Greetings from North!

[Sequinhaze]

Hello!

I have red these forums allready a couple of times but only now I had the courage to register and start to write. And when I get excited to writing I tend to write long and detailed posts.

My apologies for my english; I come From Finland - a country that is in nothern Europe, between Sweden and Russia. I try to write as fluent english as possible so that you'll understand me better. I can also use swedish or german but I prefer english because I know bird vocabulary in this language more than the other languages (excluding my first language, finnish).

My first bird came when I was only seven-years-old so now I have had avian pets eleven years. At this time I have five cockatiels (plus one that isn't straightly my own) and an african grey. Three of my tiels are the only kinds in Finland: the only two yellow cheeks and the only dominant silver in here. I hope that other breeders will help me to let them spread healthy to our country. I'm also dreaming of bringing more these colors here. Finland has only grey, lutino, pearl, pied, cinnamon and whiteface. I love every single color and I want to tell finnish people the genetics and the abilities of color mutations so that people could understand certain things better. Oh God, how I LOVE to talk about the cockatiel genetics!

I'm also writing the first finnish cockatiel book. Can you imagine that there are plenty books in english but not a single one in finnish?! Not even a tiny one. I also keep a wide website of cockatiels (Cockatiels - Age of Variations: www.neitokakadut.com) but the site is in finnish. Unfortunately most of you won't understand a word but perhaps you can enjoy the pictures. (Galleria is translated gallery and clicking in there will lead to to separated galleries, if you are cockatiel picture thirsting person. )

You are free to add me to your MSN if there's a need or will.

At first I'll give you a little taste of my beloved birds. Hope you like these pictures. :)




And now I'll start to browse.

Best wishes:
Ida-Emilia

[Mud]

Hi andWelcome to the forum! i think you speak very good english. i also think your birds are cute.
how many other languages do you speak?

[Dustin]

Beautiful birds!! Welcome to BirdBoard. Any Questions just ask!

[dgcashier]

I too love cockatiels...Yours are just gorgeous.

[Graehstone]

And a great big welcome from me too!!! I love your birds, they are too pretty as my first Parrot was actually a Cockatiel but my heart now belongs to Greys.
Never hesitate to ask any questions and I am sure you will make many new friends here.

[Stacey32]

Welcome! I think you'll like it here! Your English is great!
Stacey

[Tiki]

Welcome to Birdboard! Hey your English is better than our Finnish! We love meeting people from all over the world here. Your cockatiels are adorable, I have 9 myself, 6 of which are Tiki's babies.

[Sequinhaze]

Thank you all for the very warm wellcome!

Yes, I will ask. Because of my book I need to know certain things about the care of cockatiels in different continental. People have so much different opinions and thoughts about stuff.

Originally Posted by Mud

how many other languages do you speak?

My first language is finnish. Our country is said to have two languages: finnish and swedish but the fact is that most of us speak better english than swedish. That's what it is in my case, too. The second best language is english. Then comes german and swedish together.
So finnish, english, swedish and german. :) That makes four together.

Originally Posted by Graehstone

love your birds, they are too pretty as my first Parrot was actually a Cockatiel but my heart now belongs to Greys.

My african grey was actually my first parrot. It was maybe not so good choise to give a grey to a 7-years-old girl. The bird was wild when he came to us, about 4-5-years-old. We never recieved his papers and at then the knowledge of parrots in Finland was very week. Nowadays the same parrot still lives here and he is quite tame and actually very brave also when there are guests. We named this congo with striking name: Jaco.

My cockatiels are named: Becky, Peach, Vaulderie, Delirium and Priscus. (The guest tiel is caled Minzu.)

[Monica]

Quite an interesting set of names! Curious though, what are your birds diets??? (what food do they get and how often?) Would be good to compare with others!

[Sequinhaze]

For the cockatiels I use parakeet seed mixture, mixed at least with two different mixture, and I offer in times pellets. But I prefer still seeds since pellets are actually not good choice for cockatiels or budgies. Millet, hamp, etc... I can't translate everything. Salad, carrot, potatoe (not very often), corn, apple... Sometimes I offer boiled spaghetti which is good and soft to throw up for chicks and every one of my tiels love it. Seeds are available daily and there is usually something fresh with them. I also give boiled egg with crushed shells for the breeding pairs and sometimes to others.

I use three different eggfood types. One is just normal, one contains fruit pieces and one contains little fishes and shrimps.

My african grey gets more fruits but also seeds. Mostly he gets what our family eats because he usually stays in his stand in our living room so he gets "goodies" (fruits, vegetables) mostly straight from hand.

I give grit only 4-5 times per year to avoid over eating and crop problems. This is one of the things that the world has very strong opinions. One says that you must give grit every day, one says that never give grit... And I'm somewhere in between.