FINCHforum

I currently own 6 zebra finches in a flight cage. I thought that I had 3 females and 3 males, until I saw one of the males lay an egg so I guess he's a hen not a cock. I'm confused because she has a breast bar and black cheeks, I thought she was a young male who hadn't yet grown the flank markings. When I got her she had a lot of feathers missing on the back of her neck and those feathers have not yet grown back, I've been giving a molt tonic in the water but it doesn't seem to be helping.

I'm not much good at helping with Zebra identification, but we have other members who will be able to help you. I do know that with some of the mutations, hens may have markings that they don't have normally.

Welcome to the forum! There's lots of good reading at www.finchinfo.com, where you will find many articles on finch care, housing, diet, and especially the Zebra finch. If you put your general location in your profile, it makes it easier to answer locale-specific questions later on.

Themcleodflock

Not an expert about mutations. However the problem with the feathers, sounds like she might have been plucked by another bird. Keep an eye, to make sure that she is not being plucked by one of her flight mates.

To help with feather growth, offer hard boiled eggs mashed or put through a garlic press. I mix mine with crumbled spray millet to make them more appealing. Protein, is very important in feather growth. If you can pulverise some freeze dried meal worms or freeze dried blood worms and add them to the egg mix, that will be helpful as well.

~Elana~

I just wanted to comment on the female with the black cheeks and breast bar.

It sounds like you have a black-cheek female. That's the name of the specific mutation.

It's relatively uncommon, but some females do have a breast bar and colored cheeks. (In your case, black.)

The black-cheek mutation is one of the few mutations where you see this.
You can learn more here:
http://www.efinch.com/species/bczeb.htm

In these birds, the females are lacking the spotted feathers on the sides (the males will have black spotted feathers on the sides, instead of chestnut.)
The males will also have a redder beak and much more pronounced chest markings.

I'll get a picture of her today.

The food is a finch seed mix that the pet shop produce themselves, I think it's mostly yellow millet with some red millet and other seeds.

There is two cuttlebones in the cage, some dried egg food and broccoli. Also molt tonic in one of the water dishes.

Age I think is 6-9 months, as she was sold to me as a young male, she might be older however.

Not sure on type.

Hopefully I've added the pictures properly?

That's definitely a BC hen. I also have bred some hens with faint breast bars like that but you would not mistake it from a cock's breast bars. As seen from the pictures, she has no markings on the flanks, also a sign that the bird is a hen. If you want to breed her, pair it with a BC cock to preserve the BC mutation. Avoid pairing it with the Orange mutations (OB).

Definitely a black cheek hen.
She'll be lovely once she re-grows.

Thanks for the help in identifying her. How long will it take her to grow back her feathers? And will the white patch on her back stay or is it left over juvenile feathers?

I haven't seen her being plucked by the others in the cage, she just hasn't grown any feathers since I got her, which was about 6 weeks ago.

Zebra hens can have black smudges and markings in their breast area, these are considered faults/show faults.

below are two brothers and their sister BC (center). Show fault bars can sometimes be seen in other mutations, even a normal gray.

Basic rule hens have orange beaks and males have red. The exception with this are the yellow beak mutation males and females.

Oh she's a beaut!!!! Lucky lucky, she's so pretty, and when those feathers come in she'll really wow the guys!!! LOL Is the egg fertile do you know? Are you wanting them to breed? What other mutations do you have? I think she will make some fine looking babies, if you are breeding!!!! I was going to mention the orange/red beak thing, but in your pictures, her beak looks pretty dark (almost red) which could just be the picture, but as always someone mentioned it. So you know.

We have 5 other birds, 2 males, Squeak is fawn, Pip is grey with heavy pied markings. We also have 3 females, Nutter is grey, Marge is fawn with dark brown cheeks and Flora is mostly white with very pale tail markings, a light grey cap and dark grey cheeks.

I don't think Queenie (the black cheek female) has fertile eggs, I haven't seen her mate with either if the boys. Flora has laid eggs too, but she mated with Pip and they are now incubating the eggs, I snuck Queenies 3 eggs into Flora's nest and she is incubating them so hopefully we will see.

I wasn't intending on breeding just yet, but things happen and I'll separate the boys from the girls once the eggs have hatched (or not I suppose). How long should I wait before removing the eggs if they don't hatch?