that the lady gouldian come in make them collector's items for those who have aviary's in their home or business. Because of this people who love these birds and have the space for them will see a bird with unique colors that they do not have and purchase it. This I believe will help keep the price and popularity up making it always worth your while to breed these birds.

Some Tips:

One thing that you have to be careful of when purchasing your birds for breeding or when breeding your own birds is that they are not related. You need to pay close attention to not breed brother and sister birds. The best way to purchase your birds for breeding is to use multiple sources. Don't by a pair from one breeder unless you are absolutely sure you can trust the breeder and he is not selling you related birds. If you purchase the female from one breeder and a male from another even going as far as not purchasing from two breeders in the same geographical area will help you make sure you have un-related birds. Than it is up to you not to inner breed your own birds to keep the quality of the bird at the level it should be.

To help keep track of your own birds you can put little colored bands on the legs so you know you won't breed related birds.

They need premium finch food, fresh water every day, gravel, a cuttlebone, perches, fresh fruit, vitamins (the blue-blacked ones cannot produce their own vitamin A, they especially need vitamins in their water), insects (dried or alive), and maybe a few toys for entertainment. Water should be changed every day. Gravel should be replaced once a month and whole cage should be cleaned and disinfected. The Gouldian finch proves to be difficult to breed outside its native climate of Australia but does well when given the right conditions such as a large flight or aviary.

Many mutations occur in aviculture. Yellow, dilute, blue, silver, white and even albino Gouldian finches.

Make sure you have some business cards to pass out at the shows and if you have a website that showcase some of your birds this will help increase your sales. Some people won't make up their mind until after they leave the bird show and will likely call you if they have access to your information.

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