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 Post subject: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Sun Mar 06, 2016 5:22 pm 
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I was kind of glad that even though some of my birds were mating, nobody was laying any eggs.
Our young birds often check places in the house that could be good for nesting but I would say it wasn't very serious. none of them was upset when I kick them out of there, we had no problems getting them into the cage to sleep.
Recently Cuddles was kind of horny.
There are some cardboard boxes on top of the fridge (in the kitchen), with no top and only 2 walls are tall (so they are very open boxes). They are there to prevent birds from getting to the places where they can fall behind the fridge and for them to chew. I also put straw wreath in there (after they destroyed half of it so it couldn't be hung anymore in the living room) but they shredded it so there were some loose straw in the box
Anyway... she was in that box hissing at me, which was darn familiar behavior. I kicked her out and threw straw in the trash. She flew around the house, returned to the empty box and... laid an egg. I
even saw the egg coming out of her.
What should I do? I was not planning to breed of course
Cuddles is back to the living room and I turned off the light in the kitchen



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Sun Mar 06, 2016 5:43 pm 
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It might be too late to use long nights on her. Do the birds spend the night in a room where the light won't disturb the humans? If so you could try leaving the lights on for three days straight - no darkness at all. I've never tried it myself, but it's supposed to be a good way to disrupt egg laying. She's likely to lay at least one more egg before she stops.



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Sun Mar 06, 2016 6:57 pm 
Cockatiel
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they sleep in my bedroom in complete darkness.
honestly 3 days of light seems a little bit extreme (taking into consideration I have 10 birds)
for now, I have simple questions - do I leave the egg there? tomorrow there will be a whole bunch of birds there. They all love spending time in that box. Won't seeing an egg provoke younger birds to lay as well? they have never seen an egg yet.
She is not being protective of it yet but she just laid it. Usually they spend mornings in the kitchen because sun rises on that side, then they relocate to the living room in the afternoon. Our house is rather dark, so they move with natural sunlight



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Sun Mar 06, 2016 7:20 pm 
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Name: Carolyn
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If you leave the box there it's pretty much guaranteed that she'll lay more eggs there. It would be best to replace the box with something that doesn't seem like a nest. Like maybe a closed box.

Three days of continuous light IS extreme. That's the basic idea - to confuse them so they don't know when it's day or night or what season it is, so they decide that it's not a good idea to breed right now.

Hold onto the egg for now. If you find that you can't stop her from laying eggs you can give it back to her.



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Sun Mar 06, 2016 7:44 pm 
Cockatiel
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this is what it looks like (this is where she fell in the past between the fridge and the wall and got stuck there), do I need to re-organize this area getting rid of both boxes and replacing them with something else? and remove/hide the egg, right? this area is dangerous by itself. There is a hanging cabinet above the fridge, they can walk on top of the fridge under the cabinet, and if they fall behind the fridge, I won't even know that bird is in there, and the bird would be trapped.
You can see her egg in the box on the left
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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Sun Mar 06, 2016 9:00 pm 
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You could leave the boxes in place and pile something on top of them so it's not a good nesting place any more.



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Sun Mar 06, 2016 9:12 pm 
Cockatiel
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I am glad that at least I saw it was her who laid that egg. Would be worse if I didn't know who to suspect :)
If I remove the egg/future eggs, wouldn't it cause her to lay and lay more?



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2016 6:54 am 
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She'll lay more unless you do something to disrupt her hormone levels. The three days of continuous light ought to do that, but there are other techniques that may work. But since she's an experienced breeder who is obviously in full breeding mode right now, I'm concerned that something less drastic might not be effective.



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2016 7:35 am 
Cockatiel
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I took away that egg, removed old boxes and put some cereal, etc. boxes on the top of the fridge.

it's actually my fault. Birds shredded straw wreath, and she was playing with the straw for several days there. it really looks like shaving I was using in the nestbox. I needed to remove shredded straw several days ago

Now I am concerned that she won't have a good place to lay another egg and this can be dramatic for all of us.



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 Post subject: Re: problems with Cuddles
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2016 9:24 am 
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Name: Carolyn
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If she's going to lay another egg it'll get laid somewhere. She'll drop it from a perch if a better option isn't available. It won't do any harm to her but it'll be disastrous for the egg of course.



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