aggressive new parent behaviour, help appreciated

[leanne27]

Hello everyone, what a great forum with so much information and so much experience. I am hoping that someone can offer me some advice on the best course of action to take with my first time breeding princesses.

I have two princess parrots who have never been in love with each other but co habited together and have just had two beautiful babies. All has been going wonderfully well until the last few days when the babies have decided to start to come out of the nesting box (they are now 5 weeks old).

Since this the female has been extremely aggressive to the male, screaming at him and chasing him constantly. This has ramped up to flying at him and real attacking and biting.

He has been stressed and running away but has finally had enough and is reciprocating, making the ticking noise, flapping his wings and lunging at her. he is extremely protective and attached to the babies, he has been a wonderful father. When one of the babies is out he places his body around it and threatens her. She wants to go towards the babies and it results in full on attack.

I don't want the little ones to experience this level of aggression when they are learning the ways of the world and I don't want to have them hurt in the cross fire. The hen did bite one and push him off the perch but I think that was because she thought the boy was going to hurt him, I think! Otherwise she is looking after them well.

I set up another cage and have tried both of them in there, neither wants to be in there. the male is more stressed and is pacing up and down. Even though the hen hates him she still calls out for him and sits as close to him as she can in the separate cage. She will give him a regular screaming warning though.

She is not as stressed as the boy is in the second cage, so do you think I should put him back with the babies and put her in the second cage?

I don't trust them together at the moment, but hope that they will be able to come back together at some point when they are less maternal/paternal s I think this is now the root of the problem.

So please all you well experienced people what do you think? male on his own or female away from the babies, or another solution I haven't though of?

 

[QuakerMom]

Is their cage roomy enough? If they are stressed they may be taking it out on each other and the babies.

 

[leanne27]

yes they have a very big cage, which has probably helped him to get away from her, it's 1.8m high x 95cm long and 78 wide

 

[QuakerMom]

Hmm. We'll see what others think.. I know nothing about breeding birds. Sometimes they don't quite get the hang of raising babies the first go-round. That's true in all species of animals. Hang in there, someone will have ideas on how to resolve this issue!

 

[getwozzy]

I personally don't have experience breeding or raising babies, but I'm sure one of our experienced members will chime in soon.

The other option off the top of my head, would be to remove the babies and hand-raise them. But that would involve hand feeding and such...which is not something to take lightly if you're inexperienced in that department. Hopefully someone else will have some other solutions or advice....

 

[MikeyTN]

IF the father is caring for the babies, let him! IF the mother is the aggressor, let her be solitary until the father can fully wean off the babies. Most of the time it is the father that does the aggression cause he wants to mate again and go for round two. But in your case it is the mother that became aggressive. If you had kept them together with the babies, one of them will be hurt so it's a good thing you've separated them apart. As soon as the babies are weaned, then you can have the babies on their own and put the pair back together once again.

 

[leanne27]

I think I'll do that, he is far more stressed being away from the babies than she is. He is in the separate cage now and just pacing up and down as one of the babies looks like it is going to stay out of the nesting box for it's first night.

I did find them mating again about one week ago and wasn't sure what to do so perhaps this aggression is based on that? She was a willing party and I haven't seen him chasing her and bothering her.

 

[leanne27]

I have put my girl in a separate cage and have tried a few visits but she is just awful, she has one mission and that's to attack my boy. SHe is even squealing at him most of the day from the other cage.

I was wondering if people thought it would be an idea to remove the nesting box now that the babies have come out as I am thinking this might be one of the causes of her rage?