Aussie Finch Forum

Had been eagerly awaiting the fledging of my stars and returned home yesterday after a week away hoping to see them. Was greeted by no young stars but there were 4 young goulds out that werent there last week. I expected those anyway. Anyhow spied a young chick on floor (just getting pin feathers on wings, eyes not quite open) went in the avairy to replace him in the box. Returned it to his 6 other nestmates. Everything OK. Decided to check the nestbox where the stars were. Nothing, zero, zip, although there was evidence that there had been chick/s in there by the state of the nest. Anyhow, to cut a long story short, feeding the birds this morning and decided to sit an watch for a while. Then I saw it! A gould chick chasing the stars and begging to be fed. Then the stars started feeding it, both yellow cock and red hen. How strange! The only thing I can think of is that the goulds have laid in the nest and the stars have raised them.

Anyone else had similar things?

I've had Stars and other species regularly feeding other species' fledglings which were not raised by the Stars. So this is a possibility. In one breeding aviary at the moment every clutch of young Orangebreasts beg from the Stars & get topped up after fledging & the Stars raised a few clutches of their own at the same time.