Daytona is a red-headed normal male gouldian that I handfed in September 2002. (OK - we didn't know he was a boy when my nephew named him "Daytona".)

I had called an end to breeding season in the aviary at the end of August and removed all of the nest boxes. But that didn't stop my champion egg-layer, Lucille, from laying "just one more egg" in a potted plant.

I gave the egg to a pair of caged society finches, and being societies, they sat on it. And being societies, they decided that one egg wasn't enough, so they produced 4 more to keep it company.

Daytona hatched right on schedule and he grew quickly as his foster parents kept him well fed. A week later, his step-brothers and sisters hatched. Now there was a problem. Daytona was huge compared to the tiny society babies. I was afraid the tiny babies would be squashed by Daytona, so I removed him and became his new "mommy".

Hand-feeding him was surprisingly easy. Daytona loved to eat and would gladly open his mouth for a syringe any time I was near.

Daytona is a very happy and active little bird. His "home base" is a flight cage with my other tame birds - 3 parakeets and a cockatiel, but much of the time the cage doors are open. When he's out, he flies around at roughly 100 mph, then comes in for a landing on my head or shoulder. He "checks in" with me about every 5 minutes and we have a little conversation. Then he's off again to have some fun with his parakeet buddies.

He sings and dances for my male parakeet, Juneau, and he's currently building a nest behind my neice's photo on our fireplace mantel. He's using dead leaves (no shortage of those on my house plants) and loose hairs that he yanks out of my head.

He loves bath time - almost every day he flies to the kitchen sink and waits for me to turn on the faucet.

Daytona is a joy to have around. If you would like to see more photos of Daytona and my other hand-tamed finches, go to my website at: http://www.geocities.com/finch1313 & click on "My Tame Finches".

Article © Susan Merchant 2003