Sun conure keeps on regurgitating on me

[Aratingettar]

I've been away from the PFs for some time, working overtime a lot.
My Cytrynka is doing well -- healthy and active. However, I've noticed her more and more regurgitating to my hand.

I know that it's the way she shows her affection, but it's also the sign of being hormonal. And I want to avoid the hormonal situations as much as possible. I don't let her spend time under my shirt (no nesting, darling...), try to limit petting to her head and throat only (she LOVES scratching her throat), but really can't control her regurgitating.
She flies to me (she does it all the time, if only have me on her radar), goes down to my hand and starts bobbing her head the bringing some "foods".

What should I do to limit her regurgitating? I don't want to keep her closed in the cage, I really love her assisting me at work.
What should I change in her daily schedule? She's almost 2.5yo right now.

 

[Skittys_Daddy]

This is a tough one. Skittles spends a lot of time inside my shirt and there are a 'few' times he's tried to regurgitate. Like you, I don't want to encourage that behavior (its unhealthy for us to). The fortunate part for me is that the behavior seems to be most paramount when he is on top of the curtain rods, which are a 'no-no- place to begin with. I use distraction to get him off the curtains but it doesn't always work.

The only reason I'm able to prevent him from regurgitating in my shirt is because he's usually too busy when he's in there- either napping, burrowing or preening my chest hair, lol. But I routinely 'move' slightly when he's inside my shirt and I talk to him or pet him. I basically don't give him the opportunity to have a 'quiet, motionless' place to do his regurgitating which has seemed to be the only place he will do that. If he's on something that moves, he won't regurgitate. If I stay 'perfectly motionless' while he's doing his preening or burrowing, THATS when he tries to regurgitate in my shirt.

The only advice I can offer you is using distraction as well as removing the item or opportunity for him to regurgitate. For example, when I had Peaches, I had to remove her mirror toys. Mirrors made her horny as hell.

 

[noodles123]

I would try to ignore it and stop any behavior that you are doing at the time that may have lead up to it. It is tough though.

 

[EllenD]

Do you have anything inside of her cage like a parrot bed, tent, hammock, "Happy/Snuggle Hut", or any other warm, small, dark place that she can get inside of or underneath? Anything that resembles nesting-material? Does she ever get underneath furniture, behind pillows, etc.? If she has access to anything like this inside or outside of her cage, they need to be removed permanently, as they are all a common cause...

I don't know how long she's been doing this, at 2.5 years-old it's obviously not puberty, but if anything change or you gave her anything new right around the time it started, then look at that change or new item as the cause...Or new food if it's warm and mushy...

Other than that the only thing you can do is try to avoid touching her in ways that get her started-up...Usually petting/scratching them on the head/neck/face/under the beak/chin don't cause this, but every bird is different, so it's quite possible that when you pet her or scratch her under her chin/beak or on the back of her neck it causes a hormonal rush...I'd at least refrain from doing that for a few days just to see if it stops the regurgitation, if it does then you'll know, if not then you'll know that's not the problem...

Sometimes they just do this because they are bonded to you and it's breeding-season, you're her bonded mate so she's hormonal towards you during breeding-seasons...My male Senegal is like this, sometimes he just start immediately regurgitating for my as soon as he gets on my shoulder in the morning, and I haven't touched him yet at all, he has nothing inside or outside of his cage that would set him off, etc. He just gets excited when he gets on my shoulder...As Noodles already mentioned, if you completely ignore them when they start regurgitating they typically stop right away, and that's what I due with Kane. The second he starts regurgitating I tell him no thanks, I'm not hungry, and put him right back in his cage and shut the door for 5-10 minutes...Then I let him out again and he's fine.

I'm lucky though in that neither of my females do this for me at all, the Cockatiel occasionally does her little "butt in the air while chirping" thing at me, but that's it...With a female you have to worry about the hormones causing infertile egg-laying, so you want to do everything you can to try to stop it...

 

[Aratingettar]

Cytrynka does not have any "nest" in her cage -- I've removed the "Happy hut" the moment I joined PFs and don't miss it at all (me, nor Cytrynka). Her cage is covered for the "Goodnight", and uncovered in the morning - just to minimize the impact of our activity on her rest. She does not seek dark, tight places - she spends most of her day time flying around, sitting on the doors, stairs/rails etc. When I'm out and away, she friendly spends time with the young lovie(M) -- but that's pure "platonic" friendship. However when I'm back.. She won't leave me alone for 5 minutes. Normally she sits on my shoulder or arm and starts preening herself, sometimes flies to my shoulder and tries to press her butt against my neck - in this case I'm trying to discourage her by deterring her. But frequently she goes down my arm to the hand, and starts her head-bobbing and producing this birdy stuff. She spits some, then eats it back. She does not try to feed me (fortunately but it's not something I like (mainly for her being egg-safe, but it's not pleasant, too). I haven't noticed any particular trigger - most frequently she just joins me working on a computer then starts doing her job. It starts with her licking my hands and scratching them with her beak tip - any clue?

It started.. would say few months ago. Hard to say as it became progressively more pronounced (from being occassional to a frequent basis). Nothing much happened in her life... or maybe not. Fionek, the male Lovie have joined us this year. But she does not do it to him, only to me. And if you ask me.. she did it before we had him (but as I explained, it's hard to say for sure... memory fades quickly..)
I end up putting her in her cage to "chill out", but not long after I release her, she'll try to regurgitate.. again.

Regarding her foods.. no change in her diet. Harrisons' pellets, fruits and a spoon of seeds. No warm/mushy food.
I only hope it's temporary

 

[ChristaNL]

Japie has been trying to regurge for me almost since the moment we met at his previous home (I was the first he did that to, he bit all the other candidates) and I've tried everything ever since he got here to stop it.

It does not matter if he gets time-outs, longer sleep, strict diets, no touch etc. he just keeps telling me "I like you!" by bobbing his head and presenting me with second-beak-munchables.
He is insane (cute but insane) that way.

The sunnier the weather, the more enthousiastic he is about it.
The one thing that really slows him down is a full week of rainy days with miserable temperatures.

Some times he is distracted enough by looking for lost nuts or munching on some cardboardbox he is not supposed to gnaw on etc. . but I have not found anything that makes him stop.

(I do hope one day he will feed Appie instead of me and they will regurge and munch happily ever after ...)

 

[Aratingettar]

Well you just take any hope away from me, Christa. If it's a rule about the weather, seems that I've the "main course" ahead of me. Yummy

 

[Sunnyclover]

That's so weird to me no of my 4 conures seem hormonal. Ollie is 3 and hasn't regurgitated since he was a young pup and Finley used to make love to my hand and is now 2 years old and doesn't even regurgitate now either. I can tell you what I do that seems to be working for us.
1. Make sure they have 12 hours of dark and quiet sleep and I mean DARK and QUIET. Not the normal cover the cage in the living room stuff but like use an entirety different room on another floor if you're got one. We have 2 guest bedrooms and guess what...we have 2 cages in each. If guests come we just move them for a few nights.
2. Do not feed them warm mushy foods! I used to feed Finley warm mushy sweet potatoes and lentils and that's when he would go to town on my hand. Just feed it to them cold or room temperature... they'll live.
3. NEVER pet them anywhere but the head but everyone knows that one.
4. If they do regurgitate put them down on the closest bird safe spot and walk away from them for a while so they can calm down.
5. Have separate sleep cages for night time as being around their "nest" all the time (i.e. the cage they sleep in) can cause them to be hormonal big time. I personally believe this is one of the reasons my birds don't bite me, have cage aggressiveness or are overly hormonal because they never get to "nest" really...only at night and their too busy sleeping.
6. Don't have too many high sugar or highfat foods in the diet. Is she's regurgitating that much just cut out all fruit and treats and people food for a while and definitely get a calcium supplement because at that rate she might be brewing an egg.
Well that's what I do and I hope it helps you guys!

 

[EllenD]

You have to keep in-mind that just because she is not "hormonal" towards your male Lovebird, that does not at all mean that he isn't the cause of her sex-hormones going crazy. She's not bonded to your Lovebird like she is to you, and it's not at all uncommon for male birdy hormones to get female birdy hormones going, and then as you said, the minute you come home she's all over you because you're her mate...That makes perfect sense, though the solution isn't a happy one, because it would be splitting them up when you're gone from the house, and then see if she still acts the same way towards you when you return...And if it is the cause, which it likely is, then the solution is to keep them separated, which I'm sure isn't something you want to do since they get along...But that could very well be the cause, especially if this behavior amped-up since you brought the male Lovebird into the Flock...

 

[Aratingettar]

Thanks EllenD for the hint - your explanation makes perfect sense to me.

I can easily split them since the Lovie resides upstairs with his (F)lovie, and my Conure lives downstairs. Indeed we let them hang together as they seem to go along well, but it should be an easy test. The timing with this new guy might match, but also this year the winter in my country was not so severe so she might also feel "spring" earlier than normally. I'll just check and see