Posted: Mon Jun 17, 2013 12:16 am Post subject: Breeding
Hi,
I have been breeding Kakariki's for about 2 years now and have two males and two females. The first cock and hen started mating straight away and I have had 3 clutches of eggs, producing 17 eggs with 15 chicks surviving. I closed the nest box up to give the hen chance to recover for a few months, but the box has been open now for 4 months and no eggs have arrived. We have witnessed them mating as they don't mind a crowd watching . Do I just give them time or has the hen ran her course? Secondly, my second pair are mating but the cock has started to make the mating noise of the hen and lets her climb on top of him. It's funny to watch but it keeps happening even after they have been mating, the cock is nearly a year old, the female a little older and not related in any way. Any suggestions please?????
When we have stopped kakariki pairs from breeding.. be it block /remove nesting boxes, or separate, what ever, we have usually had issue getting them started again, even thu sometimes they are mating...often giving up and pairing them off with other birds.
As to male female exchanging roles... thats strange.
We breed 3 pair all year round for 4 yrs, non stop.
Each pair produced approx 135 to 145 healthy adults.
Up to around 110/120 healthy adults we got around a 80 to 85% ratio of eggs to healthy adults, we consider anything over 75% and one is doing things basically right.
After 120 the ratio dropped off dramatically till around 140 near 100% Of the eggs did not hatch, after 140 none did batch after batch.
Pit the cock with a new female and away again... put the female with new cock, infertile.
The essential thing of breeding for long periods successfully is consistant balanced diets and good environment.
Our birds eat approx 6 times more by weight of veggies , not including fruit and protein meat/ crushed bones....Do u have meat in the diet, that often brings kakariki and many other species into breeding mode withing a few weeks to a month. _________________ My Spelling is Not Incorrect...It's 'Creative'
Posted: Mon Jun 17, 2013 9:47 pm Post subject: Diet
Thanks for that info and no we don't give the Kaks any meat in their diet, which meat would be the best? With living in England I try to substitute some of the vegies with what we have to offer here, they love seedless red grapes and millet.
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