The Making of the Outdoor Aviary

That is my brother Joe working on the suspended cage that is attached to the main aviary. This suspended cage is where we will feed and water the birds without having to go inside the main aviary. This will minimize our intrusion into the birds privacy so they will not be disturbed and hopefully, they will breed and multiply in this colony setting.  Underneath the suspended cage, there is a 4-inch space wherein we can slip a tray that will catch all the food that will drop from the feeding area. This should minimize the entry of unwanted creatures coming into the yard because they will not find any food scattered around the aviary.

We were debating at first weather to build a suspended cage for the birds or to build a full aviary. The advantage of a suspended aviary is that the birds will have less exposure to bacteria from the ground whereas with a full aviary, the birds could get down to the ground and may come in contact with harmful bacteria. Anyway, we chose to build an aviary in the end because we liked the idea of breeding the birds in a colony setting. We are not very particular in producing a specific mutation anyway because to us, they all look beautiful.

 In making the aviary, we used mostly 1 1/2- inch angle bars and flat GI sheets for the roof. We poured concrete on the floor to hold down the angle bars so the house will not be blown away during a storm. Then we enclosed the walls with a gauge # 16 welded wire mesh. Unlike the rabbitry and the chicken coop wherein we used a lot of scrap materials to cut down on the costs, we bought all new  materials for the aviary. The cost of materials was expensive but it was all worth it.