Expert: Chrys Meatyard - 4/12/2008

Question
hi!
i have 11 budgies and 2 mated. the female(Aqua) had mated many times before i wanted her to stop. so, i seperated the male and the female. the female is still raising the babies. the male,(Jojo), went into a different cage and he started to act erratically. i didn't know what to do so  i just made him content in hiss new home. one day, i was feeding my birds so veggies when i saw Aqua seedfeeding with another bird in her cage. did one of the birds in Aqua's cage help replace Jojo? What do i do? After this clutch, i don't want Aqua to lay any more eggs. Please help. i don not know what to do!

Answer
Hi, Katelyn,

After helping you previously, I knew you were going to run into a situation like this eventually!

Normally, birds mate for life.  Since you took JoJo away from Aqua, she found another mate on her own.  This is what animals do, they reproduce.  This is why they are on the earth.  This is why you need to keep pairs of birds in their own breeding cages (not all birds together in one cage).  If you do this, you can control their breeding.  

If you don't want Aqua to lay any more eggs, you'll need to separate her from any males because obviously it isn't working keeping them together.  You need to get control of their breeding or you can breed them to death.  Remove nesting boxes, keep available light down to 8-10 hours per day to discourage breeding.  You can also take Aqua to a certified avian vet for a hormone shot to keep her from breeding for a while.  If you don't want your other keets to lay eggs, you'll need to keep females in 1 cage, males in another.  I keep females and males together all year round and they don't breed unless I remove the bonded pairs into their breeding cages, keep the light on 16 hours per day, and add a nesting box.  You'll be overrun with birds if you don't control breeding.

Chrys