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Help with my bluebirds

14 years ago

For the second year in a row now I have BB babies that have not hatched. The female layed 6 eggs on May 28 and 29 and today is June 17 and none have hatched. It has not seemed that she has spent a lot of time on the next and the male has not been around much. I live in the Mts. of Eastern Oregon and we have had a cold wet Spring. today I felt the eggs and they are cold. What should I do???? should I remove the eggs, nest?? We have 4 other boxes made especially for the BB but they are all unoccupied. Will they try again? Can someone help me in deciding what to do. We miss our little families.

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Comments (4)

dzyg
14 years ago
Bluebirds lay one egg per day until the clutch is complete. Did she start laying eggs on May 28th or was she done laying all six eggs on the 29th? If she started laying on the 28th then the last egg would have been laid on the 2nd of June which would make this 15 days since incubation started. They start incubating normally the day the last egg was laid and incubation is typically 12-14 days but can be as long as 20 days. If she was done laying eggs on the 29th then this would be day 19 of incubation. Either way I would keep waiting to see what happens. It is too early to say they won't be hatching and I would definately not be removing those eggs. If you want to know if the female is incubating them you could put a small dot with a marker on one of the eggs, look the next day to see if it has been moved as the female will rotate the eggs during incubation. You should not touch eggs with your bare hands as the oils from your hands can clog the pores on the eggs and cause them to not develop. These should be close to hatching though so I "think" it will be ok. Good luck and just be patient.

Donna
simplyabiding
Original Author
14 years ago
Thanks Donna, I know that there should be one egg a day laid as it has been over the last 3 years but this year I checked the nest on the 27th and no eggs, the 28th there was 2 eggs and on the 29th there were 6 eggs. (strange-4 in one day). So the last eggs were laid on the 29th. I have touched the eggs twice, just this morning was the 2nd time and discovered they were cold, but normally just tipped the nest a little to peek. I certainly hope I've not caused them not to hatch. Hopefully you are right and they are just late. Thanks again.
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Appreciate the good advice. The other boxes have been monitored, but the female of that partciular pair was more skittish than usual. The male had shown her the nest several times over about 3 weeks and she just didn't want to be there because it is such close proximity to my front door and us walking around to our garden. We sit around out front and the other pair sees us, but they are still very hesitant to go into the house while we are there but I love that they are getting used to us. Hopefully, they will all be safe while we are out of town for a few days. :-/ This concerns me, but family responsibilities are calling.
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simplyabiding
Original Author
14 years ago
I just checked the next after seeing the female at the next and lots of chirping. She has now begun building a new nest over the old one. I'm assuming the 6 eggs are still in the old nest under the new one. Now I guess it's "wait and see" as she must be starting over again.
dzyg
14 years ago
Sounds like she must have given up on the first eggs. Hopefully these next ones will hatch ok.

Donna

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