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Male is attacking female

kathykeltsy

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These two birds are double clutching and so I have removed their 5 week old chicks and am hand feeding. Mom has only laid one egg in a weeks time and spends all her time with it in the nest box. I will swap out all eggs with dummy eggs when I think she is done.

What has me worried is my male attacks her when she is in the cage with the egg even when she is attempting to get out of the cage he goes after her. He has never done this before and is VERY aggressive! So I have quit letting him in the cage at all. Luckily I have a bird room so he is a bird without a cage right now but he doesn't seem to mind.

What could be going on? He has never done this. Is still sweet and gentle to me. Eats good and will feed the babies when I let him in their cage. Not much but some.

Mom plucked the babies one night....all their back feathers so I knew something was going on with her. I know it was her because up until she laid this new egg I had been letting her have access to the babies but she kept plucking them every time!

Do you think it's all because of the hen sitting on this egg? I am hoping so since I plan to take the nest box down once she loses interest in the dummy eggs. I only put the nest box up again because she laid an egg on the floor if the cage so I knew I had to do something but I am not wanting anymore chicks right now
What should I do? If anything.

Sorry so long. I hope someone can give me some insight as to what is going on. Thanks
 

Monica

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My girls occasionally lay eggs, but I've never given them a nest box. In fact, if they find something nest-like, then I remove it. Hopefully the dummy eggs will discourage her from laying more, but the nest box could be encouraging her to lay more eggs.


It's usually the parents responsibility to raise the chicks together. He could be upset about not being there, maybe he's wanting to breed more, or who knows what. Sounds like it would be best to keep the mother away from the chicks if she's plucking them. If the father still feeds them but doesn't hurt or over-preen them, then he might be ok with the chicks.
 

kathykeltsy

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I think you are right about the male wanting to breed. Oh and I didn't have the nest box up until she started laying again. I just felt weird about her having no place to lay her eggs. She has only laid one more and us actively sitting on it unless the male gets in the cage and he chases her out and attacks her after she's out and trying to hey away. I will replace the egg with one if the dummy ones once they get here. And take the nest box away again after she gives up on it and maybe we can be done for now (fingers crossed)
 

Monica

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Kathy, I know that you only provided her a nest box because she laid an egg. I'm just saying that in doing so, you could unintentionally be encouraging her to lay more eggs, even if she has dummy eggs! If you want to discourage her from laying, then it may help by not encouraging the behavior. Does that make more sense?
 

kathykeltsy

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So as soon as she is tired of sitting on the dummy eggs I will take the box down again. If she keeps laying them on the bottom of the cage just let her do that?

She has only just laid two eggs and won't come out of the box at all. I keep the male away.
 

Monica

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If she keeps laying eggs then you haven't removed the trigger to egg laying. You need to find out the trigger(s) to her laying eggs before you can get her to stop laying eggs. Otherwise, she'll keep laying them or you may need to flood her with dummy eggs and hope she stops.
 

kathykeltsy

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I should put all 7 in the box you think? I don't let Mica get around her
 

Haimovfids

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The mom is plucking her chicks because she wants them to get out of the nest so she can make another clutch. The directions for the dummy eggs is to put 4-6 in at once.
 

kathykeltsy

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Update. She had laid 5 eggs. One broke so was tossed. This was the first one at the bottom of the cage and when input up the nest box which I guess was the wrong thing to do but I didn't know that. She has laid 4 more. So she had 4 dummy eggs in there and I hope she is done.
What do the rest of you do with the eggs you take out? When I was a kid my mom would find eggs from wild birds and she would poke a hole in them and put on her window sill to dry them and keep them. She had a nest she got from somewhere and that's where the eggs would end up as a sort of decoration.
 

Thugluvgrl187

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When Scooty lays eggs I leave them in her cage for about a month or a month and a half so that she gets that egg laying out of her system and then she is fine without laying any eggs for a while. Keep in mind that Squeeky my male cockatiel does not pay her any attention so I don't have to worry about my eggs hatching chicks.
 

kathykeltsy

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That's the thing. Mica my male is bugging her constantly. It's sort of funny when they are both in the nest box and I can here him wolf whistle over and over again.
As wonderful as it was to go thru the laying and hatching of the first clutch I'm not gonna do that again. I'm not cut out for this kind of stress. ;). I think I was more excited than I was when my own human babies were born!
 

Haimovfids

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You don't have too let them breed again if you don't want to. Double clutching is a natural instinct so it's going to be almost impossible to stop them from laying eggs (which they already did).

Are the eggs in the nest? Dark locations trigger hormones so we are going to have to make them feel unsafe so they will stop breeding. Leave the lid of the box open. It will bring the box light, and make them feel unsecure. Boil or freeze the eggs to sterilize them. If you can't do it, then replace the eggs with dummy eggs.

Limit food so that they won't feel like they have enough for babies. Give them a 14 hour night so it will make them feel like its winter season. Change the locations of the cage, toys, food bowls, water bowls ect. This will make them feel like they are in a new enviorment. Remember on your first day you brought your birds home? I bet they weren't so confident to eat, sing, or anything. They were just watching for predictors. So you need to make them feel similar to that situation again.

It will take at least 2 weeks to start seeing any improvements. I heard that leaving the lights on 24 hours for 3 days work faster. You should leave the eggs with them for at least 21 days. If you take them out too soon, they might replace it, and if you take it out too late, they will want to make another clutch because they have a nest. Just when they are starting to give up, you should remove it.
 

kathykeltsy

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They are sitting on dummy eggs now and when they give up I will take the nest box down. And if Kona lays again it will have to be somewhere else I guess. Both parents are flighted and impossible to catch at bed time so I can't really keep all my birds in the dark all the time. The parents are sleeping where they want in the bird room. I have 7 other birds.
 

WookieeGir

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I am having this issue as well. My normally boy is being frighteningly aggressive to anyone and everything that comes within 2 meters of the cage. This is their first clutch, and this morning egg #2 was born. This over-aggression began yesterday. He won't even let our female inside the cage. I'm going to bring out his old cage, and rotate them so they can still each have 12 hours with their clutch. Here's hoping it works.
 
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