Main

 
Davis Lund Aviaries - Honeycreepers
Native Land: Central & South America
Native Habitat:  Neotropical, forest
Classification:  Order Passeriformes, Family Emberizadae, Subfamily Thraupinae
Diet:  fruit, nectar, insects
Ratings:  Care - difficult, Space Requirements - small, Pet Quality - none, Voice - Quiet
 
Living Jewels
 
The tanager  family of North  and  South America boosts some of  the most beautiful of all the  creatures.   Included  in  the  family  are  honeycreepers  or sugarbirds, dacnis, and euphonias.   Most are small, about the size of a sparrow.  Many can be kept and bred in mixed  species  aviaries. There are five species of honeycreepers.  The male Purple Honeycreeper  (pictured above)  is  a  gorgeous  deep  bluish-purple while the female is basically green.
South American jewels, the honeycreepers, are occasionally available, with the Yellow-legged and the Red-legged species the most popular and colorful.  Smaller than a Zebra Finch, they have long, slender bills adapted to sipping nectar  from  blossoms.   None of the honeycreepers can be considered good birds for beginner softbillers as they require a  specialized  diet  and  are  temperature sensitive.  With attention to these two factors though, these birds can prove to be reasonably hardy once acclimated and will breed in captivity.  At the Davis Lund Aviaries, we currently keep the Yellow-legged species.
(right)  The male Yellow-legged or Purple     Honeycreeper,    Cyanerpes caeruleus, is a beautiful bird that keeps his color year-round.  Purples are very  active, and both sexes serenade each   other   with  quiet  songs.   They have been known to be fatally aggressive if one is ready to breed, and the other is not.
All honeycreepers are sexually dimorphic although in some species the male will look like the female when not in breeding plumage.  The females are beautiful birds in their own right with a basic green overall color such as in this female Purple Honeycreeper.  Males have  a  slightly longer bill    also.     Juveniles   have the female coloration.
Although small, honeycreepers can be pugnacious, especially when breeding, and often do better housed by themselves.  They like large, well-planted enclosures.  They are very sensitive to temperature changes and do best indoors.  If placed outdoors they should  be  put  in a heated enclosure during cold and winter weather.
Honeycreepers     have     very  loose  stools,  even for a softbill, and will also fling   their  fruit  off  their  beaks and rub their fruity beaks on the cage and perches to help clean the bill.  Perches and cage walls  become sticky in very little time.  Owners must  be  vigilant  in  cleaning the entire cage and perches frequently to lessen the chance of bumblefoot and other bacterial infections.  In the house, surrounding walls will get dirty also.
Special  attention  needs to  be paid in feeding  these guys, and they are not birds for  those    people  that are too busy to spend extra time with them.  They cannot eat anything that is too big or too hard.  Iron storage disease has been known to  affect  honeycreepers so  the  amount of iron in the diet needs to be watched.  In the wild, they eat soft fruits, nectar, and small insects.  
 
We feed ours by taking a finely chopped (I use my fingernail to chink up the pieces) portion of our basic softbill fruit and vegetable mix (see Softbill Diets) and mixing this, 1:1, with a commercial diet to make a moist crumbly mixture.  We rotate the brand of our commercial diets  every  other  day,  using   the Universal Food by BEVO, Bugs-N-Berries by Avico (Cuttlebone-Plus),  and  Lory  Special Pellets by Pretty Bird.  About one half an ounce of liquid  nectar  is  given  daily  per pair in a separate cup.  Livefood such as white worms, fruit flies,  and  mini-mealworms  are  given  at  least  once  a week, although daily when breeding.
 
Honeycreepers  will breed given privacy, lots of livefood, and preferably a planted aviary.  They  will  build  their  own cup-shaped nest, use open fronted nestboxes, or sometimes open  finch  baskets.   Cobwebs,  rootlets, grasses, and small leaves may be used.  Two eggs are laid.
 
The following are recommended for more information on these birds:
 
1.  Vince,  Martin.   Softbills - Care,  Breeding  and  Conservation.    Hancock House          ...........................Publishers, Blaine, WA, USA.  1996
 
2.  Pierce, Marie.  "Mr. Red-legs."  The A.F.A. Watchbird.  Volume 10, Number 4.  ...........................Aug/Sept 1983, Pages 4.
 
3.  Rioux, Kimberly J.  "Breeding Honeycreepers in the Living Room."  The A.F.A. ...........................Watchbird.  Volume 26, Number 5.  Sept/Oct 1999, Pages 46-47
This site  presents  material  for  your   information,  education,  and  entertainment.  All photographs were taken by the Davis Lunds.
All photos and text are property of the Davis Lunds.
You may not copy, distribute, modify, reuse, or transmit any portions of this site for commercial or public use without written permission from the Davis Lunds.
Copyright 10/98