Chippy

Many thanks Greg I am so excited for you and all those babies. Would love to see some more pictures when you get a chance. Today...one of my hens decided to open up her eggs and investigate the contents....thereby killing some nearly ready to hatch chicks. Another hen on 10 eggs ( all her own ) had her first chick hatch and she threw the chick out of the nest into the breeder cabinet. So I warmed the chick until it was lively and gave it to a hen who was hoping for babies but her eggs were no good. She fed the chick and took it as her own, so I gave her 5 of the good eggs also from the "bad hen" . Here's hoping Oh boy Karen, no shortage of drama and excitement at your place! My fingers and toes are crossed for you too. I'll try to get more picture's on over the weekend. Bye for now.. Greg

Oh Kaz, I'm so sorry to hear what happened. OMG - I was so luck that I found our hens fighting and got good advice before a disaster such as yours unfolded. I can only imagine how you are feeling you poor thing. I know it may not be much consolation Karen, but I do believe that your wonderful selfless advice given in my time of desperate need for it has saved at least one if not both of our fighting hens as well as their 11 babies who are still growing and going strong. My heartfelt sympathy and gratitude go out to you. With all my "budgie love", Greg

Hi Karen, okay - thanks for that. I've tried some photos here- hope they work. Greg

All sounds good Greg. Seems like you have things under control and are very observant...the mark of a good budgie owner All the best with these guys. I think you are doing all the right things and you have common sense and are very clued into your birds. Maybe you can work out how to post some pictures so we can go ga-ga over the little lovelies :hap: PS we love photos here :hap: Oh hi Karen- sorry I didn't get back to you sooner- I didn't find your message till now. Thankyou for your kind words- that was really nice. Well, everything is still going really well- touch wood. I am just so in awe of this wonderful mummy budgie with her dedication and energy. Her name is "Sugarbabe". She has just kept on going so gallantly and the chicks are growing more every day. The older ones are now almost fully coloured and the youngest two are just so sprightly and tall now as they poke their heads up amongst the crowd in there! The male budgie is still being a good bloke helping out as I explained before.The chicks don't seem to have suffered yet thank goodness. I'll just keep watching as closely as I can to make sure Queen (not part of her name but I think she deserves the title) Sugarbabe is keeping it that way. She's a legend and she deserves all the credit. Fingers and toes crossed.The other mummy (as we now think?), her name is "Spidygirl" (pronounced spy-dee-girl), is sometimes pacing on the perches of the small cage I have hung under the eaves of our house. Poor thing is not used to a small cage any more. I hope she doesn't have to be out of the aviary for too long. She doesn't seem distressed when the chicks are calling for a feed. She either can't hear them or just ignores them- not sure which- but she makes no response what-so-ever so I am happy for her about that at least.I'll try to post some photos- they will be from a few days ago so the chicks are bigger now and I knoe the flash didn't work that well for the nesting box photo- it seems washed out- but let's see how it goes. I can always take more later. Thanks again for everything. Regards. Greg G'day Norm- great to hear from you. Thanks for the help with the egg question and the invaluable advice on soft food. I'll get on to it. Another question- in this situation, should I try putting soft food inside the box for the chicks to start eating themselves to maybe save Sugarbabe from having to feed all of them so much? I've already put millet sprigs in as Karen suggested.Great news that you have had the same situations before and all went well. I'll keep my hopes up that our darling Sugarbabe survives the ordeal with all her chicks in toe. I'm sure she is doing a far better job of it right now that I could have done hand feeding her babies. As I said to Kaz, Sugarbabe is a legend and I've honoured her with the title of "Queen" Sugarbabe. You know, she's not a big budgie, she's actually considerably smaller than our other budgies, but I tell you what she's got a big heart and spunk to-boot! I just can't help adoring her for the effort she is making. (sigh) words can't describe it.....All the best Norm, Regards, Greg (Chippy)

Hi Karen. Thankyou for all the tips. I started the soft food you suggested today (grain bread/seed/egg) as well a put millet sprigs inside the box. I didn't know what the egg food was so I cooked an egg and mixed it up with everything else. Is that right or wrong? They didn't seem to touch that food at all today. I have already been feeding greens fresh in both morning and evening. I've used thistle weeds which they adore for the leaf and stalk as well as endive lettuce of which they seem to love the stalk most of all. I have also been feeding soaked seed mix which softens the seed (soaked in water for 1 day then thoroughly washed in a strainer) daily along with their normal seed mix. They love the soaked seed. I did watch the cock bird alot today and it seems that he is more of a help than a hinderance. So far the hen hasn't been distracted from duties and the cock is helping quite a bit by feeding her several times during feeding sessions. The chicks are all strong and healthy today and the youngest two appear to have grown a bit. They have made it really well through another day. Bye for now, Greg

Hi KazThanks for your time in reading and responding to my concerns.The age of the chicks now range from (oldest) about three and a half weeks to just over a week. The oldest are very alert and have colours appearing on very bristly head feathers sprouting up, wing tips and tail tips. They also still have fluffy white down on their bodies. The youngest is still pink skinned without any feather or fluffy down yet.I haven't started hand feeding yet and they are still in the nesting box because thismorning, to my great relief, the mother hen had returned to the nest and has been feeding the chicks even more than normal. I presume she is trying to make up for the work the other hen was doing, who is still out of the aviary.I did try putting the other "nanny" as I called her back about an hour before sunset to see if they had settled down but a fight started within minutes and I had to remove her again. This time they started fighting inside the box (I could tell by the noise) and the "mother" had a bite hold on the "Nannie's" throat feathers and wouldn't let go until I picked them both up out of the box and seperated them myself.I have kept a close eye periodically today on the condition of the chicks and all of them seem to be strong still- even the youngest have their eyes open, are standing up at times and look around when I open the lid. The older ones seem as lively and beautiful as ever. Mind you there is a change and that is that they are calling for feeds more loudly today. The hen is responding well but I suspect that it's borderline as to whether the chicks are getting enough food.Having said that, one super positive development late today at around 4pm is that the hen started to accept companionship from the "Bachelor" cock AND GUESS WHAT.... HE HAS STARTED FEEDING HER. WooHoo!! I am keen to see how it goes tomorrow now that Mum has some help. Maybe she realised that she can't go it alone so decided to make friends with him to fulfill her chicks' needs??Kaz, I am certainly not sure that all the eggs belong to one hen. Doubt has been thrown on this in my mind today as I have now learnt more about it. The more I talk to people and read about it, the less likely it seems because all 11 eggs were laid over a 2 week period. Most people say an egg is laid every second day so the maths says that both hens were mothers. I didn't witness any mating union at all so I can't really say who was mating with who. It just seemed that I had one very romantic pair and the other pair were aloof al best- but hey I'm not even within a millet seed of being a budgie love life authority- so who knows? Anything is possible.I did go to the bird pet store today and had a good talk to the birdkeeper there about my options, but have decided to see how it goes tomorrow before I commit to taking chicks out of the nest. This guy hand feeds 40 chicks all the time and he will teach me how to do it tomorrow if I go that way- but he did spell out the pros and cons very clearly in that I can expect to lose chicks if they stay in the nest with only one mother or if I hand feed them. He explained that injecting formula into the chick's crop carries physical risks ( such as peircing the chick's throat with the instruments or getting formula in the lungs) that even experience cannot guarantee 100% success.I am more prepared to risk leaving the decision to hand feed another day because the chicks are not at all listless yet. I hope I just am right to wait a bit.Thanks again Kaz- All the bestRegardsGreg (Chippy) Hi Shaun,Thanks for the reply. I guess I will have to seperate them before breeding in future. I have written an update below Kaz' reply if you'd like to lookThanks and regardsGreg (Chippy)

:fear HISTORY We have had 2 hens for about 4 years. They were in a small house cage for a long time together but we put them in an aviary early this year ( size about 1.8m high X 1.8m wide X 1.2m deep). I gave them a nesting box in the winter which they used only at night and seemed to appreciate it very much when it was cold. When spring arrived the two hens laid eggs and nested together, sitting on infertile eggs for a few weeks at a time. When the eggs didn't hatch they kicked the eggs out and laid again within a couple of weeks and sat again. This went on about four times. I decided to get 2 cock birds so they could choose to mate and save the frustration and exhaustion of continued infertile sittings. I added two more nesting boxes to the aviary. One of the pairs did get along and the other pair ignored each other. BOTH HENS SAT ON THE EGGS. The other cock has been a bachelor so to speak. To my amazement,within a couple of weeks the mating pair's hen laid 11 eggs and ALL of them hatched!!! The last chick hatched about one week ago. BOTH HENS HAVE BEEN VERY DEVOTED MOTHER AND "NANNY" UNTIL TODAY!!! THE PROBLEM All *** has broken loose this week. The Daddy cock who was a very devoted Dad and ate for and fed his mate all day long for the few weeks since the first hatching got out of the aviary a few days ago and flew away. The two hens continued to mother the chicks happily without the Dad. The bachelor cock suddenly started carrying on with alot of cocky "look at me girls- I'm still here- yeh over here- look at me babes" sort of behavior. The hens took a bit of notice, but not too much- if anything the real mother hen (having lost her mate to the great outdoors) paid more attention than the "nanny". Today the hens had the most horrific fight. They were rolling around the ground biting each other and would not seperate till I rushed into the aviary to seperate them. The poor mother was bleeding from the wing. She can still fly normally but she's obviously shaken and tired. The Nanny had blood on her face feathers. She seemed the be more exhausted because she had trouble flying normally at first but seems fine at present. I took the nanny out of the aviary straight away, thinking that the mother would be best to stay with the chicks. UNFORTUNATELY THE MOTHER HEN HAS NOT RETURNED TO THE NEST TONIGHT. Can anyone please advise me about what I should do next? Shuld the "nanny" go back? Should the bachelor be taken out? Also, is the bachelor cock a danger to the chicks? Any advice would help