Hormone shot?

[LoveMyConlan]

I have a female green-cheek who's extremely hormonal. She's always trying to back into things crying, I can't give her any nesting material stuff like I do normally newspaper on the bottom of the cage. She is constantly trying to back into my hand when I ask for a step up. You can't pet her without her whining bobbing her head and twitching her wings.

Someone reccomended the shot of Lupron? I think that's it? Something about helping with hormones?

Is this a real thing? Is it harmful? Anyone have experience with it?

I'm pretty sure my vet doesn't do that but we have another in the area that might. But he's crazy expensive and I don't want to waste a trip.

 

[chris-md]

Having a hormonal bird into itself isn’t a particularly good reason to get the treatments because hormones are temporary. Usually there needs to be excacerbating circumstances, excessive egg laying in a female for example. Human frustration is not usually an acceptable reason. Hormones are just a part of the parrot owning territory.

Lupron is the shot. There’s also an implant called deslorelin that is used as well.

 

[LoveMyConlan]

She is like this all the time though. She's bsb looks this for about a year and a half. She's 3 years old.

If you ask for a step up, for instance, she will grab your hand in 1 foot, hold on like crazy with just that foot and pull your hand towards her. I have had to remove a lot of toy types, cage liner types, I've had to put her in a spot that I can control her lights/darkness, no mushy or warm foods.

And very little change. And shes a priss with my other birds.

I was talking to someone who breeds conures and they recommended it for her because of her hormones because it's not normal for her to be like that year round.

 

[chris-md]

I still wouldn’t rule out a late blooming, protracted puberty. The problem I have with trusting a breeder in this is they don’t usually see puberty often. They deal with breeding age birds and chicks they sell long before puberty.

Not to impugne their knowledge and experience, but their perspective strikes me as a bit colored.

if you are concerned, a visit to the vet would be in order. I just don’t think what youve described here so far is terribly worrisome quite yet, and not a candidate for extreme intervention such as hormone therapy. I’d want to see what happens over the next six months before getting worries.

It again, if it would give you some peace of mind, absolutely make a visit to your vet

 

[LoveMyConlan]

Thank you Chris-md! I was concerned over the shot and figured I'd ask for some advice from others before I made an appointment. I'm still queezy about getting my macaw micro chipped. So this was something I was kinda on the fence about. I just feel bad for her.

 

[Laurasea]

I don't know if I've been lucky or if the way I take care of my Parrots is different. I've never had hormonal problems in birds. I had one female GCC for 17 years and she slept in a hut, never any problems, never. I have a second female GCC for 8 years she sleeps in a home made safe hut ( after learning of the threads of death) and I have never had hormonal problems with her either, never any eggs never any of the things I read others go through. I have read that some obsessive hormonal behavior is due to lack of activity, foraging, and other stimulating.. I also spend probably an hour a day with head scritches . In a flock they would have a lot of grooming and touching and beaking. Mine are also kept on a natural daylight schedule, eat a lot of veggies, pellets, and seeds, are flighted, have a lot of out of the cage time. So I don't know if I have a good combination, or if for 18 years of keeping GCC I just had birds that weren't hormonal?

 

[chris-md]

No problem!

Laura, definitely not just you. When I had my conure, I don’t recall much of any change in her. Granted she died around the age of 3 or 4. But would have likely Been well past puberty. Male Ekkies aren’t SO bad if you manage some of the common triggers like inappropriate touching, and diet (esp high sugar). Then you see it...once or twice a year, relatively mildly.

 

[ChristaNL]

They are birds, not machines... it is not: do not press button A -> activity N will not occur.

So your bird went straight from baby-behaviour to flirting/ inviting to mate.... did you teach her any other option (ways of interacting) in between?

Not saying she cannot possibly be a superhormonal pain in the butt!
(most growing up parrots are for a period of time, and some <like certain toos> are impossible as pets during that period)

A a human: it is no fun being treated as a sextoy.

not so domestic bliss here atm:
Japie is flying to my shoulders and panting and trying to regurge and if I let him he will go even more crazy and try to mount my head.
The one thing is to block that behaviour and only contact that silly bird when he is not overexited.
It just happens (?): a few minutes ago he was happy exploring the room and gnawing some cardboard while I was doing things (water, food, making tea) - and now I am typing he sees his chance...
so, is it him?
Or it is me standing still and making certain movements/ sounds etc. that trigger this behaviour?

So...I have to send him to his cage (inpromto training) / ignore it as long as he not on me...
(al the flying will 'cool him off' eventually, but it IS a pain in the neck!!)
He is like that most of the year, all the years I have had him.
I am sorry he feels that way- but I am not going to 'play along'/ let him get away with it and since he is a guy hormones are not available anyway...

He will switch back to 'normal cuddly parrot' sometime later and get scritches, a shower, another toy etc.etc..
I feel bad for him, but he needs to deal with it.

He has been doing a bit of flying to and fro, and I've send him to his post (neighbourwatching) and he started to whistle and call -> switching mood again...


=


so I would say: if she shows a certain behaviour: ask her to do something else first, if that is a 'no' then its time to shun/ignore. The moment you spot a 'wanted' or 'more normal' behaviour compliment the crap out of her.


Friendzoning the hard way
"No! .... I will only interact with you when you are not trying to hump my leg!"

It will not solve the hormonal issues all at once, but matingseason without a mate ... is usually a very short season!

Just make sure she has loads of other options to vent those frustrations (tricktraining that is not hands-on, recall flying, lots of bathing, shredding would be good if she had no option of getting the shredded material as nesting-stuff-- maybe hold a piece of stuf for her and 'steal' the shredded material as it emerges?)


I would go for "put her on a diet" first before shooting her up with hormones.
(weigh her daily and give her less rich food -> that will also influence her body-chemistry and dampen the hormones/ the weiging is to prevent drastic weightloss from not enough food.)

You already did the sleep / light so that is fine (does she actually sleep of just continue in low-light) now tackle the food.
Nothing tells a bird "not a good time to nest" like a foodshortage.

Usually I will advice against withholding food for any reason- I am just saying: lower the calorie-content of her intake!
Veggies!

 

[EllenD]

If I were you, I would make an appointment with ONLY a Certified Avian Vet or Avian Specialist (I don't know if you already have one, but if you don't then you need to avoid any Exotics or General Vets, as you need an Avian specialist who is experienced in treating hormonal parrots both medically and psychologically/behaviorally)...You need to have the CAV do a complete Wellness-Exam and complete Blood-Work as well (most CAV's won't even think about prescribing any hormone therapy without first doing Blood-Work anyway).

You need to sit down and discuss her overall-health after the exam and the Blood-Work, and then you need to listen to the CAV as they explain ALL of the options with you, and counsel you about behavioral, environmental, dietary, and schedule changes that you will also need to make even if you do decide to start hormone-therapy. There are a ton of different reasons why female birds in-particular become constantly/continually hormonal, and often there are behavioral and environmental changes you can make that will also help, and sometimes that you have to do in order for the hormone therapy to even work, because if there is an environmental/behavioral/dietary/light-schedule issue going on and it isn't changed, then the hormone therapy won't fully work either...

Yes, hormone therapy is a "real thing", in both birds and people, lol...Lupron Depot is an injection that they give either every 3 months or every 6 months, depending on the dosage they choose, and it is essentially "Chemical Castration". It completely shuts-down the birds Reproductive System by shutting-down all Ovarian activity...However, Lupron Depot and other "Depot" injections typically are not at all the most effective or successful hormone-therapies for birds.

Instead of a Depot injection every 3 or 6 months, what works so much more effectively, works for a longer time, has less side-effects, and is much more convenient is having a Deslorelin implant injected...It's a little tiny implant the size of a tiny seed (that's actually what it looks like, a little tiny seed). It's an easy procedure that is very much the same as having a microchip implanted...They usually either put the Deslorelin implants right under the skin of their backs (in between their shoulder blades) or of their chest/breast area. They first give the bird an injection of usually Lidocaine to completely numb the area so that bird feels nothing, then they make a tiny little incision/nick with either a scalpel or with a special syringe/needle that makes a little hole right under the skin. Then they use another syringe to "inject" the Deslorelin implant right underneath the skin in the little "hole" the made, and then they will typically put a tiny dab of skin-glue over the implant, and the skin grows right back overtop of it and it's like it never happened. And usually the Deslorelin implants are good for 6 months, those seem to be the most effective implants. There are ones that last a year (just a higher dosage of the medication to be secreted over-time), but they tend to not be as effective as the 6-month ones. And if the Deslorelin implant works for your bird and you want to do another implant at 6 months, they don't even have to remove the old implant, they will simply inject a new implant into the same place they put the first one, and they are absorbed by the body. Easy, safe, painless, and can usually be done with either no sedation at all, or they simply use very short-acting Isoflurene Gas that is safe and wears-off in a matter of minutes and the bird is totally fine.

The Deslorelin implants have been WAY MORE EFFECTIVE than injections of Lupron, Depot Provera, etc. They are also safer and have almost no side-effects, as opposed to the Lupron, Depot Provera, etc. (I speak from experience on this topic, and the side-effects from the Depot injections suck the big one; my spine actually started to hurt about a week after getting the first injection, literally my spine hurt, like the bones hurt all day and all night. For 3 months. That's the issue, you can't reverse the injection if it causes you horrible side effects, you're stuck with it until it wears off 3 or 6 months later; with the Deslorelin implants, if there happens to be a problem, which is very rare with them anyway, they can remove the implant and stop the treatment)...

Again, you need to find an experience CAV if you don't already have one, explain to them what is going on with her, how long it's been going on, exactly what her behaviors are, have a complete Wellness-Exam and Blood-Work done so your CAV can get a picture of her overall-health and hormone-levels, and then they can sit down with you and discuss/explain ALL of the options in-detail with you...But if this is becoming a constant/continual issue that is effecting her quality-of-life, then the Deslorelin implants are a very safe, effective way to treat this problem, IF your CAV believes that it is appropriate for your Green Cheek after doing the Wellness-Exam and Blood-Work.

 

[SilleIN]

All my birds has a mate/friend, so they don't need me for that sort of thing. And I don't know if this could be a solution for you, but a friend of mine has a caique, who has fits of hormones (as every body else with mature birds). He has a perch with some rope through. He uses that perch to "get relief".

If your bird does not get aggressive, but "just" wants to mate with you, could it be a solution for her to mate with something else? I've seen video of birds mating a stuffed animal.

I don't care of 2 males mate, just as long they don't try to mate with me. If you could let her mate with an inanimate object, maybe that would solve your problems.

 

[GaleriaGila]

May I add my usual thoughts on light management? It has really helped with my little demon.
Ever since the Rickeybird hit sexual maturity at about 3-4 years of age, I've had to manage his hormones! If kept on too steady a long day, and too much light, he stayed "in the mood" (aggressive, even louder than usual, pleasuring himself on my neck ) year round. If I keep him on a natural light schedule... up with dawn, down with dusk, year around... THEN he's only a little monster rooster from July to September). He has his own room, so I can do that easily.
Good luck!

 

[GaleriaGila]

Oh, and here are some links for vets...


Certified Avian Vets
https://abvp.com/animal-owners/find-an-abvp-specialist/
If none are near you...
Avian Veterinarians
http://www.aav.org/search/custom.asp?id=1803
In my opinion, any of the vets listed here should be better than a regular vet.