Eggs with holes poked in them

[nav (banned)]

Hi. I've seen similar questions and answers about eggs with holes poked in them, but there's a slight difference in this one.

History and behaviour:
I had two male budgies gifted to my mom. I have no clue how old they are. One was already weak and died, so my mom bought a female budgie (named her Sunshine). I'm told the female was perched close to another bird in the shop they purchased her from (bonded pair I assume), so the female didn't properly bond with the male I have (named him Sky). A month later I saw her perched on a nestbox, and he came next to her. She actually lifted her leg sideways and pushed him such that he fell off the perch. On many other occasions she showed her dislike of him. Two months later, they do preen each other and sit next to each other, but Sunshine is still ambivalent to Sky even though he feeds her. She is always busy with her life and her reflection in the mirror that we kept for Sky when his buddy died, and he keeps following her around the cage and imitating many things she does. Sky seems a bit immature, compared to her. She can fly well for more than a minute and is acrobatic. He can't fly for more than 10 seconds at a time.
A week after they were introduced to each other and even three months later, I've seen him place a leg on her to mate (even when her cere turned dark brown), and she immediately moves away. So I was surprised when she laid an egg.


Just before egg laying:
Two weeks before egg laying, Sunshine was busy chewing a lot on Eucalyptus bark and (real) cuttlebone. She was also constantly examining her nestbox (an earthen pot) from all directions. Three days before egg laying, her cere turned from light brown to dark brown. Still, she never sat inside the nestbox. She always sat on a perch near a mirror.

Egg1:
One morning, I see an egg fallen below the perch near the mirror, and the egg has a hole poked in it.
That morning itself, I noticed the dark brown tinge on her cere started becoming light brown. The same morning, I saw Sky placing a leg on her, apparently to mate, and she moves away from him. Since she laid an egg, I assumed she'd want more calcium, so I offered a cuttlebone, but unlike before, she didn't want to chew on it or the Eucalyptus bark anymore.






Egg2:
Assuming the egg fell down because she was near the mirror, I removed the mirror. Now she took more interest in the nest box, and used to spend more time inside it. Sky followed with his imitation, and he used to get into the pot with her too, occasionally, but just for a few seconds.
One day passes, and the next day at around 2pm in the afternoon, I see a second egg at the bottom of the cage. No damages on it, and Sunshine is perched outside the nestbox. I take the egg and put it inside the nestbox, and Sunshine immediately jumps inside the nestbox, carefully adjusts the egg position and appears to incubate the egg. Sky also seems quite excited at the prospect. By 10pm at night, Sunshine still appears to be incubating the egg, and Sky is perched on top of the nestbox, apparently guarding it.
Next morning, I find both of them outside the nestbox, and the egg has a hole poked in it.
Few hours later, there's also some black object next to the egg. By now her cere does not seem to have the dark brown tinge at all. This is today.



(Click image to view larger)

She threw out the broken egg, and I think she's done with laying eggs for now. She's spending more time outside the nest box, so I've placed the mirror back in the cage.

What's surprising about this episode is:
1. Howcome she didn't use the nestbox the first time to lay the egg? I assumed she didn't understand the concept of an egg.
2. The second time, how did the egg end up at the bottom of the cage when she spent time in the nestbox?
3. She seemed to show interest in incubating, so why would she poke a hole in the egg even if she was calcium deficient? She knows there is cuttlebone nearby. The egg yolk is not a good source of calcium, and the hole on the shell is small. There is plenty of yolk remaining inside the shell too. I highly doubt they poke holes to get calcium. There's also this person saying he provided a calcium source, but no use.
4. What is that black object near the second egg? Does a bird's feces not have space to escape when it is holding an egg?
5. Does a bird know an egg is infertile and break it intentionally? Somehow, I have a strong feeling that Sunshine and Sky didn't actually mate.

[Hezz]

Just because the hen has laid eggs does not mean that there has been any mating going on. Take the coconut out of the cage and let her get back to normal. How do you know it was her who broke the egg? It might have been the male, don't you think? All around the second egg look to be poop to me. A hen in laying mode generally does huge poops, and not so regularly, as the egg, faeces and urine all have to travel the same route through her body.

[nav (banned)]

I'm not saying she poked a hole in the egg. I'm referring to the other posts on the internet which claim that a calcium deficient bird will eat the yolk in her own egg.
I was just considering taking out the earthen nesting pots, and noticed today morning another bump near her tail, which indicates she's going to lay another egg. If this one is also broken, I'll take out the pots.

Two other questions:
1. Does it take around 5 eggs to make a bird seriously calcium deficient?
2. Once the earthen-pot/nesting-box is removed, will she actually stop laying eggs?

[Hezz]

You are going to have to be a bit more pro-active in breaking her laying cycle. We have been through this soooo many times. Move her out of her cage, change around all the "furniture" of the cage, including perches, toys, feeding pots even, shorten her days so she doesn't think it is breeding time, remove her from the mating male.

Take out the pot anyway, regardless of whether this egg is whole or not! She will, generally, lose interest in that egg if she doesn't have anywhere to lay it. As you don't know how long it might take to break her laying cycle, make sure she has a calcium additive in her water. Things like cuttlebone and calcium blocks are sometimes not enough.

[starlingqueen]

It's protein in the yolk, the calcium comes from the shell. A hen that routinely breaks her eggs should not be bred from.

[nav (banned)]

Thank you Hezz. Yes, I had researched the techniques of breaking the cycle, but just wanted to confirm if it could be done while the egg laying cycle is ongoing. So you say it can. Will do.

Thank you too starlingqueen. She's laid her third egg this evening and seems quite protective about it. From the pics you'll see that only a small portion of the shell is broken. So unlikely it was for the calcium. For egg 2, there was a significant amount of yolk still in the shell, so it couldn't be for the protein either.

I didn't know a bird that routinely breaks her eggs shouldn't be bred. I guess that's good advice, but some prior reading on the internet showed that young budgies make these mistakes while learning to be parents. One guy (on the internet) mentioned how his bird broke 4 eggs and didn't break the 5th to the 9th egg.

ps: I don't think the male broke the egg, coz I saw both of them outside the cage this evening and the egg was inside the pot. If the male was jealous or wanted to break it, he could've done it then, but he didn't. Also, the female turned out to dominate, as y'all had predicted. He just follows and imitates her, so I don't think he'd take initiative to break an egg.

[Hezz]

There is another potential problem that I can see - do you know how old the hen is? If she is young, just a year old, then possibly she will mature out of eating her eggs like your fellow on the net found with his; if she is an older bird there is a very real chance that she could become egg-bound, which is a very serious health issue. Budgie hens have a relatively short optimum reproductive span, from 12 months to three years. Any older and their chances of problems increase with their age.

[nav (banned)]

I don't have a clue how old they are, although I'd assume they are reasonably young.
She hasn't broken her third egg yet, and is quite protective about it. Always concerned about it whenever she's out of the pot. Flies back to it immediately when I'm anywhere near it. I see the male still trying to place a leg on her, but she doesn't respond. She's even eaten more of the cuttlebone. Can see another egg bump which means more are on the way.

They had two earthen nest pots. At first she chose the slightly smaller one. I assume that's why the second egg might have broken. Maybe she didn't have enough space to move around, and accidentally cracked it with her foot. Or perhaps because the egg had at first fallen to the bottom of the cage and I put it back in the pot (I've heard of some other species of bird not accepting their chick back in the nest if a human touched it when it fell from the nest). When I saw the third egg coming, I had kept the smaller pot upside down at the bottom of the cage, so she laid the egg in the larger pot.

I think she's just figuring out the concept of an egg and how to take care of it. All seems ok for now. Thank you so much!

[nav (banned)]

She laid her second egg (technically the fourth one, since the first two were broken) and I see a third egg's bump near her tail. She's busy incubating the two eggs she laid.
Also saw the male mating with her before the second egg was laid. Seems like immediately after she's laid an egg, the male tries mating with her.
I feel since she's already laid four eggs on total and a fifth is on the way, it'd be better to separate the male. So the male is now in a smaller cage kept next to the female's cage, so that he can see her. He was very frustrated initially, but calmed down after half an hour.
Thinking of putting both of them back together when it's almost time for the eggs to hatch (with the hope they won't promptly start mating again).
Hope I've done the right thing by separating the male, since I've heard budgies keep laying eggs until they reach a certain number of eggs.

[starlingqueen]

The male should be with the female. He has to feed her while she sits on the eggs.

[nav (banned)]

Even when the male was with her, she used to come out and feed herself. She did so even after he was removed from the cage. I placed him back in the cage with her just now, and he immediately calls her out of the pot for mating :-) Will be taking him out before it happens.
The main question here is whether it's ok to not allow them to mate before the female has laid the standard number of eggs. I think 5 eggs is the standard, right?

[starlingqueen]

She will leave the nest while she is still laying her clutch. Once she has finished lying she will then stay inside for the majority of the time with maybe one or 2 visits outside to stretch her legs. The male is crucial to her at that time and after the chicks have hatched for all her food. And when the chicks are older the male will take over the feeding of the chicks when they leave the nest. She can not do it alone, please leave the male to do what nature has intended.
She can lay 8 or 9 eggs and that doesn't include the ones that were broken. Is she doesn't want to mate then she won't. It is the hen who initiates mating not the male. There is loads of stuff about this all over the internet, please read up about it before the chicks hatch so you know what you are meant to do.

[nav (banned)]

You were right. He does feed her. I had put him back into the cage with her immediately. She went on to lay a total of 6 eggs and 4 have hatched already.
Thanks.

[starlingqueen]

Great news. Congratulations.