Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 6:42 pm Post subject: Female on Eggs Died, help?
I just came home from a few days away to find my female cockatiel dead in the nest.She was sitting on 5 eggs who are due to hatch on the 9th Oct. My other pair are sitting on 3 eggs at the moment, can I foster them out or do I have to get rid of them? The male is sitting on them at the moment but not sure what to do about tonight?The birds are in the same flight together will they get grumpy about having 8 eggs in the nest?And will the original father not like the prospect of loosing his partner and eggs?If the female has been sitting on the eggs will they still be OK?Im pretty devistated really as these are the first birds that have layed eggs as we have only had the avairy for about 5 weeks
Thanks heaps Please reply as I dont wont to loose these eggs if nessisary
Princess
Edit: Changed subject title from "help" to one that descibes the subject matter
Admin.
You might be able to get away with putting the five eggs with the three eggs in the other nest. If the weather is not too cold, they maybe able to incubate about 8 or 9 eggs, expect to lose a few though, if all the eggs hatch it will be a miracle.
How far along are the pair with the three eggs? They will probably lay more. If a lot of the eggs hatch, more than five, you will have to remove some of the older chicks for hand rearing as the foster parents will struggle to rear all the chicks.
Thanks heaps!!!
I have moved 4 of the eggs and left the male sitting on one. I know this one will die if the female doesn't incubate but just had a thought that maybe once the other chicks start to hatch maybe I could put the chicks back under the original dad for him to rear?Do you think that would work or do you think that would disrupt both pairs?Like I said Im really new to this bird hobby and not sure what can and cant be done
I have clearly marked the eggs from 1-4 in the order they were layed in so hopefully they may still hatch
I think the female died on sat night or sun morning.When I checked her before letting her go to heaven she had no sign of injury,no egg binding,and no evident worm infestation.Just really curious how she died?
Maybe it was something she ate.I've been putting minerals on their green food every 2-3 days,maybe I put too much.All the other birds look healthy enough and the kaks are as cheeky as ever?
Any thoughts of similar cases would be helpful.
Kakariki sometimes die for unknown reasons and an autopsy is often the only way to determine the cause unless there are obvious signs.
kakariki are generally very good parents and are capable of unusually positive behaviour. You never know, as unlikely as its seems that male may just hatch that egg, keep us posted. He is more likely to feed chicks, but you will have to observe him and the chicks around the clock for a while to make sure that he looks after them.
Sounds like you have done everything you can for the time being. Now is the time to keep a close eye on the entire aviary. Sometimes just being observant from the outside of the aviary will give you a better picture of what is going on. As I said in my other post we found one of our hens had died based on the reaction by the cock bird.
Try not to disturb the nests too much. Now that you have placed the eggs under the second pair let them settle down. Keep your inspections of the nest to a minimum. It is always hard but too many disturbances may mean the second hen will abadon her nest altogether. A very well respected breeder once wrote that checking nest boxes actually does more harm than good and places additional stress on the hen. This makes sense when you consider that in the wild the last thing a bird would expect is a human poking their head inside a hollow tree way above ground level. So try to be patient. Easy said than done. I know.
The reason for the death of the first hen could be anything. As Allen has said an autopsy is the only way to find out for sure. It is always a good procedure to have the autopsy performed if the hen is sitting on eggs as some disease's can be transferred to the eggs and the last thing you want to do is pass this on from any new chicks to the foster parents. Having said that it is also possible that your hen has died from a fright. Hens are very vulnerable when sitting on eggs. Their natural instinct is to stay with the eggs and quite often they will stress and die inside the box rather than abandon their eggs or chicks. It is the motherly instict. If you have been away the fright could have been anything from a rodent in the aviary to a local cat on the roof. It is always hard to second guess and why some careful observations from a safe distance is the best way to try and work out what is going on.
Stay positive and make notes on what you learn from this. You will be surprised at this will help in future times when things turn a bit pear shape. If you have any doubts dont hesitate to ask questions. We are all here to learn and help where possible.
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