Just my luck.....

[Boothcreek]

I had my new and first pair of Java sparrows for 13 days now and the hen tried to lay her first egg and got eggbound and died........

just my luck, birds are happy enough to start laying after just 13 days in their new home and now this............. I don't even know where to get a new hen, the male is totally miserable right now...
She died very quickly, in the morning both were sitting on the upper perch preening eachother and chirping and hopping about like every morning.
I come from work 8 hrs later both sit on the cage floor looking miserable. After an hour she had passed away and he would not leave her side......
When I took her body out of the cage he didn't leave his spot either. When the body was gone he went searching throughout the cage for her..... I didn't know finches bonded like that, at least the weavers don't(they can live great without eachothers company).

My Java is sticking with my Weaver hen now, even though she attacks him when he gets too close to her....

Is this normal in Javas that pairs bond like that?
Are finches easily egg bound? I don't want to buy another hen just to have her die on her first egg as well..... These buggers are expensive when bought at the Petstore.

Anna

[Thalia]

Hi Anna,
I'm sorry for the loss of your hen I know when Alfred died Andie was pretty upset about him dying, she sat just above his body on a perch and when we removed it she also searched for him. I brought home a new male the next day and she accepted him pretty quickly, took roughly a week for her to really bond to him though. She didn't beat him up or anything before that, she just didn't let him preen her and would chase him away if she was eating or drinking. But these are zebra finches I'm talking about so I don't know if there's a difference in the amount of pair-bonding developed between different species. A few questions I'll ask since I'm first to reply
What are you feeding?
Is there a ready source of calcium?
What sort of enclosure are the birds in? Is it inside or outside?
What's the temperature (and humidity if you know it) of the cage?

[tammieb]

Sorry about your bird. Egg binding is a fact of life when keeping hens. It's a good idea to keep Calciboost or a similar product on hand. It can save a hen that is near death... my Strawberry hen has been close to dying several times over the past year due to egg binding and *knock-on-wood* each time I have been able to save her with the Calciboost.

[Boothcreek]

I am feeding lots of different things(each feed cup has something different). I feed:
-Tropimix eggfood
-Regular Finch seed
-Molt helper(since my Weaver male is molting right now)
-Organic Finch seeds with dried veggies(although they don't touch the veggies, when I refill the cup the seeds are gone and veggies still there)
- have a bowl with mealworms, lettuce, apple, and strawberries in it, but the fruits and veggies are more or less rotting away at this point cause no one eats them....

I have looked in our petstore for Calciboost, but they don't carry it and cannot order it in.
The birdies do have a whole seed cup full of grit mixed with oystershell and charcoal, the bottom of the aviary is also sprinkled with it since the quail need it too.

The birds are inside during the night(small budgie cage does the trick for that) and are out in the aviary during the day or at least half of the day; depending if I have time to put them out in the morning before work or not(then I put the cage right by the window to get some sunshine). On the day my hen got egg bound they were inside while I was at work.

I do not know the temp of the cage, humidity I cannot tell ya really either.
I do have my incubator running though and need to keep the humidity high enough for the chicks(in this case ducklings) to not get stuck while hatching. The bator has a humidity of 60% in it, so the house is probably somewhere close to that.
The temperature depends on the weather, at night we go down to +8 in the house and during the day up to +25°C.
I don't heat my house right now, as long as it doesn't get as cold as outside at night(-3°C).

So finch hens are more prone to egg binding then say Pheasants, Quail, Chickens, Peafowl etc??

Cause with those I had in all the years(13 or so) I had'em, only one laying hen get eggbound.

If Finches weren't so darn expensive(why are such small, practicly useless birds so expensive anyways??) I wouldn't mind so much. I can get my petstore to order me a hen, though.(they'll order me in any type and gender of finch I want pretty much) At least that is somehwhat easy(unless they can't find a breeder).
Gonna check that out tomorrow.
Otherwise my male will have to wait until next year when there is another auction(6 hrs drive far away) where I could possibly aquire another pair of Javas.
Anna

[Hilary]

So sorry! I lost one hen to eggbinding - she also bound and died before I even saw there was a problem. I've also had a couple of my tiny waxbills get bound, but like Tammie have saved them with heat and calciboost. You can order calciboost or calcivet from many different online sources - it's great to have on hand for these kind of emergencies.

You may want to also try eggshell and/or cuttlebone - some birds will eat one source of calcium but not others (that's the problem with this one swee hen - she won't try ANY source so I have to put calciboost in her water).

I hope you find another java soon!

[kenny]

hi boothcreek
with regard to your javas pair bonding,they do very much so i have had pairs that have been together for quite a few years..they are all in the aviary and they always seek out the same mate and the same nest if they can so obviously your bird will be missing its partner

ken