Yikes! yesterday BOTH the WB babies fledged, (oldest is 2 weeks) and would not sleep in the nest. It got down to 50 last night (cold for us Floridians) and the adults huddled and hung around them to keep them warm. I just banded and pulled them for hand-feeding. I use tweezers and break off little chunks and feed them. Force feed at first because they will not open their little beaks. One is a growler and growls when I pick him up...so ferocious...
Then it gets worse. The good egg in the BN nest must've hatched, and there is no baby to be found. AND...panic time, the 2 eggs in the incubator look good and one looked like it was getting ready to hatch and (going by tiel hatch experiences) I thought I had til tomorrow at the latest to move it to the nest. My game plan was to pull the current BN baby that is 5 days old, and put these 2 eggs in the nest.
Nope...mother nature has it's way, and I was getting ready to do the switch, almost screamed when I looked in to find that one egg hatched!!! There is a cockatiel egg in the incubator to show differences in egg sizes.
Now the delemia. I've talked with mousebird breeders and zoos and from more experienced breedes andr they have found that it has been impossible to handfeed a mousebird baby and get it past 3 days of hatch. ALL attempts with other have failed.
Now I don't know what to do. Should I stuff it back into the half-shell and put the new hatchling in the nest along with the other egg, and pull the 5 day old baby?
In either case the baby can be lost. Either by dying at my hand or some of the adults alarmed with the change and eating the new hatchling. At least I do have hopes for the 2nd egg, which I will put out there.
Thankfully I have a couple hours to decide because the little one can get by on absorbing the yolk sac...
Then it gets worse. The good egg in the BN nest must've hatched, and there is no baby to be found. AND...panic time, the 2 eggs in the incubator look good and one looked like it was getting ready to hatch and (going by tiel hatch experiences) I thought I had til tomorrow at the latest to move it to the nest. My game plan was to pull the current BN baby that is 5 days old, and put these 2 eggs in the nest.
Nope...mother nature has it's way, and I was getting ready to do the switch, almost screamed when I looked in to find that one egg hatched!!! There is a cockatiel egg in the incubator to show differences in egg sizes.
Now the delemia. I've talked with mousebird breeders and zoos and from more experienced breedes andr they have found that it has been impossible to handfeed a mousebird baby and get it past 3 days of hatch. ALL attempts with other have failed.
Now I don't know what to do. Should I stuff it back into the half-shell and put the new hatchling in the nest along with the other egg, and pull the 5 day old baby?
In either case the baby can be lost. Either by dying at my hand or some of the adults alarmed with the change and eating the new hatchling. At least I do have hopes for the 2nd egg, which I will put out there.
Thankfully I have a couple hours to decide because the little one can get by on absorbing the yolk sac...
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