2017 Gouldian Breeding Season - Australia

[lovezebs]

wildbill

It's still early.
Hopefully if the weather settles down, things will come around.

[wildbill]

my lime/blue hen mated to a white breasted cock bird laid 6 eggs a couple of weeks back. in total 5 were fertile and 5 hatched yesterday. amongst the young were 2 blue chicks. these are my rarest mutations in the gouldians so are penned in an aviary - just by themselves.

the good news for me is the white breasted cock bird is now a guaranteed white breasted/blue cock. as both parents must carry the gene to produce the blue mutation bird.

so there's 3 normal coloured flesh young which if 1 was carrying the lime gene would make the cock bird a double split. either way its more important that they stay alive.

in another aviary the news not quite as good as one pair hatched 6 young yesterday and today all 6 dead. parents still sitting on them but didn't realize they also had to feed them. this is an annual occurrence each year with first year breeders...some are good straight off the bat and other have no idea what to do.

those which lose the first nest usually get their act together by nest two and come good. another problem I've struck with first timers is after the eggs hatch the parents appear in great shock and dessert the nest. that happened in another nest where they were setting on 4 eggs

three eggs were fertile and one clear. when I checked that nest there was only 2 eggs left and both stone cold. in the fertile one the chick was pecking away and halfway round the shell. the nest box next to it had young just hatched so I placed the egg into that nest box. so far so good

overall its not a great breeding season but they are breeding......SLOWLY

[Babs _Owner]

wildbill

Hope your new parents figure out what they are doing soon. I think you mentioned a while ago you were thinking of breeding some strong normals this year as well. How's that going?

[lovezebs]

wildbill

Well, at least your birds have the excuse of being young and inexperienced...
What do you do with older, experienced birds, who are pulling the same tricks

Soup pot???

[wildbill]

babs

as of now the normal are on eggs so time will tell on that venture. overall its one of those years in birds when for some reason they don't want to breed or breed well ..and that's it.

not much you can do about it but wait it out. first time in years I have actually saw young dead on the floor. birds sitting for several days and leaving eggs and so on.

last year it happened to other experienced bird breeders here in OZ. in a different location to mine. I guess this year its my turn

anyway I have had an extremely good run the past 3 years so I can't complain


lovezebs

i'd say 99% of all my gouldians are young first year breeders. I sold out all my last season breeders and kept maybe 3 or 4 birds.....so no birds to pot

I think by end of april it could improve but I don't expect big numbers apart from that there is not one thing I can think of to improve the outcome except time!

[lovezebs]

wildbill

As I recall, you tried out some hard boiled eggs last year or the year before, with good results. Maybe give it a go this year as well (?)

[wildbill]

all good egg food wise as it is in with the soaked sprouted seed and green feed. on another note that nest of 5 has dropped to 3. started off 2 blues and 3 splits or maybe even a lime.

usual scenario is -you lose the blues first. not this nest and it has reversed so I have 2 blues and the unknown. better news these first timers now know what to do and all 3 remaining young had upon inspection full crops so I think all is good and should go the distance.

in aviary one I checked a box with a hen setting away on 8 fertile eggs. 3 eggs in total had hatched either overnight or early morning. all 3 young being blue with still 5 eggs to go. again first timers so in theory it would have been better to see possibles rather than blues hatch. so it will be a wait and see if things go ahead on the positive side in that nest box or the total opposite.

back in aviary 3 i'd say in the past 3 days I have lost a good 20 young when again the first timers failed to feed. once again still sitting on their young - so warmth wise good-feeding side bad. i still have young and some pairs are now down to one young per box but thankfully finally feeding them. this I feel is all you need to give them the idea on what to do and by nest 2 - I expect a total turnaround of disappointing events.

at the moment I sit in a position with 5 mutation green back young flying and 4 normal from another cage/aviary. I don't really count those young as I gave the lot about 12 in total to a guy I know. just waiting to move them out.

so to sum up I have 5 young in total flying from about 30 pairs not bad eh~ am I concerned? well yes and no! I don't think -well I know I won't hit any big breeding numbers this year but I think it will pick up in the next 4 or 5 weeks and the young will start multiplying

one good thing though - in those single young nests you do end up with a very nice well fed young one:lol:

[lovezebs]

wildbill

Well, look at it this way....
Without so many birds to worry about, you'll have more time for the cars and the bikes, lol

[wildbill]

how true I just placed a deposit on this adventure bike yesterday. they arrive in the dealers end of month so I should be bush riding early april

[lovezebs]

wildbill

That is a cute little machine, but nothing like your other bikes

I knew you'd find some way to fill the hours, lol.

Say, did you ever make that planned trip last year? Never heard anything about it (?)