FINCHforum

would a cock do the mating dance for a hen which is his sister? hes always dancin and she goes about like theres nothin goin on, i think anyway. would he know if it was a sibling?

i bought a pair of gouldians but it never dawned on me that they could be siblings.

thanks...

He will dance and he will
I would not have nest in there cage as its not good for siblings to have baby's

Males will dance to anything with 2 legs! In breeding is not good for the offspring - it's typically just asking for troubles. If in doubt - do not let them breed.

*dances*



*runs*

yes the Male will court any females. EVEN MALES. I suggested not cage them together at all. Not a good idea. You should separate them immediately.

Did you get them from a pet store? Do they have bands? Maybe you can tell by the bands if they are a related pair or not.

I know you can never be sure how truthful they are being, but I would tend to want to believe the store, if they tell you they are unrelated. It would be pretty near impossible to know for sure, unless you raised the parents yourself.

In my opinion, at some point you have to trust that the seller is telling the truth, or possibly give up on finding breeding pairs all together. If they tell you they don't know, then, perhaps it would be a good idea not to breed them. I'm not sure you have to necessarily put them in separate cages though. Most people here say that if you don't want to breed, just remove nests and nesting material. If eggs are layed on the bottom of the cage, toss them. Usually in the absence of a nest, the egg laying will stop. I personally don't see why brother and sister can't have an incestuous (sp?) relationship...in the finch world at least! As long as no 'children' result from it. A lot of people keep their finches in colonies in large aviaries, and I'm sure that on occassion there is some of that funny stuff going on with siblings, before the juveniles get moved on to new homes...