Lovebird living outside

May 16, 2011

Lovebird living outside
by: Linda

No they cannot live outside without supplemental heat for the winter. It also takes more than one season to acclimate birds to the outside and is more like two to three seasons. You will also need an air flow regulator for the hot summer days as well, so this means electricity.

You will need to have an electrician wire your aviary so you can have full spectrum lights for the inside room. Aviary has to have an inside room for resting, and during shorter winter days, they will need full spectrum lights hung in the ceiling. Heat source can be no light emitter light bulbs, and they screw into ceramic light fixtures. The wattage will depend on how large your inside area is and for two lovebirds, it does not have to be too large so long as it is just the two of them. Each pair of birds will need their own roosting space. The nestbox does not need to go in the inside roost, it needs to be hung inside the outer wire enclosure part of the aviary and you can only breed any species of bird once a year to keep hen healthy. So your box would not need to go into aviary until Spring which would be breeding time.

So to recap, you cannot put them outside in Oregon without supplemental lights and heat. I've lived in Oregon, and they will freeze to death during a winter night or they're feet will freeze to a perch in outside aviary during the day. Once feet freeze, they rot off, so you don't want that to happen.

Sorry it will not be as easy as you thought, and they will need to stay inside until you get the aviary up and running. It is not cheap to build an adequate outside aviary, so you need to look into all the various aspects of having a safe, healthy aviary. Rats, mice and snakes will come into a dirt floor, so you need concrete flooring with piping from inside to outside and floor sloping to a drain in the middle. Your outside wire will hae to be put into concrete curbs, so no vermin can enter aviary. Wire needs to be small enough so baby rats, mice and snakes cannot enter through the wire, say 1/2" down to 1/4" is advisable.

Thanks for writing,
Linda

Lovebird living outside

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Lovebird living outside

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