Rockstar Parents

[pidgepudge]

I have to yell about this to someone and no one I know irl appreciates it lol.

But I have a pair of fairly young zebra finches who are in the process of raising their first clutch ever, and holy cow, they're rockstar parents.

I was really afraid at first because they mated within 30 seconds of me introducing them (the female was more than willing, it wasn't just the male jumping her bones), so I was like oh great, this pair is gonna be too overexcited to actually sit their eggs and stuff.

But to my surprise, they laid six (!!) eggs, and at a week I candled them and all were fertile. I was amazed. But of course, knowing that mishaps happen, I expected maybe 4 of the 6 to hatch at most.

Nope, all six hatched, one of which was a good two days later than the rest of them.

That sixth baby, since it was already so far behind the other five, didn't seem to have a good outlook, I was prepping to have to try to hand raise it in case the parents tossed it or didn't want to bother with it since it was so much smaller than the others.

But to my surprise, on about the second day after it hatched, I checked on the nest and its crop was stuffed full of seed just like the others.

Now the babies are 11-13 days old, feathering out great, and the parents are doing an amazing job taking care of them. It's a massively full nest and for first time parents I can't believe how well they're managing.

Of course I had to include some pictures! The parents are a florida fancy male split for orange breast, and a normal grey female also split for OB. I'm hoping to get out a full OB maybe.

There is sooo much poop

[Sally]

Cute pictures!

[Shannylee]

This story made my day!!! Love at first sight is real. LOL!! That is a LOT of poop! I raise societies. Disgusting nests that have to either be discarded or soaked in bleach water and scrubbed. I also raise javas. Only one chick so far but a super clean nest. Birds are so funny. Can't wait to see how your little guys color out! I LIVE in FL and have never seen a FL Fancy.

[lovezebs]

pidgepudge

Congratulations!

Leave it to Zebras, to not waste any time, lol .

Babies look healthy and well fed from what I can see.
Please don't worry about the poopy nest, we all know how completely these nests can get, but it doesn't seem to worry the babies or the parents.

Keep us updated with more baby pictures, and good luck.