When do I take the babies from parents?

[Dakota52]

Hi,
I was just wondering when is a good time to remove the babies from the parents. They will soon be 6 wks. old. I have hand fed and also let the parents feed them. I wanted these to be a bit tamer than the first clutch. Because I work daily I couldn't hand fed all the time. The babies were held daily and talked to but now I'm afraid that if they stay with Mom for two long they will not be as dependent on me and will become less tame. I am not a lovebird breeder and will be more careful not to let them hatch out any more babies for at least a year. They had two clutches back to back. I was able to give half of the eggs to another hen that was laying eggs at the same time and she didn't have a mate. So she is very happy with her two babies. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Kay

[birdsnthings]

Actually, you could handle the babies about 15 minutes at a time and give them back to the parents to do all the feeding. You don't need to feed along with the parents. This way they are used to being handled but mom and dad does all the work on raising them.
The babies should wean by the time they are 8 weeks old but carefully watch to make sure the babies aren't attacked by the parents when they come out of the box. It can happen with love birds. I would say another week at the soonest that they would venture out of the box.
Alice

[Dakota52]

Wow, really attacked? These are already comming out of the nestbox. So far the parents are doing well with this.
I have even seen the two older ones eating pellet food. I still hold the babies but now they seem to be afraid of me all. They had been fine with me holding them up to the time they started getting out of the nestbox. Now even the older ones are flying a bit.

Thank you for your quick reply and help.
Kay

[Monica]

Baby chicks normally regress when they are parent raised and handled a little bit while in the box. I experienced this with a couple of bourkes, but as soon as they matured a little more they accepted me again... but I had to still work with them to be sure they stayed tame...

[Mr Five]

Hello Kay,

Normally we don't pull the chicks from the parents until we see that they are eating on their own. If they are ones that we're going to sell we pull them normally at 2 weeks for hand feeding. But you've stated that you do not have the time to do this. As long as the hen allows you to take the chick out of the box and play with them a few time a day they will be good birds to sell. I will say that once you've pulled them that you spend more time with them so that they stay tamer.

JM2C

Mr Five

[Dakota52]

Hi,
My babies are now 6 wks. old. They are eating and flying on their own. But they still return to their nestbox at night and when they become afraid. The babies will let me handle them and they have not tried to bite me as of yet. I hope that this continues. I want them to be tame enough to be good pets for someone. I don't really want to get rid of them but as I don't have a lot of free time just now, I will try to find good homes for them. I'm not really interested getting money for them. But know that I should ask something for them. As I said I am not a breeder. But I was in a shop that was selling lovebirds at $75 for creamino's that were not handfed or tame that I could tell. By the way I would have never bought one from there. They all looked a but sick. They had a beautiful little blue babie there that I would have loved to had. But I was afraid to buy it because of the condition of the other birds in the box with it.

[CrazyBirdLady]

If the conditions look bad, that's my first "red flag" sign to say no, even though secretly all of us bird people have this twinge in the heart when we see something like that and want to rescue them all.

At six weeks, you might consider removing the box as it is a safe place for them to hide in, but I've found once they are full feathered, taming is easier without the box. Also, mom and dad might decide to use the box again if it's there to start a new clutch. Keep working with the little ones, having full flight is great for muscle development, but at 6 weeks they are very independent and it's hard to catch a fully flighted baby lovebird that can outmaneuver the best F15 fighter pilots! LOL

[Dakota52]

Thanks for the tip about removing the nestbox. I will do that tomorrow. I had to clip the wings today as they are very hard to catch like you had said. I just give up on letting them have all that space to fly away from me. So I did trim those wings today. They will have to tame down a bit before they can get full flight.

Kay

[birdsnthings]

If the babies are eating on their own you can take them now and put them in their own cage. Continue to handle the babies.
I had a breeder bring in 9, yes nine baby love bird fledgelings to me that the parents started to attack once they came out of the box. One was in bad shape, I had to inject fluids and immediately give him oral fluids to get him to bounce back. Thank goodness the breeder (who didn't know how to hand feed) trusted me to take care of this little one. He was fine but I had to hand feed all the babies at the age of 6 to 7 weeks old. It was a mess and a chore! They all survived and got homes though.
Alice