chirping cockatiel eggs

[fishyfishyfishy13]

Well its been almost 20 days now since my cockatiels layed their eggs and just a few minutes ago I heard them shuffling around in the nesting box a lot. I went over to the box and I heard little tiny chirps coming from the eggs;D I'm so excited to have little babies! Does anyone know how long its going to take them to hatch if I can already hear them. Oh yeah and my female sunny is just freaking out because of the little chirps this is her first fertile clutch.

 

[Lucy]

Sorry, I don't know anything about birds but that just sounds so cute!

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

haha yeah I just posted that to get kind of an idea I figure they might be hatching in a few days, I had another thread and just kinda keeping people who watch the bird forum updated

oops sorry guys my bad it wasn't a chirping egg, it had just hatched

 

[gremlin]

Yeah, by the time you hear chirping, the chick will have already started hatching. It is a good sign that they are chirping right away. It means they are good strong chicks. So, where are the pictures?

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

haha sorry Ill try to get some tomorow, the parents won't get away and just 1 has hatched out of the 4 she has layed so...

 

[Aquarist]

Congrats on the eggs hatching Fishy!

I'll be looking forward to your photos.

Ken

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

I'm listening for chirping but they are sleeping so

I did manage to get a few pictures while she was moving the remainder of the eggs around, its kind of an ugly little thing but there your go!

 

[gremlin]

Looks like she is being a good mama. Congrats!

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

yeah I'm happy, this is her first fertile clutch she seems to be pretty dedicated to them. I do think that my male has breed before though, I got him from someone last winter. But I have been able to watch them a little bit and I seen them it almost looks like they are preening the chick? I don't know if that's what they are doing but it seem like there picking at the baby. Is this normal?

 

[gremlin]

They will preen/clean the chick. Just watch to make sure that it doesn't get out of hand. If they start injuring the chick, you will have to pull it for hand feeding.

Do the parents let you handle the chick? If you can handle the chick a bit each day, it will grow up more tame than if you just left it with the parents.

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

no they don't really let me near the box, my female has always been really protective over the eggs when they weren't fertile. I don't think that its really to bad.

 

[Betta/Horse lover]

Its a bit ugly but soon it will be sooooo cute!

 

[Akari_32]

That's the cutest thing I've seen since this morning when my betta attacked my finger to get his food XD

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

on the second picture there you can see it has a lot of fuzz ( or at least it seems like that to me) for a chick that just came out of the egg yesterday.

heres better pictures of the chick!

 

[Akari_32]

It looks like its momma <3

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

The grey one is the daddy and the yellow one is mom

 

[Akari_32]

The grey one is the daddy and the yellow one is mom

Kinda figured from an earlier post lol. How can you sex them (other then wait for eggs or no eggs lol)?

 

[fishyfishyfishy13]

Kinda figured from an earlier post lol. How can you sex them (other then wait for eggs or no eggs lol)?

There are a lot of ways that people say you can tell the sex of the birds, but other than dna testing the only other way would be to wait till they reach sexual maturity and the female starts to lay eggs. Some ways that I have heard of is that the orange spots on their head tend to be lighter on the female, but my females is very bright and colorful, another way is that there are stripes on the bottom feathers of a male, I don't know if that's true or not. I kind of figured that mine was a male because of the way he acted around my female he just couldn't stand her not being in her sight. I have also heard that you can tell from a bone around the bottom of their belly.

 

[gremlin]

With the normal grey coloring, the males will have more yellow on their heads - basically most of their heads will be yellow while the females have mostly gray.

How you tell with the stripes on the feathers - males have solid coloring on the underside of the long tail feathers while the females will have barring across the feathers. This can be seen even in the white cockatiels. It is somewhat unreliable with pied cockatiels.

The bone method - you feel the bones on either side of the vent. If they are widely spaced, it is most likely a female. If they are close together, it is most likely a male. This is not as reliable unless the female has previously laid eggs. Even so, you can have a male with wide spacing or a female with narrow spacing.

You can also tell somewhat by watching them. The males are much more vocal than the females. They also tend to take a dominate role in the relationship - although some females can be bullies.

 

[Akari_32]

With the normal grey coloring, the males will have more yellow on their heads - basically most of their heads will be yellow while the females have mostly gray.

How you tell with the stripes on the feathers - males have solid coloring on the underside of the long tail feathers while the females will have barring across the feathers. This can be seen even in the white cockatiels. It is somewhat unreliable with pied cockatiels.

The bone method - you feel the bones on either side of the vent. If they are widely spaced, it is most likely a female. If they are close together, it is most likely a male. This is not as reliable unless the female has previously laid eggs. Even so, you can have a male with wide spacing or a female with narrow spacing.

You can also tell somewhat by watching them. The males are much more vocal than the females. They also tend to take a dominate role in the relationship - although some females can be bullies.

Hmm, interesting. Thanks for sharing =)