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From: rcb33483@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (R C. Buchmann)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: Another question regarding budgies
Message-ID: <1989Oct31.033744.23404@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu>
Date: 31 Oct 89 03:37:44 GMT
References: <8910291210.aa15790@BONNIE.ICS.UCI.EDU> <2494@cbnewsl.ATT.COM>
Sender: paul@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (Paul Pomes)
Reply-To: rcb33483@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (R C. Buchmann)
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Lines: 25

In article <2494@cbnewsl.ATT.COM> nora@cbnewsl.ATT.COM (nora.y.mclaughlin) writes:
>loves it, especially when he is getting new feathers.  By the way, does
>anyone know what that is called? (getting new feathers).

Every bird goes thru a period at least once a year called the _molt_, where a
birds sheds it's original plumage and grows a new plumage.  Some birds, such as
ducks, do this in large sections--they lose all their flight feathers at once.
Others, such as songbirds (and budgies) shed their feathers more gradually.  
Generally the molt is like growing permanent teeth--the new feathers force the
old out of the follicles of the skin.  The effect is something akin to a rash.
In the wild, some birds, such as the house sparrow, take dust baths to help
this along.  However, you apparently serve the same function to your pet.
To your budgie, this is the same as a deep massage or a loving back-scratch,
because for some birds, the skin gets quite irritated during the molt.  Note:
some pet birds feel the molt more than others--some pets don't like to be 
scratched even during their molt, as you indicated. 

 
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R. Cody Buchmann                             ^.^  
   "Kehaar"                 

email: rcb33483@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu       "Now I fly for you..." - Watership Down
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