Translated by Nick R
If you are an experienced bird breeder or owner, you have probably seen how some of them throw their young out of the nest or pity them, not a nice scene to see.
The truth is that this behavior is very common in the animal kingdom and can have different causes, most of them related to instinct or survival. Keep reading to learn more about them and how to avoid aggression toward the young.
Table of Contents
1. Provide a good diet to your birds
Food is essential for the welfare of birds and their offspring. It includes not only the seeds that are often given by inexperienced owners, but also mixtures, feed, fruits, vegetables, and some supplements such as cuttlefish bones, which will help to maintain the beak size in the case of Australian parakeets or lovebirds.
2. Use appropriate nests for the species
Be aware that not all birds use the same types of nests, although the most popular are the cavity nests used by Psittaciformes such as parrots, parakeets, or cockatiels and the bowl-shaped nests used by canaries and goldfinches.
Remember to provide enough material so that they can build their nest well even if it is already made.
3. Make sure that all eggs hatch at the same time
The incubation starts once the female has laid the egg; however, there will always be a gap between each one of them.
This technique is suggested by experts in bird breeding. To do so, you need to have plastic eggs of the same size and color as those of your bird, so that they can replace the real ones:
- Identify the hours for laying, usually in the morning when the sun rises, it is important that you know this from the first egg so as not to disturb the female so much and cause her stress.
- From the first egg, you should begin to replace it with a plastic egg until the entire clutch is complete, remember to store the eggs in a cool, dry place.
- When the female has completed the clutch (usually 5 to 6 eggs, although they can be less or more) you must now lay all the real eggs and remove the false eggs to start the incubation of all of them at the same time.
4. Keep the nest well placed
The place where you place your bird’s nest should be quiet, according to the cage space, and cause as little disturbance as possible.
In the case of cavity nests, it’s common to place them outside the cage near a door so as not to reduce the space inside the cage and make it easier to check the hatchlings’ condition.
If for some reason you realize that the nest is not in the best place it should be, do not try to move it, as this may cause confusion and stress in the female and cause her to abandon the nest.
Limit daylight hours
Since laying in the wild is seasonal, the conditions to prevent your bird from coming into heat and wanting to lay more eggs will be to limit the hours of sunlight and reduce protein-rich foods such as breadfruit, millet, and blackthorn.
5. Clean the nest thoroughly
Although it is not recommended to handle your bird’s nest too much, whenever you have the opportunity, you should do a little cleaning of the nest (without using chemicals or detergents!), cleaning the feces and the feathers left by the female, to avoid the appearance of parasites.
Deworming
Deworming your birds from time to time prevents them from getting seriously ill, in the case of breeding, it is good that before nesting they are already dewormed to prevent their chicks from getting sick.
6. Avoid constant manipulation of the nest
Don’t check your bird’s nest unless it is extremely necessary, as disturbing your bird at this stage by instinct can cause stress and cause it to abandon its young.
7. Separate the couples
When the behavior is abusive on the part of the male, it is good to separate them with a grid in the middle of the same cage, so that the pair is not completely separated and you can wait for the young to grow up to get back together.
Reasons why a bird may reject its offspring
First brood, first-time parents
When the birds are new to raising, they can make many mistakes not knowing how to act, despite being an instinctive behavior. This is common and you should not worry in most cases, they may eventually stop this type of behavior and can take better care of their young; however, if you feel sorry for them and want to raise them by yourself you can consult the blog on how to care for baby birds.
Lack of food or improper nurturing
In the wild, the mating season occurs when resources are abundant to allow them and their offspring to subsist. However, this season may be permanent in captivity given the conditions in which they live.
If the amount of food you provide is still the same as when they were not breeding, they will probably kill some of their young to survive with the resources they have. It’s essential to be aware of this behavior and to provide enough food.
Lack of calcium
This has to do with the eggs, as in some cases the mother breaks them and eats them due to a lack of minerals such as calcium, which is found in the eggshell and can be supplemented with cuttlefish bones or clean eggshells.
The stress of the female
If your bird’s conditions are not favorable, she may abandon the nest due to stress. Some factors that may influence this are:
- Excessive noise.
- Crowded places with a lot of people passing by.
- Humid places with direct exposure to sunlight.
Because they are smaller than their siblings
Each egg has a different hatching cycle according to the order in which it was laid, so the chick from the first egg laid is more likely to live than the last one. This is due to two factors:
- Larger broods demand more food and the food the female consumes is enough for all of them.
- The larger siblings either kill the smaller ones by accident or manage to push them out of the nest.
New broods
Some birds may start a new breeding cycle after their young have hatched, which makes the females need much more space to lay their eggs, and if they do not have it, they resort to throwing their young out of the nest or killing them.
Sick chicks
The most natural reason why an animal can throw or kill its chicks is that one of them is sick and exposes the others or the mother to contagion, being the most common parasites such as mites or lice, in cases where the whole brood is sick the mother will simply abandon the nest with the young.
Deformities
Deformities can also be a key factor in a female’s failure to care for her young since the young will probably have no chance of surviving in the wild once out of the nest.
Excessive estrus in the male
This behavior is common in breeder birds that are stimulated through the supplementation of estrus. In this type of situation, the male will frequent the female’s nest to disturb her or cause her to leave so he can use the opportunity to kill the young and stimulate the female to lay eggs again.
Excessive cage time
When the hatchlings have already fledged and are able to leave the nest and fend for themselves, they may become annoying to the mother, which will lead to them being assaulted by her and result in fatal scenarios such as death. In my case, I witnessed this behavior, in which a beautiful Australian parakeet hatchling named Josefina, appeared injured at the base of the cage and out of breath because of a fight she had probably had with her mother.
Ways in which a bird rejects its offspring
We should know that not all the times a bird rejects the young it will just kill them, other ways are:
- Throwing it out of the nest.
- Abandoning the nest.
- Not feeding the young well.
Conclusions
Remember that when the female drops a brood it is not always due to rejection, it can happen accidentally by using an inadequate nest, carelessness of her moving in it, or the difference in the size of the chicks that push the others.
Keep in mind that your birds’ actions are not always bad behavior, but rather instinctive habits that they’ll follow no matter how much you teach them, so sometimes you, as the owner, must intervene to ensure a good life for your pets.
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