FINCHforum

I have 5 baby finches, days old, and poor momma finch died today. I don't want dad to die too. How can I help make sure everyone is healthy and eating enough? ?

FoxAffair

Can you give folks a little bit more information?

What species? Is the dad feeding (are the crops full?) Is he sitting? Offer dad some mashed boiled eggs to help with his health and his feedings, if he is feeding them

They are zebra finches. Dad is sitting in the nest, but I don't know how often he's feeding them. I don't want to disturb the nest to remove the chicks.

I gave him some crushed egg and egg shell to eat. I read that they are good sources of protein. Most of the shell is gone this morning, but he didn't touch the egg. I gave him fresh batches of both and crushed the egg up more this time.

Is it possible to move the chicks to a separate cage and hand feed them if dad isn't keeping up with it? How can I tell if he is?

FoxAffair

Sorry about your Mama bird.

As Babs mentioned, we need to know the species, and we need to know if Dad, is feeding the babies ? How old are these babies?

Do you know what happened to the Mom? Did she appear sick in any way? Does Dad appear sick in any way?

If Dad is healthy, and has been feeding the chicks along with the Mom, than he should be able to manage raising the babies on his own.

Offer lots of nutritious foods. Grated hard boiled eggs, spray millet, a high quality finch seed mix, some chopped up greens (like kale, spinach, cucumber, etc.) Offer a drop or two of bird multi vitamine into their drinking water.

Good luck, and please keep us updated.

Sorry for your loss.

Whether or not dad is carrying something depends on whether mom passed due to a illness or parasite that is transferrable.

For right now is all appear healthy and dad is feeding the young as mentioned above it is best to supply the father with boiled grated egg, a little finely chopped kale for the folic acid the babies need, as they get bigger you can add finely grated carrot to the kale. Adding powder vitamins and minerals to you egg food as directed o the product will also help. Go very easy on veggies that contain to much water like cucumbers, avoid fruits right now.

If dad suddenly appears ill or stops feeding we can help walk you though hand feed and what might possibly be wrong. To be on the prepared side of this it might be good to get a small container of hand feeding formula, either Zupreem or Lafebers is good. Found at PetSmart.

Update:

Dad does not appear to be feeding them at this point. But he is acting normal and eating for himself, at least. Mom did not appear sick in any way before she died, so I don't think it was parasitic.

Since dad wasn't feeding, we took over and removed the chicks to syringe feed them a NutriStart formula I picked up today. There are only 3 chicks, though. I miscounted, but also, one was dead in the bottom of the cage this afternoon. One of the chicks is much larger, and I think hatched earlier than the others. We've done two feedings at this time, and they are looking better already. Much more active during the second feeding. They have full crops now. Dad returns to the nest with them about 15 minutes after the feedings.

Thanks for the suggestions, any continued advice is greatly appreciated!

You may find that Dad will take over the feeding once the babies are a few days older. A male bird is perfectly capable of raising a clutch by himself. Try adding some spray millet to the cage, that is usually relished by birds, and it is also something that is easy for him to feed to the babies. If he isn't eating the egg food, it may be too moist for his liking. You can dry it out a bit by mixing in a little dry commercial egg food like Volkman's or Quicko, or even plain yellow cornmeal if you can't find the others. Is he used to eating veggies? If so, add some of his favorite veggies.

Welcome to the forum! There's lots of good reading at www.finchinfo.com, where you will find many articles on finch care, including this one on hand feeding:

http://www.finchinfo.com/breeding/handfeeding.php

If you put your general location in your profile, it helps us to answer locale-specific questions later on.

FoxAffair
Good luck with the babies and welcome to the forum! Please keep us posted.

Update:

We lost another chick over night :'(

As I mentioned before, one of the chicks is larger than the other one, but this one has lumpy seed looking stuff stuck in it's crop, left over from before. It looks like dad may have fed it full seeds, if I was to guess. I'm very concerned.

Dad is doing well, however. He isn't eating much of the egg still, or the spray millet that we added yesterday. But he is gobbling down diced cucumber, so I'm giving him plenty of that. I put the cucumber in with his regular seed dish though, does that affect how/what they eat? Should I mix the other food options in with the seed as well? The rest of the food, like the spray Millett, is draped over a perch, or in other areas where he can reach it.

Thank you for the links! Please keep the help coming! These chicks need all they can get

PS: I have no idea how to add pictures, but I have been taking a bunch. I'm posting from my phone, so keep that in mind if you know how to walk me through it. Pictures might help explain some of what I'm talking about.

It is perfectly normal for you to seed full seeds in their crop. Cucumbers are mostly water so I'm not sure I would keep feeding so much of that. Better to get high protein foods in them like egg.
Good luck

FoxAffair
Sorry about the chick. Try not to take it too hard. I am sorry but I have only had one clutch - two chicks - and the parents raised them without any trouble. I am not qualified to help.

I have read that some finches like the egg drier. Do you feed granules? Or do you have any feeding formula? You could mix some of that in it and see if the dad likes it better. I also read a bit of baby cereal could be used. Less nutritious but something you could try just to see if it helps would be some bread crumbs.

How are things going?

FoxAffair
So sorry for your losses. Sending lots of luck your way.

How are the babies looking now?

Kind Regards

Zebrafincher

Thanks for everyone's kind words!

I'm happy to say that hand feeding is going pretty well! The two chicks are getting healthier every day. They appear to be about a week apart in age, but both are developing equally. I don't want to say we're out of the woods yet, but I'm getting hopeful.

Dad, Frank, is also doing well. He sings his songs and is happy to keep the nest warm and he likes to mend it with dry grasses.

What a great name for a finch! (Frank!)

Zebrafincher