Well it seems my little “Chicken” has laid her first egg, at least while in my care. After weeks of doing her little mating call (and dance), she produced what I feared she would—one little white egg.
My first thought was to pull the egg out of her cage, but after doing a little research (reliable online sources) I’ve found that it is best to allow her as much time with the egg until she decided not to incubate it (sit on it) anymore. See, she has no mate to fertilize the egg and it will not produce any little birdies (of course there was that time I allowed her and Tweeter Bird to share Millets…Humm…just kidding). This could be a few days or up to a month before she is willing to leave the egg, but once she grows tired of sitting on it and a baby doesn’t hatch, she will move away. Then I get the pleasure of snatching the little gem and hope she won’t feel the need to replace it. Hence this is why I wait, otherwise they will feel lose and try to reproduce for what is missing.
I’m happy that I checked about this before just rushing into the cage for the egg, as it also stresses the importance of allowing the hen the time to nest. And that if I were to remove the egg now, she will miss it and produce another one. This would be bad, especially if I did this more than twice, as producing the egg internally is very taxing on the bird and requires a lot of calcium. If the bird keeps producing eggs and doesn’t have the adequate health or nutrient daily, the calcium will be drawn from the bird’s bones and this would end up putting a bird in distress and eventually killing them.
So I wait, pray it won’t take her long to realized no baby bird will appear and she will return to a more normal state of habits. Until then, I just keep her comfortable and I watch to make sure she doesn’t have any more or when she grows tired of waiting…bam that little sucker is coming out. Pictures later, but right now my little hissing hen is nesting and trying to be a really good mommy to a little white egg.
My first thought was to pull the egg out of her cage, but after doing a little research (reliable online sources) I’ve found that it is best to allow her as much time with the egg until she decided not to incubate it (sit on it) anymore. See, she has no mate to fertilize the egg and it will not produce any little birdies (of course there was that time I allowed her and Tweeter Bird to share Millets…Humm…just kidding). This could be a few days or up to a month before she is willing to leave the egg, but once she grows tired of sitting on it and a baby doesn’t hatch, she will move away. Then I get the pleasure of snatching the little gem and hope she won’t feel the need to replace it. Hence this is why I wait, otherwise they will feel lose and try to reproduce for what is missing.
I’m happy that I checked about this before just rushing into the cage for the egg, as it also stresses the importance of allowing the hen the time to nest. And that if I were to remove the egg now, she will miss it and produce another one. This would be bad, especially if I did this more than twice, as producing the egg internally is very taxing on the bird and requires a lot of calcium. If the bird keeps producing eggs and doesn’t have the adequate health or nutrient daily, the calcium will be drawn from the bird’s bones and this would end up putting a bird in distress and eventually killing them.
So I wait, pray it won’t take her long to realized no baby bird will appear and she will return to a more normal state of habits. Until then, I just keep her comfortable and I watch to make sure she doesn’t have any more or when she grows tired of waiting…bam that little sucker is coming out. Pictures later, but right now my little hissing hen is nesting and trying to be a really good mommy to a little white egg.
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