Why does my bird kicks its babies out of the nest?

Question

At about 2 weeks old my mother finch kicks her young out of the nest to die.

Does anyone know why this would be

Answer 1

reason 1: maybe she wants them to fly or something but she doesn't know they are not ready...... reason 2: that a crazy bird!!!

Answer 2

hi,

reason 1. she is aggressive.

reason 2. she wants them to learn how to fly.

i would recommend u hand fed them and hand raised them

Answer 3

Immaturity is usually the cause.  Birds should be 2 years old before they are allowed to breed.  

If you are breeding her to a brother, the chicks could have a deformity that you can't see but she can sense and she is killing them because of it.  

Please, take the nest out and let them rest.  Finches do not need a nest to sleep in, it only promotes breeding.

Answer 4

because she smells you on them or around them or she feels it is time for them to learn to fly and if they are unable they are not fit to be hers most likley the first one though

Answer 5

It is certainly not because she smells you on them--that's nothing but a load of bunk. Birds won't abandon their babies because they smell human on them, in fact the vast majority of birds cannot smell humans in the first place, so it is not because she smells you on her babies.

It could be from inexperience, perhaps because she is too young to know what to do with them yet, as mentioned before. I doubt it is due to deformation because it normally takes multiple generations before inbreeding creates such problems, and you would certainly not expect to see it happen every single time.

Either way, I would suggest that you stop letting her breed, at least until she is older.

Answer 6

First of all what kind of finch is it, and is there a male in the cage?

If there is a male.. chances are 99 to 1 that is the male doing the chucking, not the hen.

It could be a variety of things from being too young to breed, to an inadequate diet causing stress which leads them to toss, to the bird requiring a very special diet in order to successfully rear chicks (e.g., cordon bleus and other wax/softbills need a LOT of live food in order to successfully raise chicks, and even in the face of an unending amount of live food they sometimes still toss due to the artificial conditions of aviary breeding).

It could also be age in terms of old age.

Either way - you need to examine the conditions they're breeding in. Is the cage big enough? (Most pairs of finches need at least a flight cage of 30" wide) Are you offering a wide variety of foods to feed in frequent amounts? (Egg food, soft food, live food, millet, sprouted seed, etc etc)

These are some things to consider in terms of why it's happening.

Answer 7

Hi,

Hens normally sling the chicks out if they know that the chicks are ill and weak, but its strange that its at two weeks old. Perhaps the chicks could have left on their own and theparents thought they had died and so didn't try looking for them.

What i would try is putting them in a smaller cage and to build a deeper nest box so that its difficult for the chicks to be thrown out.