Vicious Hen

[Roach1989 0]

Hi guys I am new to the forum and breeding budgies really.

 

A little background before the issue, sorry if it's long.

 

We have had a bonded pair for three years and one day they decided to start mating (this wasn't our intention but we were excited).

We got her a nesting box and off they went. She has had three clutches so far of around 8 eggs each time (around 4 hatch and survive). The reason we let her have the third clutch is because she keeps laying more before the last chick from the last clutch has left the nesting box. My friend is Libby I think she used to be a member here? Anyway she told me how to fix that problem because she is probably exhausted and needs to rest for a while before breeding again.

 

Anyway one day randomly I heard a commotion from one of the cages (the one that had her and the cock as well as 4 babies that had left the nest, about a month old, as well as all the new eggs she is laying). I went outside to see her and the cock fighting like mad, I noticed blood on and around her beak and none on him, took me a minute to notice one of the month old babies sitting in a corner bleeding like crazy from a wound above her ceres and a cracked beak. Strait away called Libby, she said remove the baby and put her in another cage with the older babies we have (4 months) and clean with warm salty water, etc etc keep an eye on her. after a while we put her back in with mum and dad cause she wasn't eating just sleeping and mum kept trying to preen her and feed her so we thought all was well. Next morning mum wakes me to tell me mum is attacking again, as well as repeatedly trying to attack another baby. We removed her and dad and put all babies in together. All was well until.............

 

Yesterday! Mums friend was buying one of the babies from the most recent clutch. We didn't want to get them mixed up and sell one we wanted to keep (as 3 were almost identical) so mum said move the one we wanted to keep in with the mum and dad. I said no because the mums crazy and we should instead put it in the spare cage until her friends came to pick one up. Anyway mum insisted and I said you better keep an eye on them all day. I went to work and came home around 330. Mums friends rocked up and I heard mum going OMG. Ran out and the budgie we put in with mum and dad was barely breathing, face covered in blood (way worse than the first one she attacked), lying face down on bottom of cage, bloody feet. Etc. Mum was covered in blood like a vampire and had injured foot, and dad had injured eye. Mum said its cruel to keep it alive and asked her friends husband to euthanized it. I was soo angry as I wanted to take it to the vet or try help it and stormed off. Needless to say it was euthanized and I feel sick. Can't get image out my head. It was my baby from the first clutch .

 

I know won't put any budgies in with her again. I am worried about the new clutch, they haven't started hatching yet but will she attack these? I think she may just be exhausted. Could the little one of been saved? My friend reckons it could as its beak was intact.

Why is the mum doing this? Do you think the dad was in on it too?

 

Sorry this is soo long!

 

Rochelle

[Nadene 0]

Hi and welcome to the forum.

 

Wow what a terrible thing to happen I think she has just had enough. You will have to be prepared she may attack these chicks if they hatch but if she doesn't and all goes well I would be taking the hen out when the chicks are about 3 weeks old and let the father raise them.

 

Good luck

[Kaj 0]

Hi Rochelle,

Sorry to hear about your sad story and terribly sorry for your loss. Like Nadene, I would consider removing her when the chicks are 3-4 weeks old or perhaps when/if she starts laying. If she does lay, you will need to throw out any eggs unless your friend has a clutch you can add them to. Nobody likes discarding fertile eggs but you will have to do it for her sake. Once you have removed her, check that the dad is feeding and not hurting the babies- check their crops and / or weigh them on digital scales. I had a dad once that was attacking mum and so she had all the blood on her. If dad is hurting the babies you may have to put them in a separate (non breeding) cage with mum checking that she is not also attacking but feeding them. If all else fails you may have to resort to hand rearing.

Good luck and take care.

 

 

 

 

 

[PJI 0]

Remove the cock & allow the hen to hatch & raise the chicks on her own.

[Roach1989 0]

PJI why do you say remove the cock? Do you think he is doing this? He always seems to stop the mum?

[PJI 0]

I may be reading your post wrong, but I assume you are cage breeding ?. If that is the case & your pair is laying there third round of eggs with four one month old youngsters in the same cage ,this is not a good scenario. You have to get those one month old youngsters away from the breeding pairs as soon as they start cracking seed & let the pairs get on with it un interrupted. What is probably happening is the hen is getting aggressive towards the one month old chicks being in her breeding space, & maybe the cock is trying to protect them from the mother "who knows".

[Finnie 0]

How long have the new eggs been in the nest? Because you do have the option to throw away the new eggs and take the nest box away. If fertile eggs are fairly far along in development, then I hate to toss them, but if the newly fledged chicks are just one month old, then your hen has probably just started laying. If there are only two or three eggs so far, then they have not had much chance to develop yet, and you would pretty much just be throwing away yolk.

 

Any time you breed a clutch, when the chicks start to fledge, you need to keep an eye on how the parents are going to behave towards the chicks, and be prepared to take away one or both of the parents. Depends on which parent is objecting to the chicks.

 

I have had mothers who are happy to allow the older chicks in and out of the box while she is incubating the next clutch, and I have had it the other way where the mother will attack any older chicks in the cage. I have also had a mother protecting her chicks from the father who was doing the attacking.

 

I'm sorry you had to experience the worst case scenario.