by Pajarita » Mon Mar 04, 2019 10:28 am
No, the mothers decide if the egg will be fertilized, when it happens (they can store sperm for up to 90 days) and if the baby will be a girl or a boy. It's something that only birds can do. When there is a gender imbalance (more males than females or more females than males), there is something not quite right. You are getting all females because you are feeding too much protein and giving the mother artificially long days so, because the conditions are way too good for breeding, they end up being bad (less is more with birds) so she breeds all the time and produces only females. She is also attacking the babies because she is, most likely, half-depleted by now. Mother birds do NOT attack their babies -neither do the fathers- BUT this requires that the birds are kept under good husbandry: spacious cage, out of cage time to fly, right diet, healthy endocrine system so the bird only breeds during breeding season, etc. I know that this is not what you wanted and that you are concerned about her but your bird has become a chronic layer, is severely overbred and not in the best of health (her endocrine system is screwed up from the diet and the light schedule) and has a diet way too rich in protein for the species but lacking in nutrients.
Most people think that putting a female and male together in the same cage and giving them food, water and a nest is enough for successful breeding but it's not. I breed canaries (very seldom now) and have been doing it for many, many years but I learned from breeders, watching them, asking questions, reading, doing research, etc. before I even started so I don't have the usual problems people have: no gender imbalance, infertile eggs, dead in shell, pecked babies, eggbound hends, off-season weak babies, etc. Please stop breeding your birds because, if you continue, you are going to end up with a dead mother bird and weak and defective babies (depleted birds cannot produce healthy babies - they just don't have the reserves for it).