Help please!

Hi, I'm new here. I have come seeking advice on how to deal with some recent behavior changes in our 10 year old Greenwing named Lola. We've had her since she was 4 months old. She's always been very easy going and easy for my husband and myself to handle, though not many others can. She has her own space in each area of our house that we hang out in, so she can be with us, as well as her own bedroom with a cage that she sleeps in. She stays in her room while we are out of the house but we don't usually lock her in during the day. (So she's basically cage free, except at night). She's never laid an egg.

About 4 weeks ago she adopted a red rubber ball and began sitting on it as if it were an egg, she sat on it on the floor, she never got down off her cage before this. She was very protective of it and was threatening to bite us, so we took it away. She found another toy, a loose woodblock and started to sit on that, so we took it and all loose toys away. Unfortunately, her behavior got worse after that. She started doing what I'd call nesting on the floor. She sits in the corner with her beak tucked. She is very threatening every time we come in her room, spreading her wings as high as she can and making every feather stand on end. My husband can still handle her most of the time if he's very careful, but she's worse with me and I can only get her to somewhat cooperate some of the time. She's refusing to stay in any area of the house except her private room. If we bring her to the other areas she gets very agitated (dancing and making noises) and flies down to go back to her room. If we try to make her stay with us she purposely poops on the carpet or where ever she knows we don't want her to (something she's never done before unless she just couldn't hold it). Where she used to have 1 or 2 'accidents' per month, she's now having them every 10 minutes when forced to be somewhere she doesn't want to be.

I was hoping it was a hormonal phase she'd pass through, but we are on week 4 and she is definitely getting worse, not better. As I see it, we have three options, 1.) continue on as we have, trying to keep our routine as normal as possible with her fighting us and pooping on everything. 2.)Let her have her way and stay in her room, bothering her only when necessary. 3). Make her room completely off limits, caging her in another area of the house.

I'm not sure which route to take here. Any suggestions, opinions, experience welcome. The think I most want to know is if this is likely to be a short term change or long term change? Have you had a bird change like this and how did it turn out?

Thanks!

I'm sorry that I don't have any advice for you~ hopefully someone will post and help you out

I will be watching this tread with interest as I am dealing with a similar problem, only with a male. We are at about 6 months of nearly unmanageable aggression and there is little doubt that it is driven by breeding behavior.

I tried changing cages. I tried increased exercise. I tried to wait it out. I tried bringing in parakeets to keep him from being lonely. (in their own cage.) I have tried clicker training.

I can now usually hand him food through the cage bars without being bitten, 7 out of 8 times. It is dangerous to change his food bowls. Every time.

Hope someone with more experience can help us. We are really struggling here and my husband has had it with this bird.

newtobirds said:

I will be watching this tread with interest as I am dealing with a similar problem, only with a male. We are at about 6 months of nearly unmanageable aggression and there is little doubt that it is driven by breeding behavior.

I tried changing cages. I tried increased exercise. I tried to wait it out. I tried bringing in parakeets to keep him from being lonely. (in their own cage.) I have tried clicker training.

I can now usually hand him food through the cage bars without being bitten, 7 out of 8 times. It is dangerous to change his food bowls. Every time.

Hope someone with more experience can help us. We are really struggling here and my husband has had it with this bird.

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Six months...so far? :thud:

How old is your bird and how long have you had him? Is it a greenwing too?

Oh my goodness.

I, unfortunately don't have experience with "brooding" females, but please, if you could, go the the Macaw Forum, and post the same question there. Or you could just LINK to this link.

There's quite a few big Mac owners here, and LONGTIME mac owners...and I hope someone will be able to give you some good advice.

Here's the link to the Macaws: Macaws - Parrot Forum - Parrot Owner's Community

Posted this in the amazon section.... might be relevant here as well....

MonicaMc said:

Here's some articles that might be informative in regards to petting and the 'oversexed' psittacine.

Site Name - Articles - Behavioral - Sex And The Psittacine
RP - Mating
Hormonal Parrot
The Laughing Parrot - Tips for dealing with hormonal birds

A change of how you pet, the foods you feed and even how you feed (dry food vs soft food, warm food vs cold food), lighting, and even cage placement/arrangement can all help discourage mating behaviors. It is not healthy for parrots to be sexually stimulated by humans because it can lead to enlarged sexual organs, unhealthy relationships (there is no way that a human can physically please a birds natural desire to mate - at least, not without making things worse!) and possibly hernias (most common in cockatoos).

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Forgive me if someone has already posted this but I say a Avian Vet exam is an order. I'd think the vet should be able to rule out any health problems and give you the best possible recommendations.

I too will be following the thread with interest. Good luck!

You may want to provide her with a nesting box and let her go through her routine. Everytime you take it away or remove something she is using for nesting, or as an egg, you are restarting the process. She has never fulfilled her 'duty'.

Also, my avain vet offers hormone injections. They kill the hormones essentially.

MaraWentz said:

You may want to provide her with a nesting box and let her go through her routine. Everytime you take it away or remove something she is using for nesting, or as an egg, you are restarting the process. She has never fulfilled her 'duty'.

Also, my avain vet offers hormone injections. They kill the hormones essentially.

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^ I agree with the option of consulting an Avian Vet. You can get hormone injections that can help remove, or at the very least, pacify the behaviour. Otherwise, at the very least, get some advice/insight from a professional.

Ugh!! Feather Monster Syndrome!! Try cutting down on the daylight hours. By cutting down the hours of daylight, it may trick your birds hormones. Usually as the days get longer, the hormones will act up in mature birds, especially females that want to nest. You could try keeping Lola covered for at least 12 to 14 hours a day. Also, consult with your avian vet. I had a female and she was a little terror when it came to nesting time and she did not have a mate. It got to the point where she would open her cage door and find a small cubby (usually under a cabinet door) and nest. As I would walk by not knowing she was there and she would lunge at my feet and one time she drew blood. I did end up taking her to my avian vet and they started hormone injection treatments. The hormone was called "Lupron". It took about two or three shots before her hormones calmed down. Be prepared for the price of each injection, they are expensive.

Niner10Tango said:

Ugh!! Feather Monster Syndrome!! Try cutting down on the daylight hours. By cutting down the hours of daylight, it may trick your birds hormones. Usually as the days get longer, the hormones will act up in mature birds, especially females that want to nest. You could try keeping Lola covered for at least 12 to 14 hours a day. Also, consult with your avian vet. I had a female and she was a little terror when it came to nesting time and she did not have a mate. It got to the point where she would open her cage door and find a small cubby (usually under a cabinet door) and nest. As I would walk by not knowing she was there and she would lunge at my feet and one time she drew blood. I did end up taking her to my avian vet and they started hormone injection treatments. The hormone was called "Lupron". It took about two or three shots before her hormones calmed down. Be prepared for the price of each injection, they are expensive.

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That's very interesting! I had never heard of giving birds hormone injections. Especially Lupron, I went through many years of treatment for infertility, and used Lupron myself and it made me a crazy biotch, LOL! I'm surprised it helps birds behavior. I'll try calling my avian vet to ask about it tomorrow. I'll also ask him about not allowing access to her room, if he thinks thats a good idea. To be honest, I'm a bit daunted by the thought of taking a bird I can barely handle to the vets office. Getting her in and out of a carrier, when I can barely get her in and out of her cage sounds like mission impossible. We'll see what he has to say though, if he thinks it will help, I'm willing to try.

Hello, I have a male B&G who will be 10 this May. In having a male, when he entered his hormone/sexual maturation stage at age 6, it started literally overnight with eye pinning and screaming like a banshee like I've never experienced before.

His behavior went from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde in a blink, no triggers whatsoever! Very extremely aggressive towards me, lunging at me. When he lunged at my temple unexpectedly, I was stunned and scared how close he missed my eye, he was even running towards me, chasing me aggressively. He bit numerous times, lots of pain and blood, and the scars remain.


I've discussed this with my avian vet, and he suggested to use a few drops of Benadryl, cooled chamomile tea in place of water, or valerian root...nothing made an impact in calming him. The only thing that worked was a spray bottle.

This was the only way that I could have any type of control. The spray bottle had a forceful stream. (he takes baths/showers in the bathroom so I wasn't associating his bad/aggressive behavior with cleaning himself, being afraid of or playing in the water).



If he was out of his cage playing or just sitting somewhere, in the flip of a switch he'd change, his behavior suddenly became aggressive and dangerous, I would shoot him in the belly/chest area one time with a stream of water to get him to snap out of it long enough to get him in his cage without me suffering losing a finger or any more blood and pain.


As he has gotten older, I've learned to recognize his body language. When he is going into an aggressive stage, he entire body shakes instead of the eye pinning and his feathers on head stand straight up (like the evil gremlin from the movie). I try to gage how bad an episode will be.

Sometimes I'll just leave him alone and it will pass, and other times if I feel that it will be safer for him(and me), I have to get the spray bottle out and get him in his cage asap, but that is only in the worst circumstances. He has these episodes that extend off and on for 3 weeks at a time, and I'll keep him in the cage for days at a time when it's at the highpoint.


Other behavior, he will go into the bathroom for hours, (a guy needs his quiet time) close the door and he finds a way to grab the toilet paper and unroll it all into a pile and act like he is nesting and shredding the pile until he's done. He does this with dish towels too.

I don't know if this answered your concern, but these are the experiences that I've encountered. He first two years in this stage were the worst. He can be very aggressive, but he's nothing like the beginning. I'd welcome any positive feedback as well. At the time there wasn't a lot on the hormone topic, so I literally played in by common sense and hoped for the best. It broke my heart to see him change like this.