My birds had babys! But I dont want to hand feed!

Question
Hi,
I had 2 birds then they layed 3 eggs (more but they died)and know the brother and 1 of the sisters layed eggs. 3 but one died.(Fell out of cage)  So know I have 2 baby birds.  If you want them tame do you have to hand feed them and take them away from their mothers for ten days?  Because to me that sounds to risky.  If one of the babys has red eyes does that mean that its blind.  And do you know if the brother and sister getting married had any thing to do with it?
Thanks,
Lexie

Answer
Hi, Lexie.  Thanks for posting!

Handfeeding allows the baby birds to imprint to humans, thus, allowing them to become tame toward humans.  If baby birds don't imprint to humans, they will not be tame.  Sometimes it's possible to tame baby birds without handfeeding them if you handle them several times per day then put them back with the parents.  However, this usually doesn't work with most baby birds.  So if you want to be sure your babies are tame, you need to handfeed them.  Handfeeding means you remove them completely from the parents when they are about 10 days old and handfeed them until they are ready to wean, then you wean them.  You also have to teach them the things they need to learn that the parents would have taught them.  You've been misinformed if you've been told you only remove the babies for 10 days.  Once you remove babies for handfeeding, you would not put them back with their parents.  Once babies are removed from parents for a day or longer (depending on the particular birds), the parents usually don't recognize those babies as their own and most pairs won't accept them back.

Babies may look like they have red eyes when they are young, but their eyes are most likely dark (unless the bird is all white).  If any of the babies continue to have red eyes as it gets older, this means it's albino.  Red eyes (albino) doesn't mean a bird is blind.

You SHOULD NOT allow brothers and sisters to mate.  Babies could end up being deformed, crippled, brain damaged, etc.  It's very difficult to care for a deformed/crippled/handicapped bird, so separate these birds if they are breeding and producing offspring so they do not mate.  You should also not allow fathers/mothers to mate with their offspring.

Chrys