# The hatching has begun!



## Camtaro (Oct 19, 2012)

So everyone. I'm back. It's been a busy couple of months, for me and my birds. I made this little post awhile back; (http://www.talkcockatiels.com/showthread.php?t=39439), talking about how my birds had mated and asked for some suggestions. 

Thankfully everything suggested has worked out great. The main thing I was worried about, was the age of my male, but so far he has been extremely instinctual and docile about the whole process being quite gentle to both his mate and myself when interacting with the nest, despite the fact he was(possibly still is) going through his molt(Still find his baby feathers falling out, gosh they were so pretty).

They have been mating(though it's stopped recently with all the darkness from storms and the eggs so close to hatching), sharing nesting duties(one goes out, the other in. They are both outside for no more then a few moments), spending nights together in the nest box entirely(once I cover them at night they pretty much sleep in there till morning... then come out and drop stanky stank droppings), and now, at the end of my females 2nd clutch (first was earlier this spring, this second one has happened over the past month) we have two little fertile growing babies, one who has pipped the shell tonight, and a second who will hopefully start pipping away in the next few days.

We had 0/8 in the first clutch, she was alone when we adopted her from a friend, also because she had not bonded with anyone yet, and 3/8 in this clutch that she had with her mate who she has bonded well with, quite quickly once she moved in with us. #3 died sadly, there was an accident with a crack and some glue shortly after the first days of showing fertility, but after repair it seemed the process stopped and went to an infertile yellow glow. I blame myself for having very warm hands which can destroy the embryo if you handle it to much and I believe I did during the glue repair. Thankfully the other two's development has been coming along nicely. It's quite dry here in NM where I live, but the storms have brought a higher humidity and I try to spray the parents every now and then. I have also started to mist in the nestbox to help with the hatching right now.

The air cell looked well during development, the first pip is good and made a nice crack right about where you want it to be. When I pick up the egg I can hear little chirps from inside. I warmed up some new bedding, changed everything out and give it a nice misting not to long ago. Mom's in there happily roosting on it as it chirps away and Dad sits sweetly by the entrance singing even though it's so late at night. All in all I think we might have a baby in the morning. 

I am about to go pick up some distilled water, pedialite, and the ingredients for formula for an emergency situation. If there's anything you all can think of please suggest away. I will have pictures as soon as the little scamp is out. I will also keep you all posted in case of an emergency.


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## Gromit99squi (Dec 22, 2012)

The only thing I could suggest is to take some pictures, which you've already mentioned! 

I am very new to breeding birds, like as in, the first baby my birds have ever hatched out, hatched two days ago. I still haven't seen the little Diamond Dove chick, I found the eggshell which was plenty of proof to tell the chick had hatched and then my mum spotted him today. But I think egg and biscuit is good to feed them especially during the breeding season. I was told by my mum that feeding them some soft items (we've been giving the parents porridge and of course fruit) makes it easier for the chicks to digest. I think this is true however like I said I'm extremely new to breeding birds.

That sounds very exciting and I hope all goes well! Please keep us updated! 

Good Luck! :grey tiel:


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

> I was told by my mum that feeding them some soft items (we've been giving the parents porridge and of course fruit) makes it easier for the chicks to digest. I think this is true however like I said I'm extremely new to breeding birds.


If your birds get pellets at all those count as soft foods too. 

Congrats on the first baby hatching soon. It sounds like you got all the bases covered, just keep an eye on them and keep us posted!


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

Congratulations on the good eggs and the hatch in progress! It's not likely that the warmth of your hands killed the embryo in the damaged egg; birds have a higher body temperature than humans do (in the 104-106F range), so unless you had a very high fever you're not as warm as the parent birds. It was probably the crack in the egg that did the harm; I've never had any success with repairing damaged eggs so I know that it doesn't always work.

It's not necessary to change the bedding when there's a hatch in progress, and I think it's best not to do it because it's disruptive. The original bedding should have been quite clean anyway because no one has started pooping in there yet. It's actually not necessary to change the bedding at all - the parent birds never clean the nest and it's normal for the babies to grow up surrounded by their own droppings. This isn't a bad thing since it probably helps strengthen their immune systems. 

A lot of us humans can't take that much mess so we change out the bedding sometimes, but it's less trouble for everyone if you wait until it's actually dirty. I don't do any cleaning until the oldest chick is at least a week old, and if it's a small clutch I'll put it off longer than that.


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## Camtaro (Oct 19, 2012)

Huzzah, the firstborn has arrived! 










He looks perfect!


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## Sugars Mum (Jul 26, 2013)

Yay for tiny hatchling!


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## Amz (Apr 10, 2013)

Congratulations! You sound like you've done your research and know what you're doing, which is wonderful. I'm confident that these babies are in good hands!

If you're interested, there's a sub-board called 52 Weeks of Tiels where you post pictures of your tiel once a week for a year. That would be a great way to keep track of their growth


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## Haimovfids (Sep 19, 2012)

(S)he is so beautiful


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## dshiro2012 (Feb 4, 2013)

Camtaro said:


> Huzzah, the firstborn has arrived!
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Oh my goodness! The baby is so tiny! I'm definitely excited for the first egg to hatch now! I probably won't pick them up until around 2 weeks to start co-parenting, but I sure will take pictures. Hope I get some good ones like you did!


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## Camtaro (Oct 19, 2012)

So #1 is doing really well. Have some pictures to post later. #2 has started to pip, the air cell looks a tad dehydrated, this one may not hatch as smoothly. We'll see what happens. Thanks for the kind words. I'll keep you all posted.


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## Haimovfids (Sep 19, 2012)

I hope everything's comes out OK


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## Camtaro (Oct 19, 2012)

So Baby A has been thriving while Baby B took a bit of a rough ride through the start. (S)He was dehydrated, red, had been in the egg to long(I found out there was a dropping inside), the complete opposite of Baby A's development. I also accidentally impacted the egg on inspection during the first 24 hours of pipping. It was close to the air and otherwise non-lethal and if anything helped the poor thing to hatch. It was almost 32 hours from initial pip before I found it hatched. Pedilyte helped within an hours time to restore it back to health though. The next problem we faced was the parents refusal to feed it or it's weakness to be fed, not totally sure, maybe a little bit of both. I had to hand feed it formula for the first couple days before it started receiving food from the parents.

However we stuck it through and now it's development is going great. I have limited my interaction and todays picture was well worth it. I will have a whole swarray in the 52 weeks of teils thread when I get a chance to make a thread with all the info and pictures I have taken so far and you can really see the step by step growth. For now enjoy this!


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## Vickitiel (Oct 10, 2012)

Such a cute photo! Look at that size difference!

Looking forward to more updates.


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