Brief Information About Budgie Colors And Budgie Varieties

I still remember that time when every budgie i looked at seemed to be a special and mixture of colors.As i learnt more I found out that there was a pattern to those pretty mixes.With effort you too can identify beautiful budgie colors and their varieties that make them look unique.

Wild Budgies

Let’s start with the ancestor of all our lovely budgies, “The Wild Budgies”. Wild budgies normally are in one color and one variety.All all our pet budgies colours have come from there. They live in flocks that reach hundreds of thousands in good years, breeding clutches that are normally 6-8 chicks in size and creating flocks that are a marvel to behold.  They all are in light green color.They are very beautiful.

Wild Budgies Colors

As i mentioned the body color is a pretty light green with a yellow face.On the edge of the face ,there are six tiny black spots and sitting over the outer of these on every side is a violet cheek patch.They have black and yellow stripes from the fore head and down to between the wings.The wings feathers are in blackish color with yellow edging.The long flight feathers are in blackish color with a thick yellow bar,which is visible when the wings get extended.The long tail feathers are in dark teal blue color,with the tail coverts having a thick yellow bar through them.The eyes have a black pupil covered by a white circle called the iris ring.The colors of leg and feet are grey.A male budgie can be rocognised by the smooth blue cere.Female has a brown,normally rough cere( flesh around the nostrils)

The young budgie is very similar, but the yellow and black stripes (called barring) starts at the top of the beak rather than the forehead. The juvenile budgie has a pale pinkish, sometimes bluish, smooth cere. Their eyes appear solid black due to a darker iris ring.

Captive Budgies

If there was only one type of budgie in the wild, how did we end up with so many different budgie colors in captivity?In all living things the process of mutation occurs. If a mutation occurs in the sex cell of a budgie the cell that is passed on during it can have an effect on the new born chick. Now, this is likely to cause death, as most genes are vital exactly as they are, but occasionally you get a mutation that alters something not life threatening, like the color of the feathers. And in captivity we are able to protect these birds .We can breed more of them, leading to much more variation than you could get in the wild budgies.

Basic Body Colors

The best place to begin learning is the body color of your budgie. I mean the color from its chest down to its vent and around under the wings and on the back. 

As we know that the wild type budgie has green body color and a yellow face.  These colors are caused by melanin and psittacosis – two types of pigment.  Melanin is responsible for the blacks ,brown , grey and other dark colors that you see on a budgie, including blue.Psittacosis gives the yellow pigment. This means that a green budgie is actually a bird with blue body color and yellow over it. This gives a yellow head.As there is no blue there and a green body.Where the yellow covers the blue. So budgies are not actually blue or green, they are normally all blue but with yellow or without yellow!

Once you have study about the body colors. You may want to learn about the budgies varieties The variety of a budgie effects the color and position of the markings.

Budgie Varieties

I am sure you have noticed that there is a huge array of budgie colors.So now let us look at the budgie varieties.

What is a Budgie variety?

Sometimes a mutation happens that alters the color or pattern of a budgie’s markings.If this is able to be passed on to new chicks it can become a new variety. The variety is different from a budgies base color. It can occur on any color and is basically overlaid, so budgie is described by its color and its variety.

The Normal Budgie Variety

Normal term is used for budgies whose markings match with the wild budgies.The budgie can be any of the basic body colors, but so long as it has the wild type markings it will be of the normal variety. So you can have skyblue normal, grey normal, dark green normal…. etc.

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Varieties with markings that are not wild type black

There are several varieties which have markings that are not black.They are as follow

• Cinnamon
• Fallow
• Lacewing
• Brownwing
• Brown markings

Non existent markings

• Grey wing
• Dilute
• Clear wing
• Faded

Varieties with the pattern of its markings different than a normal

There are some varieties which have marking patterns that are different from the normal:

• Black face
• Opaline
• Spangle

Pied Marking varities

• Dominant Pied – another name is Australian or Branded Pied
• Clearflight – another name is Dutch Pied
• Mottled – it is not an actual pied,however looks like one

Budgie Varieties With No Markings

If you have a bird that you think belongs to one of the budgie varieties with no markings and no body color .The bird is just white or yellow . Then there are three varieties they could belong to. These are the

• Inos
• Double Factor Spangle
• Dark Eyed Clear

Inos – Albino and Lutino

Ino is the name for the varieties that have had all the melanin .The substance that produces all the colors except from yellow and white. This means if you have a blue or grey bird you will end up with a white one, and if you have a green bird you will end up with a yellow one.

White ones are called Albino

You can also buy these budgies varieties ,if you do not like the above one.They are:

• Yellow Face or Golden Face
• Clearbody
• Crested
• Anthracite
• Saddle back
• Dark wing

Conclution

Keep one thing in your mind,that many budgies are a mixture of more than one variety.Combinations are so many,which is very difficult for me to list them all here .

I tried my best to provide you with all the knowledge i knew about budgie colors and their varieties. Hope you like my article and gained info from it.Please do share it on social media and with your friends,may be they are looking for such info as well.

Thanks for landing on my page.

You may like https://birdandbeyond.com/all-you-need-to-know-about-your-budgies-aka-budgerigar/