Red throat male on nesting overload!

[slwatson]

I have a pair of red throat parrot finches who have had one successful clutch. Every other clutch they've laid in the past never hatched. The male will fill the nest with coconut fiber, the female will lay eggs, but then she'll never sit. After pulling the nest yesterday I think I've finally figured out why. My male over stuffs the nest....and he ends up covering the eggs as the female lays them. Or, he goes in and "tidies up" the nest so much, he caused the eggs to fall through the coconut fiber, and the female doesn't see the eggs and assumes they're gone. (This is what I'm thinking is happening anyway) I looked really closely at the nest last night, and the coconut fiber wasn't neatly layered at the bottom...it was fluffed up to the bottom of the nest opening, and the eggs were down at the bottom of the nest underneath all of that fluff!

I tried not to put much coconut fiber in the cage this time, but the male looked for other stuff he could put in it. He ripped scraps of paper from the cage liner, he pulled plastic leaves from the artificial vines in the nest. He's on nesting overload! Even if I just line the bottom of the nest for him with coconut fiber, he still fluffs it up!

I need some suggestions on what to do to stop this. I use a twig finch nest for them, because they don't seem to like anything else. http://glamgouldians.com/product-nest-twig-finch.php

I know I could pull the eggs and have societies foster, but I'm really trying to get parent raised babies.

Thanks in advance for your help!