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| In spite of his mother's assistance, this baby didn't survive. His four older siblings did. |
Fuchsia's fifth egg didn't quite make it.
As you can see from this photo, the hen attempted to help this one out of the egg, but too late, I think. Yesterday only his beak and cere were showing through a small hole. This morning, it was as you see it.
Fuchsia had pushed the dead baby-in-egg out in front of her, making it easy for me to remove it from the nest. Her other four babies were huddled under her. She made no protest.
Judging from other egg shells with "serrated" edges, I believe she may have helped some of them out of their shells too.
Sadly, this baby would have had pink eyes. Happily, there is still one other baby in the nest with pink eyes. My husband believes the birds with these light colored eyes are genetically not as strong as the others. I hope he's wrong. We have four from earlier clutches who appear strong. One is out of Rhett & Cherry, two from Rosie and Pretty Boy and one from Fuchsia and Flame plus the one still in the nest.
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| Same baby removed from shell. His neck looks odd to me. Perhaps a reason for his demise? Or, the dark belly? |
After removing the egg/baby, I put warm water around the shell and removed the embryo. I didn't expect it to revive, but gave it a shot anyway.
One sign of a truly dead bird is if its eyes are sunken. These partially were. I was certain it was dead, but still warmed it and watched it before discarding it. Even if I'd intervened early yesterday, I doubt he'd have survived. If he couldn't get out of the shell, then there was probably something else wrong with him. Sad, but Fuchsia has four others! ;-)
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| Eyes are slightly sunken. They would have been pink, not dark like most Bourke parakeets. |
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