Five months

[Laurasea]

My feelings were hurt when no one responded before ,
Two part question
Can my five months old quaker be in puberty?
Also he seems to be shopping for his bond mate. Because he is head bobbing and regurging to me, my GCC, and my other quaker. I don't know if I should limit his time with them so he and I stay close,? Or let him pick one if the parrots or if this isn't even what he is doing? I can handle regurge and redirect, but I don't know what to do about him bonding like a mate to the others. Advice welcome please

 

[Jen5200]

While I don’t have a Quaker, I believe they hit puberty similarly to conures which is usually 12-18 months. I think it would be pretty early for him to be hitting hormones, but they are all different. Personally I’d not limit his time with the other birds, but I’d be sure to keep my interactions with him very involved as well. I have two conures that seem bonded, but they are both still very attached to me. They feed, preen and do “other things” together, but I haven’t had any issues with them not wanting to be with me (they’ve been together for 3 years). Just my experiences, hopefully someone with quakers chimes in

 

[Sunnyclover]

I don't have a Quaker either but I have a renegade Nanday Conure who has been humping my hand and regurgitating to me since 12 weeks old. Let's just say I know how strange it seems but I don't think yours is truely in puberty, he's more like a baby kid who has discovered their "special place" for the 1st time or something. And you're right he is actually probably looking to bond to someone or some bird but I'm not sure the regurgitating and all that is actually linked to this because a parrot would do that regardless of puberty at his age or before. I never kept my 3 birds apart at all...I let them do whatever and as it turns out they don't even preen each other and they all picked me as their mate and don't ever show any mate behavior towards each other. I do have one bird who picks on another bird so their definitely not going to mate up and leave me in the cold (boy and girl). Other than that they get along fine and all love me and just consider each other flock mates and my husband a flock leader or sorts. Just leave them be and make SURE to spend enough time with them individually every day or your baby will try to choose one of your birds as a mate. Also one other technique I used was in the very beginning when I was worried about my 2 male Conures bonding too much is if I did see them preen each other (happened in the very beginning) I would pick the one up who was being preened and pet him and preen him to reinforce our bond. I think my plan worked!

 

[Laurasea]

Thank you SunnyClover and Jen! I will try your trick with replacement preen! That's a good idea!

 

[noodles123]

Treat it like puberty---worst case scenario, you teach it early life-lessons.