When Do Baby Lovebirds Leave the Nesting Box?

Lovebirds lay clutches of four and six eggs. As the baby birds grow, their nesting box will become crowded; it will be difficult for so many birds to coexist comfortably in the box. It is normal for baby lovebirds to leave the crowded nesting box when they are mature enough to begin caring for themselves.

  1. Lovebird Reproduction

    • Lovebird eggs hatch 22 to 25 days after they were first laid. The female and male birds both incubate and care for the eggs and hatchlings. Caring for the baby birds is a time-consuming activity that requires both parents to feed each individual nestling. If the baby lovebirds are removed from the parents before they can feed themselves, they will have to be hand-fed by a person until they are ready to feed on their own.

    Weaning

    • Baby lovebirds wean themselves naturally from their parents when they are approximately 8 weeks old and have developed all of their feathers so that they are able to fly. Baby lovebirds who are fully weaned can find and eat their own food and do not require hand-feeding or continued feedings from their parents. In a natural environment, baby lovebirds who have been weaned will move out of the nest.

    Taming Baby Birds

    • The younger your baby lovebirds are when you start handling them, the easier it will be for you to successfully tame them. Tame baby birds tend to make better pets than those who are not used to being handled by humans until a later age. It is common for lovebird breeders to remove baby lovebirds from the nesting box before they are old enough to be weaned so the breeder can begin taming them.

    Hand-Taming

    • You can remove baby lovebirds whom you're hand-taming from the nesting box when they are less than a month old. Young baby birds who have been removed from the nesting box are hand-fed and handled regularly to tame them. If your adult birds are social and do not mind allowing you to handle the babies, you may be able to remove young chicks for handling every day and then return them to the nesting box so the parents will continue feeding and caring for the chicks. Not all adult birds will allow you to remove chicks from the nest and then care for those same chicks once they have been returned, Consider your birds' unique personalities before you try this method.