Ask Lafeber

Are budgies ready to mate?

I have 2 pairs of budgies who are over a year old and should be the right age to mate. I have put both pairs in one breeding cage (was this my first mistake?) and added two nest boxes (was it too soon?). However, birds don’t seem to be bonding at all. The females seem to be more bonded between the two of them.

Should I leave just 1 pair in the breeding cage? Or should I let them all back in the big cage, and if I see some form of bonding, I put them back in the breeding cage? In the big cage (with no nesting boxes) i have a male and female which seem to have bonded but I am not sure whether they are 1 year of age so I don’t think I should place them in a breeding cage for now, right?

Hi Nadia,

They really are a bit too young still for breeding. Just because they can breed, doesn’t mean they are ready. Captive bred birds become mature at a much younger age than in the wild, and they are really not ready for breeding. I would wait until the females are closer to 2 years old and the males are closer to 18 months old.

When you do set them up, you need to only have one pair of birds per cage. You should not give them a nest box right away. Wait until they are showing signs of being ready to breed – sitting together and grooming or feeding each other and mating. Once they have the nest box, if they do end up laying eggs and hopefully raising chicks, you need to remove the nest box and rest them for a few months. They will only have one clutch per year in the wild, so if we don’t limit them in captivity, they will keep breeding until they are worn out and the chicks start being unhealthy. It’s best to limit them to no more than 2 clutches per year. While some breeders of America  parakeets will colony breed their birds, you really need a large walk-in type aviary and still there will be more issues than when you only have one pair of birds per cage. If these are English budgies, you definitely should only have one pair of birds per cage because they are traditionally not bred in colonies.

Thank you for asking Lafeber,

Brenda