FEATURE


After a quiet period in June and July, we had another egg on the 15th of August 2012. Because the female didn´t incubate at all, this egg had to be put in an incubator as well. After five days it was clear that the egg was fertilized, and 11 days later the first hummingbird chick finally hatched in Weltvogelpark Walsrode! Although the chick made a hole in the shell on its own, it was not able to hatch without our help and it weighed only 0.37 grams! The chick was hand reared in an artificial nest placed in a separate incubator. Initially, it only received some water, but after 24 hours, when the yolk sack was completely absorbed, we started feeding nectar and flies. The chick was fed every 20 minutes from 8.00 am to 11.00 pm and was left to rest during the night. Although the chick was begging very actively during the first two days, it looked very weak on the third morning and died a few hours later. It took some time before we had another chance to breed these beautiful birds, but in November, one of our females started laying again. We were able to monitor the breeding behavior by placing a camera above her nest. The female laid two fertilized eggs and incubated them perfectly. On the morning of December 8th, we were very happy to find one healthy looking chick in her nest! It hatched completely on its own on the 16th day of incubation. A few hours later it got even better: the second chick started hatching! This chick also hatched on its own, after only 15 days of incubation. The female took good care of both chicks. She was constantly catching flies to feed to her chicks and in between she was cleaning or incubating them. The chicks clearly received an enormous amount of flies, causing their crops to grow as big as their heads. Both chicks grew very fast and were begging actively. After a week, their eyes started opening and after 10 days the mother stopped incubating them


during the night. Sadly, on the 12th day after hatching, one of the chicks got some food in its trachea when it was being fed by the mother. We couldn’t do anything, and the chick died within two minutes. Fortunately, the other chick kept on growing and after a while it was sitting on the edge of the nest, curiously looking at the world around it. During this period we started feeding the chick with a feeding tube, so it would recognize feeding tubes after fledging. On the 7th of January 2013, the chick took its first flight and made a clumsy landing on the floor of the aviary. During the next days it became better and better at flying and it started feeding from a feeding tube on its own. A couple of days after fledging, the chick was separated from its mother and Weltvogelpark Walsrode had its first fully grown hummingbird chick! Two months after the first chick fledged, an egg was once again abandoned by its mother. The fertilized egg was put in our incubator, and on the 14th of March, a chick hatched after 15 days of incubation. Once again, we tried the best we could to hand rear this tiny bird, and this time our efforts paid off!


BIRD SCENE 00


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