Red-Crested Touraco (Touraco erythrolophus)

Sorry, we no longer breed birds.

approx. size: 16 inches/40cm	native to: east Africa	available season: summer-winter
min. cage size: large flight, preferably outside	talking ability: none	price: $500.00

This species is a true frugivore and should be fed a large variety of fresh fruits including grapes, papaya, figs, apple, melons, platano bananas, and berries. They should also be fed a high-quality mynah pellet and their food should be dusted with a vitamin-mineral powder formulated for birds. Babies are hand-fed with a parrot hand-feeding formula mixed half and half with pureed ripe fruit (papaya is best).

Chicks wean between three-four weeks of age but continue to grow quickly after weaning. They change coloration as they grow, attaining the beautiful adult coloration at about three-four months of age.

Touracos hatch with their eyes wide open and looking to eat!

These touraco chicks are two days old.

These birds have lovely wings and love to fly. They should be housed in a spacious aviary and their wings should never be clipped. This species is NOT suitable as a small-cage pet. Hand-fed birds are lovely in the aviary and approach the keeper for special fruit treats! This touraco species is non-aggressive with other species and can be kept in an aviary with other non-aggressive species- i.e. finches etc.

At ten days of age, this chick is already sprouting flight feathers!

At six weeks of age, this young Touraco has been fully weaned for over two weeks and is starting to change into its beautiful adult coloration.

This is one of our beautiful breeding pairs. At right, the pair is shown mating.

They make a lovely whooping noise when excited or curious! Our two breeding pairs are housed in large planted aviaries flanking our front entry and they always announce the arrival of someone at the front door!
We love our "watchbirds"!

beautiful Red-Crested Touraco breeding pair in their planted flight on 5/9/05

Species Profiles
All photographs are by Gail J. Worth and are copyrighted.
They may not be reproduced by any method without written permission.