Price for an English budgie

[vidablue]

I want another bird to join our 3. I went to the independent pet store that has hand-fed birdies. I saw and English budgie who is pretty, let's me give him a chin rub, but he is a year old. Got good advice from you guys who said to go for it.

Today I went in and found out he is $95. Is this too expensive for a year-old English? My last English was $65 4 years ago, but that independent store went out of business.

I did get a really nice, healthy budgie from Petsmart (replied to that thread), so I am torn about this big one. I have a hold on him until tomorrow, but I am going to Petsmart tonight.

I am going to name the next bird Yogi Beara to go with Sandy Koufax, Whitey Ford and Willie Mccovey.

Got a cage and an appointment at the vet tomorrow.

Ro :S

[SushiGURL]

He sounds like a sweet budgie! Most stores prices range, but i have no idea about english budgues lol :S

[JuliesGonnaDance]

The English budgies at my bird store only are $30. I've never seen them priced over that.
Possibly because they are "show quality". Though most English Budgies that are sold in shops are the ones that don't have a showing prospect.
It seems way too much for an English Budgie to me. :o

[A-n-M]

They had this beautiful pair of light green spangled english budgies at my petstore for $50 for each bird.

[misslinda]

I know NOTHING about English Budgies, other than what they look like. My question to you is, "Do you want this particular English Budgie enough to pay $95. for him". If so, it's not too much! :)

[allison]

I've seen them for $50 at the lowest and $85 for the highest so It's kinda high, I'd say just go for it though.

[Kerry C]

You are not going to find good quality English budgies at a pet shop.

The birds that are sold to Petsmart are going to be the bottom of the barrel stuff. These places ONLY pay the breeder $10 per bird.

People who breed quality English budgies will NOT hand feed them. Hand feeding stunts the growth and SIZE is what counts for a show bird. You can still pick up really nice male birds for about $30. Male budgies make the better pets. English budgies move slower than "American" budgies, this is because of the solicited breeding these birds have gone through. Hand taming can be done by clipping the wings and working with the birds in this manner. I had some friend in Washing state who were selling English budgies at a bird fair. People kept coming by asking for tame birds. One of the guys clipped the wings of 2 birds and started working with them. In 30 mins they had 2 birds that would perch nicely and step up on their fingers. They reset the price on these birds from $30 to $65 and they sold like hot cakes. Not a bad mark up for 30 mins worth of work!

California and Texas are the 2 largest states producing English Budgies. There are breeders all over the place.

Kerry

[JuliesGonnaDance]

Oh wow! I had no idea they were that much. :o
Guess they just sell them cheap in my local stores. :p

[Meghanxx4]

well all the petstores ive been to dont even sell english budgies only teh maerica/australian kind, but the handraised normal budgies are like 50$ fro normal green or blue colour. no idea how much the 'fancy' coloured ones are. Ive seen english budgie breeders around here and they charge 50-75$ depending on the mutation. so i would say its little pricey but if you really like the bird then gte it it will be totally worth it in the end.

[Bea]

I would spew if i saw a budgie that grossly over priced. :P If it's a show budgie being sold from a pet shop then it's not show quality, otherwise why would the breeder have sold it to a pet shop that's not going to give them much money at all for it? Here most "show" budgies that are sold in pet shops are the same price as all the others ($20-$30). As for being hand fed, i wouldn't let that sway me to pay that much. I didn't pay that for my handraised cockatiel! If you can get a baby budgie then taming will be so easy, without paying 3x as much as you should be for a "hand fed" budgie.

[allison]

This thread reminds me of a story. I went to one of the smaller, better petshops that carry handfed birds a few years ago and there was an American budgie in a cage by itself being sold as an English budgie for $50 when the tame american budgies were only $25. I asked them why they were selling an American budgie for $50 and they insisted me that he was an English. :rolleyes: He was deffinantly not an English though... I feel bad for the poor sucker who believed the sign and bought the same budgie for $25 more.

[Kerry C]

The English budgies at my bird store only are $30. I've never seen them priced over that.
Possibly because they are "show quality". Though most English Budgies that are sold in shops are the ones that don't have a showing prospect.
It seems way too much for an English Budgie to me. :o


I have a friend who paid $1,000/each for 8 birds from a friend of mine. The birds were pure Joe Mannis bloodline (from Germany) She was being pushy and my friend didn't really want to sell the birds she was looking at. She took him up on his prics. She sold way down on her birds last spring and I have some of that blood line and only had to pay $100 a bird last year. I just pick up 7 more of that bloodline 3 weeks ago for $30/bird!

Kerry

[vidablue]

I did think that price was high and the bird is not show quality just like everyone says. Appreciated the comment about not hand-feeding English. Oh, and this is an independent pet store with only birds to sell, not a petsmart. I guess what I forgot to say is that I got 2 different stories about the sex of the birds from the store the 2 times I went to see them Hmmm! The sex of one was not obvious due to the color of the bird, like my current white male budgie.

Vet also said that that seemed like a high price.

Cancelling vet appt and starting over. Went on-line for breeders. Sent an email to the closest budgie breeder and it came back returned. Guess they flew the coop!

Anyone know a reputable breeder in the san fran area?

Want another cutie for my flock.

Ro

:)