Extremely aggressive Lovebird, Don't know what to do.

[Akazee]

Today I was chased out of the living room by my bird after he wouldn't stop flying for my head to attack me.

Icarus came to me 4 months ago. He (she???) is a lovebird and was rehomed at 8 months cause his old owner moved away.

Im inexperienced too I'll admit. This is my first birdie. But I was researching about birds long before I got him.
At first he was terrified of everything, especially hands and only stepped up to sticks. It took awhile but after a lot of hardwork he was flying and landing on our arms from across the room and eating from our hands.

But he never got over his fear of hands, I've never gotten him to step up.
Then his personality took a complete 180. It slowly started when he began to obsess over chewing on phone cases. He started nibbling on our arms, and would try and bite our fingers while sitting on our phones watching us type smth.

I do not know what triggered it, but hes become so aggressive I'm scared to be around him.

his lunges have gotten more "deadlier", he'll attack us for no reason. Just the other day I was feeding him out of my palm, he turned to look at me and then he attacked my face, bit and clamped down on to the part under my lip. I have this ugly bruise there now. He does the same with our arms too.

We could be typing on a keyboard and he'll fly over to sit on top of the monitor because he likes the noise, and then out of nowhere hell jump off and onto the keyboard and lunge for our fingers. Yesterday he landed on my mothers knee and literally climbed up her body to try and attack her face.

We also cannot hold him at all without him running up our arms and attacking our faces.

He has something against faces?

I don't understand why he's so psychotic all of a sudden. Its breaking my heart - I want my darling back. Not this replacement satan that's literally attacking anyone who walks within a 5 meter radius near him.

I think it may also be due to the fact he's probably a hybrid birdie - I've read that they may have increased agression. i don't think he's a girl because hes almost a year old and I haven't seen any eggs. But i took away the fuzzy tent thing in his cage just in case. I put a picture of him below.

I hate putting him in his cage, hes ibut if this continues he may never be allowed to come out for the for see able future.

Somehow I've seemed to entirely loose his trust, and I dont know if I'll ever get it back.

Please for the love of god, if you know anyway to remedy this situation do tell. I need all the advice i can get to rebuild our relationship.

 

[JLcribber]

Sounds a little hormonal.

This is a good place to start so you understand what's going on.
Site Name - Articles - Behavioral - Sex And The Psittacine

 

[Akazee]

Sounds a little hormonal.

This is a good place to start so you understand what's going on.
Site Name - Articles - Behavioral - Sex And The Psittacine

Helpful article, thank you.

 

[Jobot]

What is your bird's sleep situation?

 

[sunnysmom]

Yes, how many hours of sleep does he get? It sounds like hormones to me too. Increasing his hours of sleep/darkness for 2 weeks may help. Also, when my cockatiel wne through a crazy hormonal period, I gave her Herb Salad. I know some say it works, some say it doesn't. But it really seemed to help calm him down.

 

[LunaLovebird]

It does sound hormonal. That being the case, the good news for you is that it will pass. This will be the first lot of real hormones, and in my experience they are the worst. You’ll just have to adjust how you interact for a while and wait it out.

 

[metalstitcher]

It does sound like a bout of bad hormones and it will as everyone has said will pass. I agree with everyone and getting him/her on a sleep schedule and making the darkness longer. It does help because I had to do the same thing with my little because she wanted to kill my husband a few times.

 

[finchly]

And in the meantime...keep something nearby to shield your face and arms. Just a newspaper would do as a blocking device.

If she won’t step up on hands, offer another body part or a perch. I have one that won’t go near hands but if I indicate where I want him to go he will fly there. (Not a lovie. A parrotlet) offer plenty of toys she can chew and destroy, and hopefully she’s in a good size cage to move around and burn off energy.

 

[Leih]

Very informative. My lovebird has been nippy lately. She's 5 months though so I expect her to be a monster for awhile. I'm going to start clicker training with her, and hopefully she'll want the treat and not my finger! Akazee, keep us posted!

 

[Akazee]

Thank you all for the recommendations! Her regular schedule used to be at bed by 10 at the most and out again at 11 am or so. Hearing that this may pass is a huge relief. She seems to be calming down too - very slightly though. I've put her on a stricter sleeping schedule in bed by 8 and increased the amount of darkness shes normally exposed to in the house and ive gotten a darker clothes to cover her cage with. She's seemed to calm down a lot near my family members, its just me she seems to hold some sort of grudge with(probably because I'm responsible for putting her back in her cage when she doesn't want to go back). I still have a lot of hope for her, thank you all for the suggestions.

 

[Beasley]

Hey there Akazee!

I have a 3month old lovebird (Peeps) that’s been getting bitey and he has pure hatred for my phone/tablet/anything that I’m paying attention to that isn’t him. It sounds like a mix of hormones and jealousy taking place here. I agree it will pass but definitely it is worth at least trying to work with her through it.
I am essentially teaching Peeps that the phone is a part of me and using the command “no biting.” I make sure I always have a substitute for “me” and offer that (a piece of peanut or paper/cardboard, etc.) even if he spits it out and immediately charges my phone, consistency is key. Every time he successfully redirects his attention, I reward him with plenty of affection and attention before returning to, lets be honest, researching how to get him to stop biting me. So far this has been really successful for me.
Also, confidence is very important, she knows when you’re nervous, and that makes her nervous - so if it’s scary to handle her, you can try wearing gloves although Peeps is super afraid of my hands in gloves so if you are going to use them, I’d suggest introducing them slowly and making sure she’s not scared of them first. Good luck with her! I’m sure you will do great!

 

[Leih]

Hey there Akazee!

I have a 3month old lovebird (Peeps) that’s been getting bitey and he has pure hatred for my phone/tablet/anything that I’m paying attention to that isn’t him. It sounds like a mix of hormones and jealousy taking place here. I agree it will pass but definitely it is worth at least trying to work with her through it.
I am essentially teaching Peeps that the phone is a part of me and using the command “no biting.” I make sure I always have a substitute for “me” and offer that (a piece of peanut or paper/cardboard, etc.) even if he spits it out and immediately charges my phone, consistency is key. Every time he successfully redirects his attention, I reward him with plenty of affection and attention before returning to, lets be honest, researching how to get him to stop biting me. So far this has been really successful for me.
Also, confidence is very important, she knows when you’re nervous, and that makes her nervous - so if it’s scary to handle her, you can try wearing gloves although Peeps is super afraid of my hands in gloves so if you are going to use them, I’d suggest introducing them slowly and making sure she’s not scared of them first. Good luck with her! I’m sure you will do great!

I sometimes play with my 5 1/2 month old lovebird with things she can bite. I wonder if I'm encouraging biting or if since it's not me she's biting it's okay? She recently got on my hand for the first time, by accident, and once she realized it of course she bit me. But not too hard! Their bites are awful when they want them to be!

 

[Beasley]

You definitely aren’t encouraging biting behavior by providing her with appropriate things to destroy/play with. Lovebirds have busy beaks and need toys to play with or they will make their own (you, charging cords, pillows, et al.) whenever my boy bites me I give him the “no biting” command and offer him something he’s allowed to chew on, he is really into Q-tips right now. And yes they do hurt! Peeps took the opportunity to bite me while I was on the phone and couldn’t correct him without inadvertently telling a customer service rep to stop biting me lol.

 

[Leih]

You definitely aren’t encouraging biting behavior by providing her with appropriate things to destroy/play with. Lovebirds have busy beaks and need toys to play with or they will make their own (you, charging cords, pillows, et al.) whenever my boy bites me I give him the “no biting” command and offer him something he’s allowed to chew on, he is really into Q-tips right now. And yes they do hurt! Peeps took the opportunity to bite me while I was on the phone and couldn’t correct him without inadvertently telling a customer service rep to stop biting me lol.

Haha mine is No Bite! Q tips are a really good idea... When she, Aoife, comes out of the cage I of course can't handle her without a perch, but I'm going to try distracting her with a Q tip. The worst is when she goes for a treat I'm offering and decides to try to get my fingertips instead. She is unfortunately not food motivated but I've found a few faves I save only for teaching, mainly dried pineapple.