FINCHforum

Okay, I have owned my zebra finches for several years. The female finch, had a clutch of eggs . She has for the past few years been living in a large cage, with her son . I bought them food dishes in the shape of oranges, that were too small to breed in to prevent them from having eggs. Turns out that they were not actually too small , and mom zebra finch is brooding a clutch of eggs. The only other finch in the cage is her son , and he has been offering her bedding material. The mama finch has only left the next on rare occasions to get food, and seems to be spending all her time there. But the father zebra finch has yet to sit on the eggs. He does seem interested.

The mother and son zebra finch have lived together for quite some time, and she has in the past always laid dud eggs, but she's never brooded them either.

These are my two starter questions;

First : Do my finches actually have fertile eggs?
Second : How bad would the inbreeding be?

First - yes, most likely, but you can candle them to be sure.

Second - not that bad actually, if it is their first generation of close inbreeding, the chicks usually come up without problems.

zebrafinch13
Some of the eggs are likely fertile. Inbreeding for one generation probably won't cause a problem, but it will increase the chances of the babies having recessive genetic traits, many of which can be harmful. Theoretically, if the birds only have dominant alleles for every gene, no amount of inbreeding will make any difference since only dominant traits can be passed on; however, this is extremely unlikely.
If you suspect any genetic issues, you can toss the eggs and replace the seed dish with a hopper or gravity feeder to prevent more egg-laying.

Thanks!

I don't have any family history for the mother, but I know the daddy has a recessive white gene, from his father's side. do you think that would cause any problems?

zebrafinch13
Color mutations shouldn't cause problems (double factor black face being the main exception).

She abandoned the nest after a few days and I candled them, they weren't fertile. But now she's brooding again and her son has been attempting to sit on the eggs but seems to have no patience for it... this is the fifth day of incubation.

So does anyone have any baby names for the finches that may or (hopefully) may not exist?