JadynA
Moving in
- Joined
- 10/19/19
- Messages
- 7
Hi everyone. Hoping for help.
Some back story, sorry if this is too much information, but I'm at a loss and I feel like the backstory is necessary.
So, in my household there are 2 cockatiels, one about 5 yrs old and is my mom's (Beacan) and a confirmed female. And the other is mine who is almost 6 months (Nymbus). For a few months prior to my newest baby, whom we've had almost 2 months, we had housed a cockatiel of unknown age and gender (Signal), who later passed from cardiac arrest.
Somewhere in the timeframe between the change of Signal and Nymbus, Beacan had started roughing up and creating bald spots on her tail feathers, and causing them to be loose, and dangling but refusing to pull them out, just letting them flop. Beacan then started to pluck just the feathers around her neck, under her beak. From what I can tell (she's not very fond of me, so she wont let me see properly) she hasn't plucked under her wings or much if any of her back. She has two of her own cages as she always has, a daytime and a night time and we have always been careful not to impose the new birds into her territory, they have thier own cage and its separate although near hers.
When we had Signal, they were a very cautious bird, so an unhealthy previous home was suspected, though they adjusted quiet well, and filled out with builtiful new feathers shortly after we got them. With Signal whom we suspected was female, they mainly coexisted and Beacan was the more talkative and clearly dominant one.
Now with Nym, Beacan is often quiet, and we suspect Nym is male. She still occasionally chirps and calls, though it's harder to tell now, because Nym has learned some of her calls and mimics her. She has been particularly quieter in the last couple of weeks.
When we first got Nymbus, I had waited until after Beacan had finished her summer clutch, so that I didnt overwhelm the baby bird, because some of Beacan's behaviors and screeches while laying can be quiet loud and concerning, she is also quite grumpy and requires attention. However, as soon as we got Nymbus, Beacan was unusually interested and would climb on his cage and call him and make her "sexy noises" at him and suddenly she laid an additional egg totally out of her time. She didn't pay it any notice and we knew it wasnt fertilized (his age and they hadn't interacted yet) so a few weeks afterwards we got rid of it. He sings and chirps almost constantly and I'm not sure how she feels about him anymore, because since the egg, she seems to only tolerate his existence and if they are both out near eachother she will hiss or fly off.
I haven't witnessed any of her chest plucking, just her tail a little bit, so I suspect she does it when no one is home, during the day. It's quite apparent that it's not molting as we had first hoped, but she still has the bald spots so it can't be. There doesnt appear to be any sores or injured skin, so I'm not suspecting an illness, I suspect stress or anxiety. But I'm not certain how to address this issue since I'm not her person, and introducing anything new to her has proven a challenge in the past. I do know she hadn't had a thorough wet shower since my new bird, since that was normally something she had done with me, with my mom she only ever liked a misting, and she hadn't been showering with me, so I did let her come with me yesterday.
I've gotten some new shredding toys that I've been trying to show her. But she even seems more skittish in general, normally if I were to even set out an abandoned Kleenex she'd go nuts for it and try to take it or rip it, even from me, especially if it was a strip of one. But yesterday, I laid out a whole bunch of stripped up and ripped and whole Kleenexes and she was spooked, wouldn't go near them. She also loves most/all foods or at the very least NEEDS to try some of everything, and goes nuts for millet, but it took a lot of coaxing and she was spooked of it on the branch. Then, once she finally came over to it, it was like she was eating it as quickly as she could, instead of just picking the bits of it off and nibbling.
The only other thing to note is that my mom let's my bird out too a lot of times when she's letting out her own, so maybe jealousy? Oh, and my bird is almost constantly out of his cage, except when I'm not home, she is out of her cage a lot, but has to be put away if anyone is eating or cooking because she swoops and lands on food and such, mine only needs to be put away if we all are eating.
Anyway, sorry for the excessive information and really long post, but I'm concerned and run out of ideas. And I'm not even sure if I'm treating this right, or if me and my bird could be making things worse. Any ideas or help is appreciated, thank you.
Hoping to help Beacan.
Some back story, sorry if this is too much information, but I'm at a loss and I feel like the backstory is necessary.
So, in my household there are 2 cockatiels, one about 5 yrs old and is my mom's (Beacan) and a confirmed female. And the other is mine who is almost 6 months (Nymbus). For a few months prior to my newest baby, whom we've had almost 2 months, we had housed a cockatiel of unknown age and gender (Signal), who later passed from cardiac arrest.
Somewhere in the timeframe between the change of Signal and Nymbus, Beacan had started roughing up and creating bald spots on her tail feathers, and causing them to be loose, and dangling but refusing to pull them out, just letting them flop. Beacan then started to pluck just the feathers around her neck, under her beak. From what I can tell (she's not very fond of me, so she wont let me see properly) she hasn't plucked under her wings or much if any of her back. She has two of her own cages as she always has, a daytime and a night time and we have always been careful not to impose the new birds into her territory, they have thier own cage and its separate although near hers.
When we had Signal, they were a very cautious bird, so an unhealthy previous home was suspected, though they adjusted quiet well, and filled out with builtiful new feathers shortly after we got them. With Signal whom we suspected was female, they mainly coexisted and Beacan was the more talkative and clearly dominant one.
Now with Nym, Beacan is often quiet, and we suspect Nym is male. She still occasionally chirps and calls, though it's harder to tell now, because Nym has learned some of her calls and mimics her. She has been particularly quieter in the last couple of weeks.
When we first got Nymbus, I had waited until after Beacan had finished her summer clutch, so that I didnt overwhelm the baby bird, because some of Beacan's behaviors and screeches while laying can be quiet loud and concerning, she is also quite grumpy and requires attention. However, as soon as we got Nymbus, Beacan was unusually interested and would climb on his cage and call him and make her "sexy noises" at him and suddenly she laid an additional egg totally out of her time. She didn't pay it any notice and we knew it wasnt fertilized (his age and they hadn't interacted yet) so a few weeks afterwards we got rid of it. He sings and chirps almost constantly and I'm not sure how she feels about him anymore, because since the egg, she seems to only tolerate his existence and if they are both out near eachother she will hiss or fly off.
I haven't witnessed any of her chest plucking, just her tail a little bit, so I suspect she does it when no one is home, during the day. It's quite apparent that it's not molting as we had first hoped, but she still has the bald spots so it can't be. There doesnt appear to be any sores or injured skin, so I'm not suspecting an illness, I suspect stress or anxiety. But I'm not certain how to address this issue since I'm not her person, and introducing anything new to her has proven a challenge in the past. I do know she hadn't had a thorough wet shower since my new bird, since that was normally something she had done with me, with my mom she only ever liked a misting, and she hadn't been showering with me, so I did let her come with me yesterday.
I've gotten some new shredding toys that I've been trying to show her. But she even seems more skittish in general, normally if I were to even set out an abandoned Kleenex she'd go nuts for it and try to take it or rip it, even from me, especially if it was a strip of one. But yesterday, I laid out a whole bunch of stripped up and ripped and whole Kleenexes and she was spooked, wouldn't go near them. She also loves most/all foods or at the very least NEEDS to try some of everything, and goes nuts for millet, but it took a lot of coaxing and she was spooked of it on the branch. Then, once she finally came over to it, it was like she was eating it as quickly as she could, instead of just picking the bits of it off and nibbling.
The only other thing to note is that my mom let's my bird out too a lot of times when she's letting out her own, so maybe jealousy? Oh, and my bird is almost constantly out of his cage, except when I'm not home, she is out of her cage a lot, but has to be put away if anyone is eating or cooking because she swoops and lands on food and such, mine only needs to be put away if we all are eating.
Anyway, sorry for the excessive information and really long post, but I'm concerned and run out of ideas. And I'm not even sure if I'm treating this right, or if me and my bird could be making things worse. Any ideas or help is appreciated, thank you.
Hoping to help Beacan.
