July 13, 2020
Budgies egg hatching
My birdie was having trouble giving so we looked up how to help
Now the egg is soft and she’s not sitting on them
Will it even hatch?
Question:
Answer:
Hi Jancy,
Your hen has a calcium deficiency that needs to be addressed as soon as possible. If she is still not acting well, you need to take her to an Avian Vet for a calcium injection. She is very lucky to have been able to pass the soft egg – in this type case the hen often becomes egg bound and dies. Egg binding is when a hen cannot pass an egg and can be caused by calcium deficiencies in most cases, or in some cases a bird that is too young or too old or develops an oversized egg. You can try offering her some cooked eggs – wash the eggshell thoroughly, then break the egg and crush the shell and mix in with the egg and then cook it all together – scrambled is fine. If she will eat some if this, it can get some calcium into her right away. If she has a cuttlebone, make sure the soft side is exposed and someplace she can easily reach it. You can also scrape the soft cuttlebone and sprinkle it over her eggs or any other soft food she will eat. A soft egg is not viable as far as being able to hatch. Without the hard shell it will dry out. She may not be healthy enough right now to incubate the eggs, so this clutch may be lost. It is more important to get her back to good health so she can possibly breed again in the future – I would rest her for at least 6 months.
I’m not sure the history of this pair – have they bred before or is this their first clutch? If they have laid eggs before, how many clutches have they had, and how close together? They should not be allowed to have more than 2 clutches per year. After the chicks have left the nest box, you should remove the box and make the pair rest for a few months before giving the box back. You might also have to move their cage to a busier part of the house, move it somewhere else in the room every week or so, limit any fresh foods you offer to once or twice a week, and limit their daylight hours to 8-10 hour by covering the cage early in the evening.
Breeding birds need to be on a nutritionally balanced diet – a loose seed mix is not adequate nutrition for pet or breeding birds. You should be feeding them pellets or one of our foraging diets, with no additional seeds offered. You can also give them chopped veggies, fruits, multi grain bread and cooked eggs with the shell. If this pair is only eating seeds, this is one reason why she laid a soft egg. Please review our feeding guide for more ideas.
Again, this hen needs at least 6 months to get back to good health before you let them breed again She should be at least 2 years old, and can only be bred until she is about 6-8 years old. Captive budgies rarely live past 10 years, so a 6 year old bird is getting a bit old to still be breeding.
Thank you for asking Lafeber,
Brenda
