Ask Lafeber

Are my budgies infertile?

Hi!
I’ve had a budgie pair for over a year now – they were both less than a year old when I got them. The female has exhibited several signs of “readiness” for breeding. Her cere has turned crusty dark brown over several months, gone back to white and then brown again. The male has a royal blue cere and looks healthy. However they have a strange relationship. While for the most part, they sit very close together, preen each other and appear to be harmonious, they do fight and never eat or sleep together. He feeds her ever so often but she gets moody and will reject it randomly. Also they express breeding behaviors as he bops his head, and she arches her back but he only gets one claw up on her back and then seems to forget what he’s up to and flies away. This has gone on for months now. They both seem to start the process but give up in just a few seconds or get distracted. I saw him mount her back successfully once but nothing has come of it. She also hasn’t laid any eggs of her own (albeit unfertilized). I wonder what their issue might be.

Diet wise, I offer them a mix of egg food, seeds, fresh fruits and veggies. They also have plenty of privacy through the day.

Hi,

The main problem is the birds are not old enough to breed. They can be hormonal, but that doesn’t mean they are mature enough for breeding. They should be about 2 years old before you pair them and set them up for breeding. Sometimes a pair will bond as companions, but never have a pair bond. But since these birds are still too young for breeding, I would wait to try to breed them until they are both 2. Meanwhile, you need to improve the diet. Seeds are not a nutritious diet – they are empty calories and fat. You need to convert them to a pelleted diet, along with greens, veggies and some fruit. They do not need an egg food until they behave like a breeding pair and start mating – again, when both birds are old enough. And you only feed an egg food when they are breeding and raising chicks.

We do make a foraging diet that budgies readily accept. Our foraging diets contain whole, fresh human grade seeds with the hulls removed. These are combined with other ingredients and all coated with a nutritionally balanced diet, so they have the same nutrition as pellets but are not ground up. Loose seeds have hulls, so any nutrients that are added are lost when the bird hulls the seeds.

Thank you for asking Lafeber,

Brenda