So two months ago I bought some zebra finches. While they do go against my standard pet rule, easily handleable, they're cute, and require less attention then some other choices. I bought a pair with the intention of letting them breed at least once so I could have a small group rather than just one pair. I may or may not swap some of the babies with others just so I don't have a group of all related birds. They had four chicks that just left the nest this weekend. I've been planning out their cage a few times and settled for the largest one that can fit in my living room (it actually can't fit out of my living room with out being disassembled...
They've been living in my old cockatiel cage, which I realized in two days was much too small to let them fly as much as they want, a 30" x 18" x 36" dome top... The new cage is 5' long by 30" deep, by 3' tall. This is roughly 4+ times the interior space. The top has plexi doors so I can see the birds without wire in the way which they should learn not to fly into (the adults were from a store that had glass fronted cages, and they seemed to figure it out easily, I'll probably drape something over it for a while to keep it from being an attractive exit), and the bottom wire. The sides and back are solid at the moment, which will supposedly keep them calmer, though they mostly ignore the dogs anyway, and the top is wire for ventilation and so I could add lights or heat lamps in the winter.
Awful cell phone pic of the birds through their thick wired cage.
