Help please - baby lovebirds and worried!

[casrmb]

Hi, need some help please. I got a pair of lovebirds last year in September, they starting mating and laid 8 eggs. I have worked out my lovebirds are only about 11 months old? 4 eggs hatched and 4 never did. 3 are 2 weeks old and 1 is just over a week old. I have watched carefully and the mother has been feeding the babies. When the male goes near the nesting box, the female is very protective and normally bites him. He has lmiped a few times and had a cut food which i presume is where she bit him, but this has healed now. I noticed that the mum had blood on its front the other day so checked the babies. The 1 week old baby looks like it has been bitten on the head . I left all the babies altogether as through it would be best but when i came home yesterday, i noticed the male coming out of the nesting box and a really lous sqeeking noise. I took all the babies out and the 1 week old bably had cut all over its head and boby - it was really upsetting. I made it a special little box to keep it warm and with my hand feed fomula i brought (in case of any emergencies) i hand fed it, and it ate food. The other babies have a few sracthes and cuts to them, but i think the mum is still feeding them, however she seems to let the male near the cage whereas before, she would go mad and bite the male. I kept the tiny baby out last night and fed him and he seems to be moving about quite a bit so am hoping that he may survive but i couldnt fave putting him back in the nesting box and coming home to find him bitten even more or worse than that. If i return home later and the birds have more cuts on what do i do? I did notice last week that the birds were mating again!!! so im not sure if she will forget about her babies and start making a new nest if she is mating, or whether she will keep feeding them? My main concern is what happens if they have more cuts on them later? I dont actually know if it is mum or dad doing it, how can i tell? I love my birds and would not want anything to happen to them The y are blue masked lovebirds and mum and dad are called George and Mildred im not sure what to call the babies yet as not sure what sex they are. As the are 2 weeks old, is it ok to hold then and handle them, then put them back into the nesting box?

 

[MarciaLove]

first off 11 months is too young to breed and they sound like terrible parents! I would remove all the babies and handfeed them until they are weaned and separate the parents so they wont breed again until they are older. The parents are biting the babies because they want to mate again and they are trying to send the other babies away this is very common in lovebirds that are too young to breed but still do it eventually they will kill all the babies so they can start again with a new clutch that is why you NEED to remove the babies for handfeeding and separate the parents so they dont mate agian! you should be handling the babies every day from when they are 1 week old so they get used to humans thats what I do. Check my youtube channel in my signature for some videos of setting up a brooder box the babies will need one to be safe,warm!

 

[MarciaLove]

also here is some info on time to handfeed and temperature.temperature between 102 degrees F -110 degrees F
3 weeks old: 4 feedings every 4 hours Just fill those crops until they look and feel like a full balloon. At 3.5 weeks old, the babies will start to chew on their bedding. This is the time to introduce “big bird” food
4 weeks old: 3-4 feedings every 6 hours Never drop their feedings to three until you know that they are eating the normal food on a regular basis.
5 weeks old: 2-3 feedings every 12-8 hours if some of the babies are screaming.
At 5.5 weeks of age the babies will start to fly. Some babies at this time will take up to 8 cc or more of formula per feeding.
6 weeks old: 1-2 feeding per day babies can feed from 7-10 ccs at this point.
7 weeks old: A baby should wean at anytime now. If they do not cry for their evening feeding, then do not give it to them. At 7 weeks, we introduce cooked foods, fruits, sprouts, and veggies. The babies will see the adults eating the food and will follow their lead.
8 weeks old: Weaned. If you decide to clip, never clip a bird before they wean or they might not ever see a reason to get off the baby food. This is nature’s way: stop begging, get off Momma’s fat baby food, and fly! Even though socialization starts as early as two weeks, true socialization actually starts the week babies wean.
P.S. Some babies take longer to wean.
Always feed the baby from your right, to the left. Point the syringe into the beak on the right (your right) side of the beak, and slightly slant it towards the back of the throat. But just slightly. Let the baby pull away to breathe if it needs to. Support the baby’s head with your thumb and ring finger, while your middle finger supports the back of the head as you feed.

 

[crimson]

I agree with Marcia, although I don't think they are terrible parents, they are inexperienced, which is why this has happened.
remove the chicks at once, and keep the parents separated to prevent future mating until they older.
Hens are fiercely protective when nesting and will kill anything that comes near, mates included, sometimes the babies get caught in the cross fire and become an unfortunate target.
If you want them hand tamed, it's best to pull them from the nest around 2-2.5 weeks of age, anything earlier is not necessary, although handling and returning them into the nesting box would be beneficial, as long as the parents are accepting of that.

Once I had a seasoned pair of lovebirds, ove the age of two, they had produced many successful clutches prior to me owning them.
One day, for no apparent reason, my female went ballistic on my male, almost killing him. I came home to him lying on the bottom of the cage, bleeding profusely from his leg. He had many puncture wounds, and the cage was full of blood. I checked the nesting box, and she had killed two of her chicks, 2 left remaining were un touched.
I nursed my male back to health, raised the chicks, sold the female, and found my male a good home....never to put them back in the same cage ever again.
good for you for checking on them.

 

[Wdlodge]

Wow? I wonder if that is with just lovebirds or are all birds capable of this behavior?

 

[crimson]

Wow? I wonder if that is with just lovebirds or are all birds capable of this behavior?

what I have found is it really depends on the bird itself, and how tolerant they are of intrusions, from humans or even their mates.
conures tend to have similar behaviour.