Hi all,

 

Last year in my breeding I had 2 hens share the same box and they raised 7 chicks the first round and 4 the second. I have placed my boxes back into the aviary a couple of days ago and the same 2 females are in the one box again, and also 2 different females that have had clutches before (in a box by them selves) are showing the same behaviours by sitting in the box together and preparing their box.

 

Anyone else have any strange things like this happen before?

How' has them sharing a nest box worked out so far?

The 2 that had shared a box before laid 7 eggs, 1 hatched yesterday but died and another has hatched today and seems to be doing well.

 

The 2 that have never shared have laid 8 eggs with the first to hatch sometime next week, not all eggs look fertile but I think there should be around 3-4. I don't candle the eggs but I can tell the fertile eggs just from looking at the shells after about 10 days.

 

It's quite interesting the watch how they go about sharing the box, for the first pair, 1 hen constantly stays in the nest while the other hen occasionally goes in and sits on the eggs. She protects the front of the box more than incubating, she will also jump out of the box when I open the lid while the other will stay in. With the second box, both hens stay tight on the eggs and won't move even when I inspect the box, I pretty much need to push them out of the way to see the eggs.

I wonder if the second pair of hens learned the behavior from watching the first pair raise chicks last year. Maybe they don't realize it's abnormal.

 

There are a lot of horror stories about colony breeding, but that is what mostly gets talked about. Obviously, there are bound to be a lot of success stories as well, that we don't hear as much. And not all budgies are going to fit in the pattern of what's normal. It sounds pretty cool that you seem to have a flock of cooperative hens.

yeah I've heard of the things that can happen when colony breeding, thankfully nothing drastic has ever happened. I've had the odd scuffle in the aviary but if you watch carefully you can usually tell which is the trouble maker hen and remove her early.

 

You see some amazing things when housing the birds together, I also keep a couple of cockatiels in the aviary with the budgies and surprisingly some females allow the cockatiels to help raise the babies.