Budgies Anatomy

Budgie Body Parts 

Your budgies body parts are marked on the picture below. It is very useful to know what is what, and where it is!

A few notes on the external body parts:

Beak - this made up of two parts, the upper and lower mandible. The upper mandible is the top part that you can see most of the time. Your budgie is able to move this part, whereas the lower mandible is the bottom part of the beak, which is unable to be moved. The beak is made of keratin over bone. The keratin has blood vessels and there for is alive and has feeling.

Cere – this is an area of tough skin above the beak that surrounds the nostrils. In adults it is usually smooth and blue on males and rough and brown on females, however this differ in a couple of varieties.

Cheek patch – this is the triangle shaped patch of violet, grey or silver feathers below the eye on the cheek.

Ear coverts – the feathers that cover the budgies ear

Eye – budgies eyes have a pupil (central dark circle) and an iris (the white ring around the pupil. In some varieties the pupil appears plum coloured or red, and the iris can be black making the budgie appear to have no iris ring but solid black eyes.

Feet – budgies have four toes arranged with two pointing forward and two backwards. This is a feature common to all parrots.

Mantle – the area of feathers in a triangle between the top of the budgies wings.

Mask – this refers to the area of the budgies face, below the beak. Specifically the area that is yellow or white that stops just below the spots.

Rump – the rump is the area above the tail on the budgies back, you will find a gland here called the uropygial or preening gland. The budgie will rub it with its head and beak to collect oil from the gland, and then transfer it to its feathers which provides waterproofing.

Tail coverts – shorter feathers at the base of the tail, as seen in the diagram of feathers.

Throat spots – these are the round black spots arranged along the base of the mask. In wild type and small pet budgies there are often six small spots. In larger show type budgies these have often increased in number and size and have an elongated shape. Also in some varieties they may be altered.

Vent – this is basically the budgies bottom, also called the cloaca. They have a single hole that expels all waste, and is also used in mating and egg laying.

Budgie Internal Organs

Here we have an image of a parrot with its insides out! It is a not actually a budgie but the details are the same so we can use it to explore the budgie internal organs, and get a better understanding of our budgies and how they function.

Here is a brief description of budgie internal organs and their uses:
cloaca - the organ used to excrete waste and to transfer semen during mating.
coracoid - an important bone, part of a structure vital to flight.
crop - a simple sack that holds the food your budgie has swallowed until it is passed slowly down to be digested.
duodenum - the first part of the small intestine, helps digest food.
ear - yes, it an ear... for hearing with...
gizzard - a tough walled, muscular sack that fills with small stones/insoluble grit. Once the food reaches here it is crushed and rolled around with with grit until it is broken down enough to be passed into the intestines for absorption. The gizzard does the same job for your budgie that your teeth do for you.
heart - pumps the blood around, just like yours does.
kidney - carries out many vital functions including removing waste and toxins to be excreted as uric acid.
liver - a vital organ that has many functions including producing hormones, and bile for digestion.
lung - transfers oxygen from the air into the blood stream.
oesophagus - the tube that carries the food from the budgies mouth to its crop.
pectoral muscles - the large chest muscles used to flap the wings.
proventriculus - a glandular part of the stomach that mixes digestive enzymes with the food before it enters the gizzard.
ribs - surround the birds chest to protect the important organs such as the heart and lungs.
small intestine - continues the digestion of food and absorbs most of the nutrients from the food.
testis - produces sperm.
tongue - used for tasting and manipulating food... and toys!
trachea - the tube that carries air to and from the lungs whilst breathing.
ureter - carries uric acid from the kidneys to the cloaca.
vas deferens - a tube for transporting semen from the testes to the cloaca during mating.
vent - external parts ofthe cloaca, effectively the same organ.