Hi, I have a nearly two year...

Question
Hi, I have a nearly two year old female cockatiel, I'd like to have a few clutches of chicks, if I get a 5/6 month old male will they bond and breed? how long will it take them to bond? also I have this cage that I had made for rabbits its all wire the holes are 1 inch square(I had my tiel in a smaller cage like this befre she never got out or got stuck) this cage is 42 inches long 28 inches tall and 28 inches wide, how many tiels could live in this?(I'd like to keep a few babies) how big shou,d the nesting box be?

Answer
Hello,

First off, If you are intending to breed, then you'll want to get a male that is at LEAST 12 months old. 5 months is quite young, too young to breed, unless you are looking to wait until he is older. I would suggest getting a 10-12 month old male, then by the time they have bonded he will be sexually mature enough. She is the perfect age!

They won't necessarily bond, but I've found with cockatiels, they bond fairly easily. There are many exceptions, and conditions to this. I have a hen who is only 4, turns out her mate is actually 10 and I tried to repair her to retire her mate (as he has arthritis), and she refused to bond with any males I put in with her. If this is your 'tiels first mate, then she'll likely open up to him fairly quickly. It may take a few weeks to a few months or more for them to bond enough for them to actually raise a family together properly. Signs of proper bonding would be them sitting very close to each other while sleeping, mutual preening of each others heads and crests, snuggling, copying each other (such as when they're preening, they'll both preen the left wing, for example), just a few things. You must be careful to watch for signs of aggression though, you don't want a fight to break out.

What I very highly suggest to everyone introducing two birds to each other is to first keep them in seperate cages side by side, then slowly introduce them, either outside of the cage, OR in a different cage. It must be considered "neutral" territory to them so that neither one will be territorially aggressive to the other. So, if you do plan on using the wire cage, then use that as the neutral area. Now, you say you had a 'tiel in a cage similar to this before with no problems? You may have been lucky. The proper size bar/wire spacing for cockatiels is 1/2" or 5/8"..1" is far too big. I've kept babies in cages with 1" bar spacing and several have stuck their heads through (and back out again) with ease trying to get to me! LOL. I've also had one rather large adult male stick his head through the very wire you speak of. You may take the risk, I've never had any injury come to my birds by using this type of wire spacing, I suppose it just depends on the individual birds. At the moment I do have one pair in a cage with the 1x1" wire and they're just fine with it. I guess its like a catch 22. Sorry to be confusing and contradictary, just want to give you both sides.

In regards to the nesting box, what I usually use is one that is I believe 12" wide(long) by 8" deep and 10" high. Something along those lines works great. I prefer to use the metal nestboxes, which you can usually purchase at your local pet store. You can also use wooden nestboxes that you can make yourself. The diamater of the hole should be about 3" and you should provide a perch right outside the nestbox door.

If you have any other questions, I would be more than happy to answer them!

Sarah

PS: That size of cage is awesome! The bigger the better! :)