Budgies love variety, so get lots of different perches and toys (See next chapter)
Budgies should have natural wood perches. Never get sandpaper perches! Birds have sensitive feet, and sand perches hurt them. My birds have a natural looking perch made of polyresin.
Good perches for budgies
-grapevine (my personal favorite)
-manzanita
-java wood
-Cement
-Pumice
-Thermo-perch
-Rope (unless they are a chewer)
-Snak shak (Edible perch)
-Calcium perch
-Dowel (the ones that come with cage)
-plastic (with caution)
Dowel perches are considered bad for them, but that is not case. Just make sure that dowels aren't the only perches in the cage, also don't make a dowel the highest perch, use Natural perches as the highest perch.
Natural is better and helps keep their nails trim. You should give your bird variety, perches must be different diameters, otherwise they will get bumblefoot (see chapter 'Illnesses' for more).
Rope perches are not recommended for birds that are chewers! They could ingest the strands and that will lead to an impaction and ultimately death. Best to avoid unless you know for sure that your bird will not chew on it!
Caution when getting Platsic perches! I have a plastic perch, I had bought it from petsmart, it's a thick durable one. Don't buy a thin, hollow, plastic perch! I don't have one, so maybe someone who does will correct me, but I think the shower perches (a perch with suction cups to hang in the shower for your bird) is made of plastic. Again, might be wrong about that, someone correct me if I'm wrong. My plastic perch looks like this.
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Also, there are several different types of natural wood you can use as perches, however not all are safe. Do a google search to get a full list of safe and non safe woods.
Top photo is mine, Mango showing off his favorite grapevine perch.
