Red Billed Quelea

[laurab]

Did you know that the Red Billed Quelea is a agricultural pest on cereal crops in certain areas of Africa?

It is quite possibly the most distructive bird in the world, with flocks of up to 100 million birds being known to eat 500,000 kilos of food a day!!

The culling of 65-180 million Queleas each year has had no obvious effect on the population and crops are still being damaged in huge numbers :shock:

[chris]

all the more for us:lol: beats killing them anyway, and the locals would make money out of it

Chris

[Waxbillman]

there are also perfectly edible so a very good food source for them, that was announced as well.

Matthew

[chris]

good thing there's millions of them then, not much meat on something that small

Chris

[kenny]

hi all
just thought i would put this on here as it is about red billed quelea,my daughter and son in law took me out for a drive today as he was after a new pump for his carp pond the place we went to was supposed to be all about fish plants etc.but the guy who owns it breeds border canaries so he had branched out into selling a few birds and when i got inside there was some red biled quelea for £5 each magpie mannikins lavender finches ,green singers zebras ,ducks chickens and all sorts it made my day i was expecting just to walk round looking at fish and plants and they ended up having to drag me out.the man had a place sectioned of with a bank of cages full of some of the biggest border canaries i have seen the downside was that there wasn`t a price on everything and the staff didn`t know anything about the stock

ken

[Waxbillman]

brilliant, £5 eack sound very good
Matthew

[kenny]

hi matt
they were all a bit on the raggy side though but a bit of tlc would take care of them,they looked like all cock birds to me though hence the price.but the light in there was pretty bad so i may be wrong i may go back on a better day as it has been raining stair rods all day

ken

[Waxbillman]

oh right, that does explain it

Matthew

[kenny]

yeah i would have liked a longer look but they were there to look at fish ,i will have to go back and have abetter look myself

[Waxbillman]

you do that mate.

Matt

[chris]

Hi Kenny,

you wouldn't want to come to a pet shop with me then, i have a good look at everything that's living (except people before anyone makes a comment:lol: )

Chris;-)

[kenny]

hi chris
my daughter and her husband have no interest whatsoever in birds and there was only a few little bulbs in a massive place and they where in all wire cages about 3 foot above me if i had leaned any further towards them i would have been in a big tank of koi carp like i said i will go back when i have abit more time and i will syand on a box if i have to.they had ducks in there and cockerels and allsorts of birds which i never knew where there as i said it started of as a nursery for plants then they started selling koi,but as i said to matt the guy had a section cordened off with a bank of cages about 24 full of really nice border canaries so i can only assume that this guy has took the place over and started keeping a few birds in there you know yourself what us bird keepers are like
ken