Magpie Keeping .....

How to keep Magpies in an aviary.

Please excuse / ignore this one, if ye not interested. I'm prompted to jot it down simply because of the number of people finding their way here, through Google, looking for advice on how to keep magpies.

 More people keeping them in aviaries the better. They can't do much harm there. They enjoy captivity ~ if treated right. They're interesting and engaging creatures. It's a win, win, win situation.

Ok. Ye want to keep a magpie or two, for what ever reason? Cool. I have done, for some time now. I started off by catching them in a Larsen Trap. and I'd kill the old one, every time I caught a fresh one.

Only, I realised how, once the fresh ones stopped turning up, the last one would live about a week or so, in the decoy cage. As long as I kept it watered and fed it tinned Dog food. Everyone I spoke to echoed similar experiences. Everyone fed their 'Call Birds' tinned food. No one kept their birds long.

Having decided to try and break the mould, first thing I did was start offering my birds a better diet. I gave one a piece of raw, human grade lambs flesh. And that's how I discovered a magpie will exert so much effort on trying to peck a meal out of such flesh, he'll use up the energy he gains from what little he manages to consume. 

Lumps of flesh are no good. Canned pet food is so full of shit, it's little wonder it kills things that eat it.

So, I started trying my birds on fresh, human grade, minced beef. Straight from the counter of my local butcher. Not 'Pet Mince'. Some shit out of the bin, minced. My birds get top quality minced beef. No added salt or other preservatives. Just dead cow. And started living for months in the Larsen Trap.

But, only months. And it was always a relief to see they'd made it through another night and were still in some sort of condition. But, I did note how their condition declined. Tails got rubbed out. Feathers got shabby. Birds became depressed. They just survived, till it all got too much and they gave up.

It actually rather hurt me that, due to lousy service, I was long promising my oldest captive, " Peck, Peck ", a whole new life. His condition was falling away. Shabbier plumage. Thinner body. Visibly weakening. Poor soul keeled over within about forty eight hours of being released into the new Eight foot long, Four foot wide, six foot high, steel framed aviary I bought for him and his more recently caught neighbour. Damn aviary took so long to get here.

But, his erstwhile mate made it. She watched him go and carried on. And she's still out there, in great condition. She actually managed to injure her own leg, within days. I thought I'd lose her as she had to lay down on landing. But, she pulled through. Her leg mended and now I call her " Peg, Peg ", in memory.

Peggie has a new mate. Glorious male specimen I trapped when he came a calling. He settled down admirably within a week. Peg is now so tame, she comes and sits right up by the door when I come to feed them. I could get her feeding out of my hand with a weeks training. But, I have better things to do with my time. I just drop their handful of minced beef on the floor for them.

The mesh is 1" x 1/2". The frame is steel, because magpies, I've found, will peck, peck at timber. They'd reduce a timber frame to a potential disaster in amazingly little time ~ be warned!

They have the expected few branches and bits of foliage, for their amusement and my eye. Most of all, they have a top corner, sheltered from the prevailing winds and rains, by a pair of perspex sheets. 17" long and 10" high. (I'd now consider that the absolute minimum for a pair. Bigger would be better, by far) Above these corner baffles is a sheet of clear perspex about two feet square. They roost in that corner.

Oh; And they Love a bath. Be sure to provide them with a water bowl they can safely get into and have a good thrash about in. Something like a Dog bowl would do, only it'll need constant refilling in the better weather.

My pair eat 3Ilb of minced beef a week. Attending to them is as much a part of my daily routine as my Dogs and horses. Their aviary cost me about £550, delivered into Eire. I couldn't have had one built for less.

Just some things to consider about these intelligent, interesting and rewarding birds, in captivity. Want to know anything more? Just contact me.