01/02/2026
More emu eggs!!! Pebbles was sitting on another batch of eggs! In emus the male incubates and cares for the young, while the female has nothing to do with them!
Pebbles has been VERY aggressive in protecting the eggs, but this time actually let me take them all out from under him without a fight! Then when I walked away he savagely attacked me .
Based on the
comments in my previous videos on this, it has come to my attention that a surprising amount of people don't realize the eggs must INCUBATE before a baby is formed! In the case of emus, it takes around 50 days of incubation before the egg hatches with a baby. Collecting the eggs before significant incubation means there is no baby inside, just like a chicken egg from the store, crack it open and it looks the same with a yolk and no baby bird. Somehow this is a HUGE surprise to a lot of adult humans. Why not just let them hatch? Although baby emus are ADORABLE, our sanctuary is focused on giving homes to animals that need them, not creating even more animals to live their lives in captivity. There's already a bit of an emu crisis is FL, just yesterday we were messaged about another escaped one.
Plus we don't need a dozen more giant birds to feed and house. Male emus are solely responsible for incubating the eggs and caring for the chicks, making them one of the most striking examples of male-only parental care among birds. After a female lays her clutch, the male settles onto the nest and begins incubating for about eight weeks, rarely eating, drinking, or leaving the eggs during that entire time. Throughout incubation he aggressively defends the nest from threats. Once the chicks hatch, the male continues his role as the primary caregiver, guiding the young, protecting them from predators, teaching them what to eat, and staying with them for several months until they are able to survive on their own. During this period, the females take no part in raising the young and may even mate again, leaving all parental investment to the male.
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