Hello everyone.
One and a half years ago I adopted an 8 year old (now 9) male cockatiel called Helge. He spent his whole life in one room with another male cockatiel but almost no interaction with humans or toys. The owner did try to do better but eventually gave up and gave the bird away after the other male cockatiel died. I don't know if they were bonded, but considering all they had was each other... They probably were.
I already had a female cockatiel that was incredibly tame from the beginning, while Helge was scared of basically everything. He didn't know a TV or that humans were actually nice. He did get better and now sits on me all the time and wants to spend time with us and explore, he has become a proper little curious boy!
Now to the problem... Him and the female (Knofi) mate all the time, but he also keeps attacking her. Until roughly a year ago she wanted to mate and went into her banana position near him, and he attacked her feet instead of mating. Now he actually does mate with her, but then he goes to look for nesting sites (I make sure he won't find any), but he keeps attacking knofi even though she's his "partner" .
They don't preen each other, he won't let her sit on the same perch and will scare her off, and if she gets close while he looks for a nest he kicks her out and then SWOOPS down at her, trying to scare her as far away as possible. She tends to then sit on me to try to hide from him.
Obviously I don't let him hurt her or anything, and he doesn't bite much anymore, but he still does all those other things. Mating but hating I call it lol.
I've done all the things that are commonly recommended like moving toys around and the layout of the cage, not giving as many fresh foods, limiting their outside and daylight hours, separating them... None of it works. He still just wants her gone, but when he doesn't see her he screams for her.
Is there any way to correct this behavior? Knofi aka the female always asks to be preened but all Helge does is attack. He does sing to her though.
I don't know what to do anymore because he just bullies her for no reason and no matter what we do, he's still just as hormonal. They don't have to absolutely love each other but it'd be great if he could just stop being so mean to her lol.
Thanks for reading and I hope I didn't make too many mistakes, English isn't my first language.
One and a half years ago I adopted an 8 year old (now 9) male cockatiel called Helge. He spent his whole life in one room with another male cockatiel but almost no interaction with humans or toys. The owner did try to do better but eventually gave up and gave the bird away after the other male cockatiel died. I don't know if they were bonded, but considering all they had was each other... They probably were.
I already had a female cockatiel that was incredibly tame from the beginning, while Helge was scared of basically everything. He didn't know a TV or that humans were actually nice. He did get better and now sits on me all the time and wants to spend time with us and explore, he has become a proper little curious boy!
Now to the problem... Him and the female (Knofi) mate all the time, but he also keeps attacking her. Until roughly a year ago she wanted to mate and went into her banana position near him, and he attacked her feet instead of mating. Now he actually does mate with her, but then he goes to look for nesting sites (I make sure he won't find any), but he keeps attacking knofi even though she's his "partner" .
They don't preen each other, he won't let her sit on the same perch and will scare her off, and if she gets close while he looks for a nest he kicks her out and then SWOOPS down at her, trying to scare her as far away as possible. She tends to then sit on me to try to hide from him.
Obviously I don't let him hurt her or anything, and he doesn't bite much anymore, but he still does all those other things. Mating but hating I call it lol.
I've done all the things that are commonly recommended like moving toys around and the layout of the cage, not giving as many fresh foods, limiting their outside and daylight hours, separating them... None of it works. He still just wants her gone, but when he doesn't see her he screams for her.
Is there any way to correct this behavior? Knofi aka the female always asks to be preened but all Helge does is attack. He does sing to her though.
I don't know what to do anymore because he just bullies her for no reason and no matter what we do, he's still just as hormonal. They don't have to absolutely love each other but it'd be great if he could just stop being so mean to her lol.
Thanks for reading and I hope I didn't make too many mistakes, English isn't my first language.
. It's really easy to underestimate the amount of problems these little birds can have lol
