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Aggressive Linnie

Alliusis

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Caitlin
Hi all!

I have two linnies, Joey and Jocy, and two budgies, Lemon and Baxter. I generally leave my birdcages open during the day. My budgies will sometimes go into the linnie's cage. Since the linnies have been a bit aggressive to the budgies around their cage, I generally had to go and grab them out (my budgies are used to being held, so I used my hands). Then, Joey figured out that the budgies were still getting seeds (the linnies are getting mostly pellet now, but Joey is still a seed junkie), and climbed into their cage. There was a bit of aggression going on, and I didn't want a bite to happen, so I had to towel him out of the budgie's cage as he wouldn't come otherwise.

Since then he's been highly aggressive towards my hands. If he sees my hands around his cage, he gets super fixated on them. He will run out and lunge and try to bite me, and chase my hands around. If I hold his food dish in my hand and he's eating from it and happens to spy my fingers, he'll go and bite them.

Previously, he wouldn't like my fingers if they went too close to him, but he'd tolerate and ignore them most of the time. If he ends up on the ground, he'll still step up on my fingers and run up my arm. But this aggressiveness makes me sad, as it's clear my hands trigger anger and distress in him. It also makes it difficult to change their food and water.

If I get some of his favourite treat in my hand, he will calm down after a while and eat it from my fingers. So I guess that's good news.

I feel miserable that I broke his trust and that it's so upsetting to him. How would you recommend toning down the hyper-focus and aggression surrounding my hands? I have stainless steel dishes for them so I have to reach into their cage to change their food and water (which he didn't like beforehand, but would tolerate it). They are Vision cages, so they have the non-intrusive plastic dishes on the bottom of the cage I could use instead. I don't like the birds going to the ground to eat which is why I've been hesitant to use them.

I figure he might also be a bit grumpy from the pellets (he will eat them, but strongly prefers seed). The first linnie I had would get hangry sometimes, so it might be worth stepping back a bit and transitioning slower.

Thank you for any help you can offer!
 
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Ripshod

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Work towards building that trust again. Birds don't bear grudges, at least not for too long. Despite using a towel he must have seen some of your hand to make the connection.
Keep a pair of tough gardening gloves handy in case you have to handle him again, they'll protect and hide your hands so he shouldn't make that connection. I know they're hand shaped but garden gloves have saved my relationship with a few birds.
 

Alliusis

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Caitlin
Thank you, I'll give that a try.

I saw them mating yesterday, so I'm also assuming it's more of a hormonal and defensive thing. I've always read that they love to burrow (and these guys do!), but is burrowing something that encourages breeding? The female is very sweet with everything until I touch the towel I use for covering their cage at night, where she goes into a literal panic trying to get at whatever's moving the towel. This didn't used to happen either.

I'm not 100% sure on how to move forward with the breeding thing. Egg-related complications are my greatest fear with birds and they cause me so much stress wondering if they're ok or not. I'm going to go get her cuttlebone today to support it, but should I wait until after she's laid to remove the towel during the day? I'll be shaking whatever eggs they lay so we don't have any baby linnies.
 

Ripshod

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Definitely get the cuttlefish bone, prevention is better than cure.
A lot of birds will only lay if there's somewhere safe to nest. So look towards removing any shelves, unnecessary bowls, boxes. Anything nestable. I'm not 100% sure on linnies though. I had a female lay a random egg but never had a pair.
There may be tricks to stop them mating. I've read about changing their daylight hours, reducing certain foods so they only get a basic diet.
I'm sure better advice will come soon from someone more experienced.
And yes, the attacking/biting is hormonal and related to the breeding. You are encroaching on their territory.
 
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Ripshod

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Lady Jane

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Unless your bird has been slowly introduced to them in a positive way, you can do more damage then good when using a glove. Most birds are fearful of the size of the glove and its movement. It stresses them and they do not know how to react to it. We are the ones who teach our birds to bite. By reacting in a negative, fearful way when the bird makes the movement to bite (human or another bird) it has now learned what works. Bites can hurt! Bad! The trick is to react to the bird before it makes any attempt to bite. Use a small toy and place it in front of the birds beak as soon as you see the slightest interest in the bird to beak you. Praise the bird if it touches the toy. For small to medium parrots who attempt to bite, I push into the beak when the bird bites. This causes the bird to let go and back up. Praise when he releases you.
Work on your relationship with your bird, using gloves of any kind will eventually make your bird fear hands and ultimately make problems worse.
Also while wearing gloves you cannot feel what you are doing and an injury can happen to the bird. Gloves for rafters, yes totally different.
 

Dona

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Caitlin, just to address part of your question, I started off with a cage that required me putting my hands in with her food and water. That was fine, but Gigi lunged and could potentially nip if I did anything else in her cage, like clean off a perch. I eventually got a cage that I can put food into from the outside and it works out great. Now I service the inside of her cage only when she is outside of it, but even from the play gym she is tick-tick-ticking at me while I'm touching the cage.
 
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