Got a Question or Tip To Share with Big Bird?

Please post your current questions or tips here!



I like to use muffin tins with nesting material to store eggs at room temperature till I set the hen. I have so many eggs now I am using a piece of paper to divide each hole. On one side of the paper is one cage number and on the other side the other cage number.

Normally, I set eggs on the fourth or fifth day. In the bottom left, each have six eggs, the reason being that the chicks needed to be moved and I was called in and worked an 11 hour shift at the hospital and just could not get to it before I had to leave...


Do you recognize this plant? Thanks for the fantastic responses! Yes it is canola rape. This is in my front "flower" bed and actually lived through an unusually cold winter.


Questions:

Monday

1. Mary is concerned that her chicks may be starving:

Hello again:

These seems like strange questions for me to ask, after raising canaries for 45 years successfully. My brand new parent birds now have 3 of their 5 eggs hatched – two yesterday and overnight.

They are both gathering food, and the cock feeds the hen diligently when she is on the nest -- and the hen appears to be feeding her young while sitting on them to keep them warm…but I have not seen her stand on the edge of the nest to feed them. Also, I am not HEARING the peeping of the youngsters, nor do I see much egg food in their crops when the hen is off the nest. They do raise their heads…but I am worried that they are starving.

I am contemplating supplemental hand feeding. I purchase a 1 ml. syringe with which to feed and made some eggfood up with boiled water mixed in it…but I find that I cannot load this tiny syringe with the food. The water seems to separate from the eggfood and run out, and the food itself is just not going into the syringe. It is extremely frustrating.

The questions that I have are: why am I not hearing the peeping of the chicks? And What is the best way to put food into a syringe? The little beaks are so small that this is really the only thing that I can find that would go into their mouths. I have had absolutely NO luck trying to find a glass medicine dropper!! I have tried practicing with the two flat toothpicks that you mentioned using, but I am just not adept in holding the food with them.

Again, thanks for your help –

Mary Roberts

Mary

One of our blogger's gave me a small aluminum tool that is used
for putting split bands on canary legs. It is a small light
weight scoop and is easier to handle than my toothpicks.I think
they got it from Red Bird. Help blogger's?



Check comments for a tip on improvising a small spoon from a straw from Debbie!


I doubt if you can get an egg food to go through the syringe even
if you cut off the tip a bit. Get either sonic or exact hand
feeding formula. If that is not possible use some powdered
vegetable protein powder from the health food store. Not as good
but will work.

I would not worry about a hen feeding on the nest or off nor
whether she feeds less in volume and more often or is a stuffer.
Both ways work..I go by seeing a fluffy chick and pink not yellow
skin tone. When the chick is not fluffy or has a yellow skin tone,
I hand feed.