Parakeet Eggs! Here we go again! *UPDATE: Page 3: PICTURE HEAVY!!!!!*

[bgelber]

Congrats.

please post pics when able....

 

[77horses]

UPDATE: Pictures!!!

I know you all have been waiting for some pictures, so here they are! None of the eggs have hatched yet.

Here's a picture of Moss (the Cockatiel), Dove (the white Parakeet sitting on the lower perch), and Stormy (the blue Parakeet sitting on the top perch, a.k.a Carla's mate):

Moss (right) and Sunny the yellow Parakeet (top left):

And finally, here's Carla!

I know, not the best picture, but it's hard to get any pictures of her when she's way behind all those perches and on the bottom of the cage. And I didn't want to disturb her too much. And don't mind the mess she made...We put a little food dish down next to her and she spilled it everywhere and used the seed hulls for her nest...along with shredded newspaper, etc.

I will try to get pictures of the 6 eggs when she takes a break off the nest, too.

__________
UPDATE: Carla just got off the nest for a quick break and I got a picture of her eggs...Not a very good one, but as soon as she saw the camera she flew back down to the nest and rolled the eggs back under her.

(see them in the far right corner behind the food dish?

)

 

[onthespot]

I bet you hatch some babies. She looks pretty serious there, all puffed up on her nest and all. Lookin' good. If she chose the spot and is stickin' with it, that is all you can do. I bet you end up with some babies. Sometiems not all the eggs are fertile but best leave them alone for now and not try to candle. They are very fragile and if you just press a tiny bit with a tiny flashlight you can break the eggs by accident. Done that.

Just wait and see for now... Good luck!

 

[TerriLaChicks]

I see them! how cool is that? I sure hope some of them hatch!

 

[77horses]

We should be getting a few babies soon this week!!!

At least the first couple eggs she hatched should be soon.

I won't be there (they are at my dad's house) but I've been calling everyday to check up on them. As of last night, there are no babies yet. But I want to check up on them everyday so that right when they hatch we can move the other birds out into Moss's old cage that he doesn't use anymore. That way Carla and her mate, Stormy, will have all the food and the entire cage to themselves to raise their babies without any disruptions from the other birds. Last night we let them share a cage with the others and one of the others killed all of the babies.

They raided the nest and the babies were knocked out. My dad never checked on them in time. If he had checked on them he would have rescued the babies from the bottom of the cage but he never noticed they had fallen out.

Poor babies! So we are NOT gonna let that happen again! Especially since our other female Parakeet, Dove, has already showed aggression towards the eggs lately. One time we saw Carla get off the nest briefly and Dove flew down and sat on the eggs as if she thought they were hers. Then she started tapping them really hard with her beak like she was trying to break them!

But Carla wouldn't have any of that; she flew down and kicked Dove out of there before any harm was done to her eggs. She's such a good mother!

I will let you know when the babies hatch!

 

[77horses]

UPDATE:No eggs have hatched yet, but after candling some of them I've found that 1 or 2 are no good. There are 7 total. One looks rotten...It doesn't smell yet but on the outside it's obviously darker than the other eggs and when candling, I couldn't see any red veins or movement...It's all mostly brown inside and it looks like something started to form. I'm going to just leave it with Carla and throw it out once all of the eggs are done hatching, rather tan throw it out now. I think I read somewhere that eggs that don't hatch help with the babies that are hatching because the eggs that don't hatch keep the mother Parakeet from smothering the tiny, newly hatched baby chicks...Something like that.

All of the other eggs look good...I can see movement in them and each is at a different stage of development. The most developed have veins in them, the air bubble is larger and I can see the baby chick moving around inside.

The less-developed ones have a smaller embryo and the eye of it can be seen bobbing around a little.

It's just like candling a mini-chicken egg!

I will let you know as soon as they start hatching!!!!

Also, I found out that Sunny, our yellow/green Parakeet, is actually a boy rather than a girl like we thought. When we got him the colored nostrils above his beak (forgot what it was called) was pink, but now it's purple/blue. And he's also been singing and following Dove around and I think they are mates now.

So now we know why Carla's mate, Stormy, was always fighting with Sunny and getting mad at him when he went too close to Carla and the nest.

 

[77horses]

UPDATE: One of the eggs hatched last night or this morning!!!!!

My sister found it this morning. It's sooo tiny and it makes faint little peeping noises!

I tempted Carla with some bread and she got off it for a minute and I saw he chick. It looks healthy and happy snuggled in between all those other unhatched eggs!

It must be glad that it's getting all the attention...for now. Just wait until the others hatch.

Carla's gonna be really busy then!

Anyways, Carla ate the bread (she loves whole wheat bread as a snack once in a while) and then the chick started peeping to her and she flew down immediately and sat back down on it. Then she ate some seeds from the nearby food dish and the last time I checked on her a minute ago, she was feeding it! It's amazing how she can get that food down such a tiny, fragile beak!

She looked like she knew what she was doing and I think both her and Stormy are both very proud parents.

At the moment I can't take pictures because it's too dark in the cage and I don't want to disturb Carla and her newborn chick.

But maybe a couple days later I will take it out when it's stronger and take a few quick pictures.

Yay for Carla and Stormy!!!!!!

Oh and I almost forgot.......We will be moving Sunny and Dove and maybe Moss (although he seems to not mind the new baby chick...he never causes any problems with them, so we might let him stay in the cage with the parents) into a new cage nso they won't harass or raid the nest like last time.

Right now they seem a little interested in the new chick...but we'll let them stay in there for today and after that we won't take anymore chances. If Carla did indeed lay the eggs one day at a time like Parakeets normally do, the next baby should be hatching tonight or tomorrow if all went well.

 

[TerriLaChicks]

Congratulations!!!!!!!

 

[77horses]

UPDATE: No eggs have hatched yet, but after taking a quick look at them I heard one of them peeping!

As for the baby parakeet that hatched, Carla is taking great care of it and Stormy has tried to help as well with feeding and everything, but Carla seems to want to do it herself.

When all of the baby parakeets hatch, we're planning on letting Carla raise them until they are old enough to be on their own (I don't know what age that is...I'll have to look it up!) and then we're gonna keep one or two and sell the rest to a nice home of their own.

(Note to self: Must not get attached to them all!!!

)



TerriLaChicks: Thanks!

 

[77horses]

UPDATE: No more eggs have hatched, but the one that was peeping yesterday is peeping even more today and I can hear the chick pecking at the shell when I put it up to my ear!

It hasn't pipped yet, but should anytime now and I'm guessing it will hatch later today or tonight.

Also, the chick that hatched already is getting bigger! It (he? she?) is starting to grow tiny downy feathers already! I can't wait to see what it looks like when it fully feathers out.

Anyone think of any names for the chick that hatched so far? Here's some information that might help:

Mother's name: Carla
Father's name: Stormy
Bird names that we've already had/have: Kiwi, Dove, Sunny, Toddra, Bridget, Moss, Brady, Beekey, Sweety, Joey, and Fred. So none of these will work, obviously.

Since I don't know its gender, what I do is choose what I think it is and keep it at that, and if it turns out to be a girl when I guess it's a boy for example, then I can just have a backup name to change it to.
For a girl name I was thinking maybe April would fit perfectly because it was born in April.

Let me know if you have any ideas!