Hi everyone!

New to this forum... oh and kinda new to breeding.

Yes ive done my research and have been trying to breed for a few months now, my budgies first clutch, the eggs were fertile and she layed about 4 of them, she was two days into the incubation process and she just ignored them? So i thought classic first mum problems (as i had read about them everywhere) so i put the nestboxes back up a few weeks later. All is well and i think she has layed about 4 eggs, (i dont know as i try to go in there as little time as possible) she is about half a week into the incubation process and i noticed that she isnt sitting on the eggs tonight, just in her favourite position in the aviary which is about a 2 metre flight from the nest box... i dont know if she has been startled by one of our cars because the headlights shine on the aviary probably twice a night as the aviary is next to the driveway. The aviary is only quite small, 2m x 2m x 2.5. There are two males and one female and they both feed her and everything like that so i dont know who the father is. Anyway to the question, if she isnt sitting on the eggs tonight for some reason but returns to them at light in the morning will they be alright? Will they still hatch? The temp at the moment is getting down to about 15 degrees celsius (59 farenheit) and gets to a max temp during the day of 25 degrees celsius (77 farenheit). any help would be appreciated, im a first time breeder and just hoping, not expecting much and trying to learn about these birds.

Read elsewhere about your dilemma -- sorry it is not working out yet. FYI when hens first lay, they may not actually start sitting on the eggs until they have laid two or three eggs. An avian vet once told me that fertile eggs can remain viable for upto 10 days without incubation but I am not sure if this is true once they have started the incubation process.

 

Something to consider for future breeding is to have two or more couples breeding at roughly the same time... Doesn't always work because as you can imagine they don't always breed according to a timetablle but it very helpful when they do. For example I have had one female who constantly had stillborn eggs so I was able to give her some fertilsed eggs from another mum that had 6 in her second clutch and was starting to look like she needed a break.

Hi,

In my experience, a female often doesn't begin to incubate until they have laid all the eggs they are going to. Until then it can seem like they are neglecting their family but the babies still seem to do fine.

 

Hoping that all will work out for you.

Katie