The Scarlet-Chested Parakeet

The Scarlet-Chested Parakeet (Neophema splendida) has been sought after for years and during period just after its discovery Scarlet was very rare to aviculture and ornithology. In 1871 Scarlet was almost unknown, but in that same year a pair was received by Zoological Society or London. That pair was said to have bred and hatched one young in 1872. After that date there was little written on Scarlets until 1903 when Cambell in his Nest and Eggs of Australian Birds Vol. 2 wrote a little about them. There seems to have been few or no further documented observations until some 30 years later. Nearing end of these 30 years, reports started coming in. Records show that Scarlets were first bred in captivity by Mr. S. Harvey of Adelaide, Australia in 1932. Then in Holland by Mr. Polak Amersfoort in 1934; and finally in England by Mr. Boosey in 1935, for which he received Avicultural Society's Golden Medal. The Scarlets were first brought into U.S.A. in mid forties. They were then successfully bred by Mr. Dave West in Montebello, Calif. in 1947. Greater numbers of these beautiful birds reached Europe in 1930s. One pair, owned by Lord Gowrie (then Sir Alexander Hore-Ruthven), was housed by Adelaide Zoo before being sent as a gift to King George V of England. Another pair was brought over by late Duke of Bedford and given to Mr. Boosey in autumn of 1933, (the pair mentioned above which bred in 1935). Several years later in 1939 an irruption of Scarlets took place near Wynbridge, Australia and several hundred birds were caught for avicultural trade. It is said that these were nuclei for birds we are now breeding. Today there is no fear that Scarlet will vanish from aviculture as they are breeding freely in America as well as in Europe. Since good descriptions of Scarlets can be found in any book on Australian Parakeets, I have decided to delete it from this article.Young hens are a lighter version of adult females as are males at an early age. The young also have horn colored bills when they first leave nest. Sexing Adult Scarlets are easy to sex at a glance, and it is only when one is dealing with young, not yet in color that problems in sexing occur. It is said that one can sex young Scarlets by wing stripe which is found on underside of wing, and by young males showing a brighter blue in foreheads. This way of sexing is very unreliable and does not always hold true. Two hens in my collection showed no wing stripe since they were babies so I thought them to be males. Since they never colored out and have produced young, I am now sure they are hens. A. Lendon in his article Sex in Australian Parakeets said of wing stripe in Scarlets: the immatures are very variable; some, which appear to be invariably females, exhibiting a marked stripe while in others of both sexes it is Correspondingly it is invariably absent in adult male and quite inconstant in adult female, being well marked or entirely absent. I have found it best to use wing stripe in correlation with other means of sexing in order to get a better idea as to sex of a particular young Scarlet. Buying Scarlets out of color is not a bad idea, as generally price is cheaper per bird and one can buy several birds in order to assure a pair. If one is buying Scarlets in color or just starting to color up, one can be sure of sex, but price is also a little higher. The breeder has had to hold onto young until males start to show some scattered red feathering in chest, which starts to appear at three and a half to five months of age. The male will continue to get red feathers in chest until at about a year of age he is completely colored in his adult plumage. Another means of sexing is Hoganising which is commonly known as pelvic bone test. One takes bird in question and measures with a finger distance between two pelvic bones by base of tail. Usually bird with closest spacing is male, and widest would be female. Another method of sexing is to observe young Scarlets - young males are often more active and vocal than young females. Young males usually fly from perch to perch making several different twittering notes, this being another indication of sex. This same twittering can be heard in adult males during courtship, or before male feeds female. None of these methods are completely reliable alone, but when used in combination with ones mentioned earlier, you can get a fairly good idea as to sex of young birds you have. I have even gone so far as to pull a couple of breast feathers in babies at about two months of age and wait till they grow in. The young male's feathers will grow in with red on them, young female's will grow back in green. Obviously best method is to wait. The young will color up in approximately three and a half to five months, and one can go from there.