A couple of beginner questions.

[Nedley]

Seems to be alot of smart people in here, I have 2 questions that maybe I could get some help with..
 
 First off, I have 3 bobs 2F/1M in a seperate little section of the cage outside, and was thinking about moving another female in with them, that would be 4 weeks younger (they are about 16 weeks) . What will my chances be of her fitting in with them? I know the males are bad about fighting, but didn't know with a group that small, and introducing another female.. if I would run into the same problems of them fighting the new one.

 Secondly, I have about 40 cortunix that are coming up on 10 weeks, and I am just about ready to stop feeding them, and let them feed me instead. Any suggestions on what I could feed them for a week or two to help fatten them up some?, I have been feedin them combinations of flight conditioner, starter, layena blends from purina. Purina used to make a "finishing" blend for just this purpose, but the feed store tells me that purina doesn't make it anymore. I got some cracked corn today to add in the diet, seems to have more fat and less protein in it, but so far it looks like they aren't that interested in eating it, noticing lots of it on the ground below the cage like they are digging it out to get back to the purina blends.

thanks for any suggestions,
 Ned

[CharlieHorse]

On the "bird mixing" subject, my experience would be that the 3 birds you have will attack the stranger, unless you take the correct steps. There have been several different threads on this forum on that very subject, here are the links to a few:


http://shaywood.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=858

http://shaywood.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=712

http://shaywood.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=558

http://shaywood.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=455


No help from me on the "fattening up" subject.

[jchiar]

you can put them toghether  if you seperate all of them for about a week then put them all back  in one cage at the same time

[squirrelhunter]

As mentioned in another thread, I have success with introducing the new birds into the cage in a cage that fits within the aviary. It also depends largely on the sex of the birds being introduced. The dominant male in your aviary may be aggressive or accepting of them. I have a male now that is very hard to acclimate to new birds but I had a bird before that would allow birds to be just dropped into his pen.

[lhamid]

To fatten up for butchering, get some chicken broiler feed (some places call it meat bird feed).  Works great, they will be waddling around in no time!