breeding diamond doves...

[rainefeather19128]

i have 2 diamond doves, one of which is male and the other one female.i have placed nesting material in their cage but no actions have been made as of yet.what is wrong,what am i doing wrong?

[The Boy With The Birds]

diamond doves are very profilic breeders, WHEN their environment is to their liking. My diamond doves are in a large planted cage, and will never nest in open areas, only in the most dense, secretive part of the aviary they can find and the only way i notice is when venturing down to the aviary seeing what used to be 4 diamond doves is now 6.
I have also tried to get a friend into the birds and he was going to get zebra finches, but in the same shop he saw the diamonds and was hooked. He had no aviary just a cage about 1 metre tall and 0.5 m wide. He just had the pair. Since they were his first birds he expected them to breed pretty much straight away. He had a nest in the corner and feed down the bottum. then besides, everything was open, months went by, nothing just flightier and flightier biords, after 4 months he rang me saying that there was no action what so ever. That weekend i went to his house. The birds were scalped and there red orbit skin near the beak was bleeding.

the problem was no shelter at all.
i hung a perment cloth with cable ties around the back and one side of the cage. i filled the bottum of the cage thick with dry grass tussocks (he lives on a farm)
and near the nest i hung tea-tree bush covering practically the whole nst from sight. never worry about the birds not getting the nest as they always seem to with much ease. After continuing another 2 weeks of life he rang again saying tat then hen was sitting on the nest, while the cock bird brang fine grass from the bottum to line the artificial site, 1 week later an eggs and 2 days later a second egg. 2 weeks went buy to babies and another 2, 2 healthy fledglings and the parents went straight down to double clutch.
so thats my key with breeding diamond doves
privacy privacy privacy is the key.

also make shore you have a pair, the main way most sex them is by orbital eye ring, the males being larger and more red. But instead of using one i use 3 to make shore.
1. eye ring
2. wing spots maybe bigger and be doubled on a males wings.
3. and it seems that females are somewhat greyer.

use all three of these and you will most probably be guarenteed a pair.

hope this helps, but if you are shore they are a pair, privacy maybe your problem with this species.

[rainefeather19128]

problem, she just laid in a cage covered with a white blanket...nothing was in the nest.she was restless the day befoure(paced and fluttered her wings) and today i find one egg in the nest.help?

[The Boy With The Birds]

first time breeding i'd say- they are a stressful and shy species.
try changing the white blanket.
white scares birds more than any other colour. When i work in the bird shop, and a bird gets out we had brought a brand new new with an extendable handle, white as anything. it took me half an hour to catch the little quaker before returning it to its cage.
by dying the black it takes me half the time as the birds just dont seem to fly where the'res white.
id just say it was first time parenting though, she mucked up all her timing, she didnt plan it out properly and i think thats why she was stressed, she could feel it coming but had know nest built.
hopefullly second time around

[rainefeather19128]

she hasn't laid another since the infertile one was laid.i changed the blanket to a bluish/green one i had. i find it funny since they did not seem bad at all with white but tottaly flipped out when i had a red shirt on today.they also flipped when i brough a red blanket in the room the other day.i now know red for them is out the window.

[sethooo]

omg my birds dont like red lol just thought i would add lol