Chris Meistre

Want an easy way to get rid of Ants without harming them?  Use cinnamon!

This morning we got to our bird aviary to find one of the quails having just hatched a few hours before.  It was covered in ants biting them, so Bernadette quickly got them off his little body.  He at least seems fine now!

On closer inspection we found an ant nest on the other side of the aviary.  I didn’t want to use poison because the quails seem to eat some of the ants, and I also didn’t want to really kill the ants.

What to do?  Google obviously!

It came up with a few good suggestions, but the one that seemed the easiest to implement was cinnamon powder.  The rest involved mixing soap powder with vinegar, and other ones that would take too long to implement.

I poured a bit of cinnamon around the nest, and then into the hole leading down to the ant nest.

20 minutes later when I checked, there was not any sign of any ants where they were.  I didn’t expect it to work that quickly!

So if you have a problem at home, just try a bit of cinnamon powder wherever you may find them.  It’s a lot more nature friendly!

This morning Bernadette spent some time taking photos of the quails and their chicks. They came out beautiful. Notice how they look like little chickens!

Quails

Quails

Quails

Check out Raven Photography

Quails

After about 3 attempts from the different quail pairs we have, some of their eggs finally hatched. When I got back this morning Bernadette gave me the sad news that she found a dead baby in the aviary, but as strange as this sounds, it was also good news because it meant that the other quails had probably hatched as well. I promptly went outside and into the aviary to go and search for the little buggers. You could here how they’re chirping and calling for their parents. And then I saw these little things running around. So little in fact that they actually squeezed through the wire we have around the cage, and it’s about 8-10mm wide holes.

The photo is a bit fuzzy, but I didn’t want to bother them for too long. The mother is still trying to hatch out another egg. Currently there’s 3 babies running around.

While I was in the aviary I also checked up on the lovebird babies. The three of them are growing nicely, and they look like naughty children whenever I open the little nest. They just want to get out there. I’m sure that any day now they will leave the nest.

Here’s a photo of about a week ago:

Here is the little guy sitting on my hand today, and he actually ate some of the seed.

On 12 August 2009 I went to checkup on the Diamond Dove’s eggs in the nest in the morning. They hadn’t hatched yet, but I knew the time would be soon. Later the afternoon I went to check again and the first baby had hatched. Cute little thing!

This morning (a day later) I checked again and the other baby had hatched as well.

It’s incredible to see how small they are when they just hatch, and then you can literally see how they grow each day. It’s as if you stare at them long enough you can see how they grow.

It’s been 8 days now. Unfortunately one of the 4 babies did not make it, but the other 3 seem very active and healthy. The one’s eyes is also open now. It’s funny to see how they’re so different in sizes to each other.