Expert: Marie Charon - 11/1/2009

Question
Our female parakeet laid 5 eggs and sat on them for the recommended time frame.  Then one day she just quit sitting on them. After that she took them out of the nest.  Did she know they weren't going to hatch or why would she do this?

Also our male and female started fighting during the time she was sitting on the eggs.  They drew blood on each other so we separated them.  Would that cause her to not sit on the eggs?  We put them back together after a day to see if they would get along again.  

Answer
If the birds are attacking each other, especially to the point of really fighting and drawing blood they MUST be separated for the safety of each. It wouldn't cause the female to abandon the eggs.

Probably they didn't hatch, or she sensed issue within them, and she just gave them up. It could be for a lot of reason, who can say what really goes on in a birds head? smiles, these sort of issues happen with breeding birds... You didn't cause it, so rest easy.

Marie