I keep finding my 3 week old hatchling on the floor of the cage. He is rather good on his feet, he can even perch!!! he has started to get mad at me for invading his nest. I have 2 x daily since they hatched to change the bedding (a toewl under them) so he should be used to it. Is he telling me its time, I would like to remove the nest from the cage ASAP, as much as I love these babies I don't want anymore. So i'm trying to not rush the little ones but take the nest out before mom & dad get any ideas. Can anyone tell me what to look for, to better adjust my timing? Thank you K

Three weeks is a bit young to stay out of the nest box. How many babies are there? Is the three-week-old one the oldest?

yes the 3 week old is the oldest, there are 2 babies total, the 2nd one is 4 days younger then the 3 week old. I keep putting him back but then suprise baby budgie on the floor again!

You have another 2-3 weeks before the parents might attempt a re-cycle and breed again so leave the nest in for at least two weeks - clearly the other chick still needs it.

 

The parents will start to chase the chicks out when they want the nest again so you will get a clue as to when to pull the nest.

 

When you do you will need to provide some other form of "shelter" for the chicks that is at least as close to the location of the original nest but different enough from the real nest so the parents stop using it.

Some times it is hard to tell you what to do because they are so different. Some of mine start to have eggs before the last couple of babies are out. So I just take the eggs of them and if I have another pair breeding I might give them the eggs. I only block the nest when the last baby comes out.

apparently I have a fast developer, I found the lutino (who is exactly 3 weeks and 3 days old) perching on a perch today!!

Hooray! Blinkie had taught himself how to perch by the time he was 3 weeks...with a little help from me. He also taught himself to scratch behind his ear while sitting on a perch. Quite an achievement at the time!!! At 3 weeks you'll find they may be getting quite clever but they'll definitely still be needed their parents to feed them. So don't take them away from their parents until they're about 6 weeks old...or until they're feeding themselves with no parent feedings. Whichever comes first.

thanks Bea, actually I want to leave them with their parents (atleast their dad) permanently any opinions on this, or will i just run into problems?

As long as your cage is big enough then there will be no problems apart from the usual squabling over perches, toys and food. Glad your babies are doing well.

thanks Bea, actually I want to leave them with their parents (atleast their dad) permanently any opinions on this, or will i just run into problems?

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I did this (kept all my babies). The only problem I ran into was when the babies got to be about 3-4 months old, Rainbow wanted to mate with them. Of course, they had no idea what was going on - they were happy to be still getting fed!! I had to seperate them into boy and girl cages, but everybody usually gets along just fine.

Crikey

A towel under the babies?

I never use nesting material as it gets clogged up with poo

I clean my nesting boxes every 2 weeks the birds need to sit in there poo it?s natural

You will find the mother cleans the bird on her own

Well must go

yes a towel, i didn't exacly plan for babies:). I hung a bed in their cage with a soft clothe like bottom. They decided it was a nest. when the eggs began to hactch I tried to move them to an actual nest box but mom wouldn't have it. so anyway I had to line the bottom with a thin towel which i change 2 x daily because the clothe nest bottom absorbs the poop and mom can't clean it cause it gets stuck.