breeding cockatiles

Question
how do you breed cockatiles?

Answer
The first step is to make sure you have a male and a female, of course.  The second is to make sure they're bonded, i.e. living in the same cage peacefully and engaging in behaviors like sitting next to each other, preening each other, and whistling to each other.

The third is to wait until they're old enough.  'Tiels CAN breed as early as 8-10 months old, but I would avoid breeding them at that age, they just don't have the maturity.  Personally, I wait until my males are at least a year old and the females closer to 16-18 months.  If you wait till this age, they're much more likely to be successful with their first clutch and make good parents.  It's also much better for the female's health to wait.

You can usually trigger breeding simply by putting up a nestbox.  Most standard cockatiel boxes are fine, they run about 10" or 12" square.  Place a layer of aspen shavings about 1"-2" thick on the bottom.  Don't use pine or cedar - they've been known to irritate the respiratory tract and cause infections.

It's important that the parents are on a good diet, otherwise their health and the health of their chicks will be less than top notch.  For breeding, high protein foods are important, such as sprouts and egg food.  My 'tiels also seem to demand quite a lot of dark leafy greens while breeding.  These foods need to be available daily while the birds are on eggs, and perhaps even two-three times daily while they're feeding young chicks.  I've seen very young chicks die when the parents didn't have soft foods available.  I'm not sure why this is, perhaps only because plain seed or pellets are too dry for the chicks to digest properly, but I've never seen it occur when the parents had soft foods available to them at all times.

'Tiels lay between 3-6 eggs (rarely more or less), laying one everyday or every other day.  They hatch after about 18-21 days of incubation.  If you want to hand-feed, the chicks can be pulled from the nest at about 2 weeks. If you don't hand-feed, they'll leave the nest at about 4-5 weeks.  They usually wean at about 7-8 weeks.

Most cockatiels are easy breeders and will lay within 2-4 weeks of having a nestbox put up.  There are certainly exceptions, though, and problems do crop up - pairs that won't lay, infertile eggs, bad parents etc.  It's best to do a lot of reading in preparation for problems, even though things will probably go on without a hitch.

I'd also think hard before bringing more birds into the world.  Do you have plans for the babies?  Cockatiels can be difficult to sell in some areas where there just isn't much demand for them.  There's also already a lot of cockatiels in need of homes... you'd probably be surprised how many turn up at animal shelters, or are even let loose because their owners no longer want them.  Cockatiels also take a lot of time and effort to raise properly - especially if you choose to hand-feed, but even if you don't the parents need extra care, and you need to be prepared for emergencies.  I also really recommend that new breeders have a good avian vet they're willing to call if they need to.  Baby birds are especially prone to infections and accidents that may need vet care.

Here's a website with many different articles on breeding cockatiels:
http://www.cockatiels.org/articles/breeding/breeding.html

- Lara
psitta@yahoo.com