Fertility - 10 eggs?!?!

john e · Thu May 30, 2013 7:21 pm

It has been an odd year regarding fertility. I have all 12 compartments on my Trendsetter with nesting pairs. In one nest, one egg was laid and then there was a drop in temperature. 5 days passed and then one egg per day was added for a total of 5 more. However, only the one egg produced a hatchling - the rest were bad.

I also have a nest with 10 eggs and I'm not sure what to make of it. According to the prognosticator, there should have been hatchlings 2 days ago but I just have eggs. Could it be that two females are laying eggs in the same nest?

Any comments appreciated.

Leandortree · Thu May 30, 2013 8:31 pm

Hi John,
Regarding the ten eggs, I would think there are two clutches of egg in that nest! If the hen has been incubating all ten eggs ,I would be surprised if any of the ten hatch. Ten eggs is far too many for a martin to incubate successfully. The hen will move all the eggs many times every day during incubation each time see moves them a different egg or two gets cold , so none will hatch. Well perhaps a few could get lucky. I hope I'm wrong ,and all ten hatch.

I wish you good luck with the ten eggs, and with your martin colony this year.

msalcido · Fri May 31, 2013 1:07 pm

Hi John,
I also had a gourd that had 10 eggs in it, which really surprised me. Unfortunately or fortunately, last weekend when I did a nest check, there were only five in the gourds, so I'm thinking the parents knew which were the "bad" ones and got rid of them.

Let us know what happens with yours.

Thanks.

chickadee · Fri May 31, 2013 1:36 pm

a cow bird?lol) I would say more then one female maybe? and I would leave them alone. I have learned the hard way not to mess with eggs.

Scully · Fri May 31, 2013 1:56 pm

This was a ten eggs clutch, tho only nine are visible here...

Checked our records, that was in a Big Bo gourd in 2006, none hatched. But in 2008 we had four hatch out of a nine egg clutch.

So I too would leave those eggs be, and wait and see what happens.

Mike Scully

chickadee · Fri May 31, 2013 1:59 pm

scully,nice picture. did those martins leave any leafs for the rest? lol)

john e · Fri May 31, 2013 2:32 pm

So sad to think that all of these will be bad eggs.....

Scully · Fri May 31, 2013 5:17 pm

Chickadee,

Live Oak is a common tree down here, dating back to prairie days when we were technically live oak savannah; that is tall grass interspersed with mottes (clumps) of live oak.

Live Oak here remains generally green all year round but does shed a great many leaves in February. That is where all those dead leaves came from. Martins may prefer them for nest building over anything else, but that may because when they are there on the ground, there's always a bunch.

Mike Scully

john e · Thu Jun 06, 2013 9:25 am

The next day I checked the 10 eggs....there were only 8.
The next day there were 5 eggs and one had hatched.
The next day there were 4 babies and one egg
Kinda odd, but I am happy to get 4 babies....feared they would all be bad!

Leandortree · Thu Jun 06, 2013 9:46 am

Hi John,
That is really interesting, a very good outcome, 4 chicks is a lot better than none for sure!
I wish you great luck with your colony .

Dave W · Fri Jun 07, 2013 11:00 am

Do these birds egg dump like hen Wood Ducks? Seems like they are determinate layers unlike chickens and ducks..but I've found several eggs in an empty compartment with no nest, just scattered in the wheat straw. In another compartment 3 eggs were pushed out of the nest and up close to the door. I'm thinking a subadult male who has been raising cain around here. I shot one sparrow immediately upon his arrival so I don't think he is to blame. If so, he paid the ultimate price.