Hello I have 4 cocktails, 2 males and 2 females. There is only one nest and they are laying eggs but throw them out of the nest. I have seen both males in the nest so im insure if the one throwing them out is the parents or the extra male. They are about a year old. Im usure if they are siblings. I bought from same breeder. What should i do if i want them to have babies?
Hi Milly,
Unfortunately, you have a number of issues here. Since you do not know if they are related, you absolutely should not ever breed these birds with each other. If you want to breed, you will need to get birds from a different breeder to pair with these birds. If this breeder sold you the birds to breed, and didn’t mention this, then this is not a responsible breeder. You should never breed related birds. The chicks can have health issues, genetic issues, deformities and short life spans if the chicks survive. I’m sure you care about your birds, so if you do want to breed responsibly and have healthy parent and chicks, you have a lot of reading to do here. You want to do what is best for your birds, so you need to learn everything about breeding before you try again.
Your birds are nowhere near old enough to have a nest or to be paired up. They should be at least 2 years old before you give them a mate and try to breed them. Females should not lay eggs over and over. It will kill your hens. And young hens especially are not prepared to be laying a lot of eggs. In the wild, they do not breed at this age, and they only breed and lay eggs one time a year once they are old enough. Your birds need to be at least two year old before you have males and females together. I urge you to make some changes to discourage anymore egg laying until they are old enough, and have unrelated mates that are old enough.
You can only have one pair in the cage for breeding. There are several reasons the eggs are being destroyed. Breeding birds are territorial, so when you have more than one pair in a cage, even if each pair has a nest, they will raid each other’s nests and destroy the eggs. Young birds, especially males, have no interest in sitting on eggs. All they want to do at this age is mate. This is why you can’t have your males and females together until they are old enough. The males will develop bad habits like destroying eggs or eating the eggs in order to make the female mate again. Unfortunately, these males have likely been ruined for ever being breeders because once they develop these habits, they rarely stop, even when they are old enough to breed.
While these birds look like adults, they are still developing physically and mentally. They are basically teenagers and are in no way prepared to care for eggs or chicks. By having the males with the females too soon, it caused the females to lay eggs when they are too young. They are at a high risk of becoming egg bound and dying if you can’t stop them from laying eggs for now. They are not physically developed enough for egg laying. Forming and laying eggs is very hard on the females – each egg takes protein and calcium from her system, and requires strong muscles to move through the system and be laid. She doesn’t know this and will keep laying until it kills her. This is why it is important for her to be old enough and on a premium diet. Breeding birds should be eating a nutritionally balanced diet like pellets. A seed diet will not provide the nutrition they need. They also need leafy greens & chopped veggies. Once they are old enough to breed – again at least 2 years old – you offer an egg food, but only when they are breeding. After each clutch, the nest box must be removed and the pair rested for at least 6 months. You should only allow two clutches per year.
Breeding birds is not as simple as giving them a nest. They must be old enough, on a nutritionally balanced diet with fresh greens and veggies, and must be rested after each clutch. You can only have one pair per cage for breeding. The nest box should be attached as high as possible to the outside of the cage. Once the chicks leave the box, you have to remove the box. And once the chicks are weaned, you have to separate them from the parents and find homes for them. You can’t keep male and female chicks together or they will try to breed when they get older. You need extra cages because sometimes the pairs have to be separated. Sometimes a pair will start fighting, or won’t stop mating when the hen is supposed to be resting from egg laying. In the wild, the season changes and they stop breeding. But in captivity, it is your responsibility to stop them from breeding over and over. Even the male can die from exhaustion if a pair is allowed to breed unchecked. You will lose eggs and chicks. Most first clutches fail. Most inexperienced parents don’t feed the chicks at first and let them die. Some parents kill their own chicks. Some birds simply are not good breeders. It can be very expensive, and you can do everything right and still not see any results. These are the harsh realities of breeding birds. It is fun if things go right and you end up with chicks, but usually more goes wrong at first. If you can’t deal with chicks dying or adults dying, then it’s best not to get into breeding. You have a lot to learn about breeding before you try, and again, you need to get unrelated birds. For now, separate the males and females and do not give them a nest of any kind.
You need to do all of these things to discourage egg laying. Keep in mind that to lay eggs, she needs longer daylight, warmer weather, abundant food, and a quiet, private environment. Your goal is to reverse these conditions.
Limit her light to 8-10 hours by covering the cage early each evening
Do not give her anything to use as a nest – no bird huts or tents, no box, bowl, etc. If she decides to sit in a food bowl, remove it and replace with smaller cups.
Do not give her anything to shred such as paper or cardboard.
Rearrange the toys in the cage frequently.
Move the cage to a different place in the room. Move the cage about once a week, or whenever she shows signs of nesting – settling on the cage floor for example. This disrupts her idea of having a stable place to lay eggs and raise chicks.
If you feed a lot of fresh foods, stop offering any for a couple of weeks, and then only offer them in small amounts about 2 or 3 times a week. You can resume normal feeding later when the birds aren’t being hormonal.
When she is let out of the cage, do not let her get in any dark cozy places and don’t give her free roam.
When you handle her, limit any petting to only her head and neck – do not pet her on the body. Only a bonded mate is allowed to groom the body. We can’t be a mate, so touching the body is off limits.
If there is no metal floor grate, then do not use any bedding or paper in the cage tray – leave it bare and clean it daily.
Thank you for asking Lafeber,
Brenda
