Gouldian chick changed nests

[bob21358]

I have a mixed aviary of red headed and black headed Gouldians.
Two nest boxes have chicks in them.
One nest box has a single chick from red headed Gouldians.
The other nest box has 5 chicks from black headed Gouldians. These are about a week younger than the red headed Gouldian.

On the weekend, I banded your red-headed Gouldian chick as it was about to leave the nest box.

After I banded it, I put it back in the nest box. When I left the aviary, it had left the nest box and was crashing into the wire in the aviary as it was attempting to fly around. I thought that was lucky that I banded it just in time.

A couple of days later I could not see the chick. I checked the nest box and it was not there (but there are 3 new eggs). I looked around the aviary fearing the worse. Still could not find it. I then looked in the black headed nest box with the 5 chicks. And yes it was in there!

So the red headed chick and got into the black headed nest box.

Didn’t know what to do, but thought it best to take the red headed chick out as I thought it might be monopolising the food. So again it was flying around the aviary crashing into the wire.

But as I was watching it - it flew to the nest box and jumped back in with the black headed chicks!!

Oh well – I hope the other chicks are getting a feed!

[maureen_g]

Haha!!! That's wonderful!! What a smart little chick!!

[bob21358]

Just an update - a bit sad.

Found the gouldian nest changer dead next to the seed bowl - obviously the original parents were not feeding and the "adopted" parents were not feeding it either.

Oh well. Next time I see it happening will most probably hand feed it.

[finchbreeder]

Huge thunderstorm the night before last, and I check the Gouldian nests in the morning. The young pair, 6 month old hen and 18 month old cock with 1 chick. Mum is dead on the nest and youngun has an empty crop. Removed Mum and waited to see what Dad whould do. He fed the chick to the hilt. The mature hen with the other 18 month old cock have 5 healthy young about the same age, so just before nightfall the single chick got marked under the wing with food colouring and moved in with them.
LML