I don't at all understand not wanting to learn as much as you can about hand-raising/hand-feeding baby birds if you're allowing your birds to breed and the chicks to hatch. I just don't get it...I think that Yumgrinder wanting to let his birds have a clutch so he can personally experience the process is fine (assuming that he's not going to allow them to just breed and breed and breed like Budgies and Cockatiels both will do if you let them), and the fact that he is knowledgeable of parrots and very loving and a responsible owner makes it all the better...
However, this whole "allowing nature to take it's course" thing, and the "I'm not going to intervene, if the chicks die they die because that's what nature has chosen" thing is not only counterintuitive, but it's actually quite cruel and irresponsible...I'm not at all trying to "impose my will" on anyone, and that should be apparent to everyone on this forum, especially considering that many other members in addition to myself, including Christa, have many, many times responded to posts where the OP has allowed their birds to breed and they have baby chicks that they don't know how to care for and that have been rejected by the parent birds with "You need to get the chicks to an Avian Vet immediately", followed by step-by-step instructions on how to hand-feed them, how to make a Brooder, what supplies they'll need, etc...I'm 100% certain that I've not EVER seen anyone tell these OP's to simply "Let the chicks die, don't intervene, it's nature's will if they die", or anything of the like...So why should our advice to Yumgrinder breeding his birds and "planning on allowing the parents to raise and feed the chicks" be any different than the advice we have given every other OP in this position dozens and dozens of times??? In fact, with Yumgrinder our advice should be way more confident in the fact that he is capable of hand-raising and hand-feeding any rejected chicks because we know him and how much he cares for his birds and what a responsible owner he is...Yet we tell total strangers that have never owned a pet bird before that they need to always be ready to tqke-over raising and hand-feeding baby birds even if they are planning on allowing the parents to raise them? How does that make any sense at all?
And let's be real here about this "nature" thing and "not intervening" with the what the parents choose to do with the chicks...First of all, does anyone here, including Yumgrinder, reallyt think that he could sit there and watch a baby bird that has been kicked out of the nest-box by it's mom lay on the bottom of the cage for hours and hours, crying away for hours in pain while it's suffering, and him actually choosing to allow this to happen and allowing the baby to slowly die a long, agonizing death from dehydration and starvation because it is "nature's choice/will", especially when he knows that he is fully able to not only save the baby bird's life, but to hand-raise it into a sweet, loving pet bird for someone? I for one am quite confident in saying that I'm 100% certain that Yumgrinder would not and actually could not allow that to happen, nor listen and watch it happen...So why shouldn't he be totally prepared to take-over raising and hand-feeding a baby if/when this happens? Why should we not do everything we can to educate him, answer all of his questions, and make sure that he has everything that he's going to need?
This isn't "nature" and these are not "wild" birds...These are hand-raised, tame, pet birds who have lived their entire lives in captivity. And though they do retain some of their natural, innate instincts, these instincts do not apply at all to their environment...They will not ever not have enough food or water, they will not ever have to worry about predators, or weather/temperature issues, and they get professional Veterinary care whenever they need it, so they don't have to worry about dying from infections, parasites, etc. So when a natural-instinct kicks in and a parent bird tosses one of it's babies out of the nest-box because it is missing a toe or has a bad wing that will prevent it from flying, do you really think that means that we should "let nature take it's course" and allow the chick to lay there and die a long, painful death when it can live a perfectly normal and wonderful life in captivity with the deformity, or when we can get it Veterinary care and give it antibiotics to take care of the infection or parasites it has? We've done everything we can to try to "domesticate" these birds and make them a part of our own human families. So why in the world would we knowingly allow them to breed in captivity, continue to treat them like they are tame, domesticated birds by feeding them and caring for them, and then suddenly when they reject a baby chick we say "Nope! Hands-off, let it die! It's nature's will!!!"????? Does that sound rational or logical? We all know that our pet birds still innately hide all outward signs and symptoms of illness because they naturallly want to defend against predators...So should we just allow them to die and not take them to the Vet when we think they might be sick, just because this is their natural, innate, "wild" instinct to do so? I don't think so, as again these innate survival-intincts that our birds have retained do not at all apply to the environment that they have been born-into and raised in...
And Yumgrinder, why would you not want to learn everything you can about hand-raising and hand-feeding baby birds and not want to "intervene" if necessary to save the life of one of your bird's babies? Suddenly you're going to treat these babies like they're a "product of nature" and if they die they die, if they live they live? I don't think so, not for a minute...And regardless, this isn't "the wild" and honestly choosing to allow baby birds to starve to death when rejected by their parent-birds is a really horrible time to choose to start treating them like they aren't your pets, because they are...These aren't going to be baby birds that you find outside that have fallen out of their nests or that were rejected by their mother's because they have an illness or deformity. These are your tame, pet birds that are your responsiblity. And I think it's great that you want to let them have a clutch of babies and so that you can have the experience at least once...But if you're going to do it, do it responsibly and ethically, and don't choose now to start allowing your pet, tame, captive, dependent birds to have their lives determined "by nature's choice"...