I wonder - She wanders

[zvezdast]

I've been reading the article from one of the pinned posts on this forum

Hormonal Behavior in Pet Birds - Therapeutic Remedies — For The Birds DVM — Avian Vet

One of the things it suggests for curtailing cavity seeking behavior is not allowing the bird to wander.
But I wonder how to not allow a fully flighted bird to wander?

I was always for encouraging their independent play, and enjoy seeing different ways they find to play around the house, in addition to all the toys. But when they are in the nesting mood, it gets tiring shooing distracting them all the time because they are chewing on and destroying stuff.
I also believe in focused/instructional attention, but their attention span only goes so far.

So, to discourage cavity seeking, do you find yourself keeping your hormonal hens in the cage longer?

 

[pajarita]

I only keep handicapped birds in cages so I can't really answer your question but I would think that the solution would be to simply eliminate the 'cavities'.

 

[zvezdast]

Oh, but cavities are all around the house!
Under the stove, bellow kitchen cabinets, around the fridge, in the bookshelf, in a drawer, under the table, under a blanket, behind the pillows, behind anything! Even a mug seemed like an interesting cavity to her!
Are your birds in an aviary or freely roaming around the house? You seem the have a LOT of birds.

 

[Happynme]

Oh, but cavities are all around the house!
Under the stove, bellow kitchen cabinets, around the fridge, in the bookshelf, in a drawer, under the table, under a blanket, behind the pillows, behind anything! Even a mug seemed like an interesting cavity to her!
Are your birds in an aviary or freely roaming around the house? You seem the have a LOT of birds.

I feel your pain! I had a determined lovie fully intent on making a nest anywhere with anything once i took away her hut. She very skillfully defended a small space behind a cereal box in the pantry that she found in the three seconds it took me to fetch her some cheerios. The ONLY thing that helped was lots of distractions while out and no unsupervised play until out of nesty mode. Thankful it passed quickly and she can now be trusted not to nip a finger out should she venture behind something...lol

 

[pajarita]

Oh, but cavities are all around the house!
Under the stove, bellow kitchen cabinets, around the fridge, in the bookshelf, in a drawer, under the table, under a blanket, behind the pillows, behind anything! Even a mug seemed like an interesting cavity to her!
Are your birds in an aviary or freely roaming around the house? You seem the have a LOT of birds.

I have the canaries and finches in one room and most of the parrots in another (only the handicapped are caged, the rest live cage-free in it). But I say 'most of the parrots' because, right now, I also have three (senegal, redbelly and sunnie) in the human living areas (dining room) and the cardinals in the living room. When (although it feels more like 'if' than when) the new birdrooms are built in the attic, everybirdy will be in them and loose -even the handicapped, if I can manage it. The ones in the living areas are either loose all day long (the sun conure was kept clipped until recently so he -I think it's actually a 'she'- doesn't really fly from his cage that much) or have each 4 hours of out of cage time (with 2 hours of one-on-one) but they are never that hormonal because they have no mates and are kept at a strict solar schedule and given less protein during the resting season.

 

[zvezdast]

I have the canaries and finches in one room and most of the parrots in another (only the handicapped are caged, the rest live cage-free in it). But I say 'most of the parrots' because, right now, I also have three (senegal, redbelly and sunnie) in the human living areas (dining room) and the cardinals in the living room. When (although it feels more like 'if' than when) the new birdrooms are built in the attic, everybirdy will be in them and loose -even the handicapped, if I can manage it. The ones in the living areas are either loose all day long (the sun conure was kept clipped until recently so he -I think it's actually a 'she'- doesn't really fly from his cage that much) or have each 4 hours of out of cage time (with 2 hours of one-on-one) but they are never that hormonal because they have no mates and are kept at a strict solar schedule and given less protein during the resting season.

Wow, you are lucky to have two rooms to dedicate to the birds!
Do your three birds that live in the human areas sleep there as well? Or do you take them somewhere in the evening in order to be on the strict solar schedule?
When the day gets longer, do they then naturally get into the breeding mode? Or does less protein you give during that time of the year again discourage them from nesting? Essentially, your birds are never in the breeding mode?!

 

[pajarita]

Yes, the birds in the living areas sleep there. I turn on and off the overhead lights at the same times I do in the birdrooms, and feed them also at the same times. Once night falls and they are asleep, I cover their cages with opaque material so no light shines into the cages because there is light that comes in through the windows from the street lamps and the Senegal and the sun conure's cages are placed too close to the kitchen where there is light after dark until we go to sleep during the short days. No overhead light is turned on in the living room or the dining room after the sunset or before sunrise and noise is limited to whatever is absolutely necessary (no TV, no radio, no loud talk, etc -the dogs would bark, on occasion, but they go upstairs to my bedroom at 8pm and the birds have, apparently, gotten used to their barking every now and then because they don't seem to react at all to it). So, although I don't move them from the human areas, they also follow a solar schedule.

I don't reduce protein during the breeding season, quite the contrary, I increase it as this is exactly what happens in Nature and I try to emulate, as much as possible, the conditions they live under in the wild.

All my birds produce sexual hormones during the breeding season, it's only that because they have been following the seasons and have a nice, long resting one (winter), they never become overly hormonal (there is only so much their sexual organs can grow in one season - it's when the season never ends that they have trouble) so there is no real aggression, desperate nest searching/building, off-season or chronic laying or any of the problems that captive parrots might have. There are a couple of tiffs in the birdroom (males getting more possessive of their hens, a pair defending a spot they decided it's theirs and nobody else's, a bit more jealousy over me, etc) but nothing to write home about. As a matter of fact, the birds already registered the lengthening of the days and are beginning to prepare for the breeding season so, this morning, there was an incident with the male jenday taking exception to my spending one-on-one time with my Congo gray but it was no biggie.