• Welcome to Avian Avenue! To view our forum with less advertisments please register with us.
    Memberships are free and it will just take a moment. Click here

Hormonal Behavior

AbnormalAvian

Meeting neighbors
Joined
1/23/18
Messages
48
My bird is almost a year old now, and he's starting to become hormonal. He's gotten a lot meaner and won't let me pet him anymore. He also keeps running over to my closet door and tries to squeeze under it for some reason- not too sure what that's about. And he's definitely a 'love'-bird, as I caught him masturbating to his bell today. I'm not sure what to do to get him to act normal, so any tips are greatly appreciated. And does anyone have any idea when this behavior will stop? He's been like this for a couple months now, but I've just now seen him do the 'bell thing'. He's also not a confirmed male, I don't know his gender, if that's important at all.
 

ReNap

Strolling the yard
Joined
6/29/18
Messages
115
Real Name
Chelsey
My guess is running under the closet door might be viewed as a potential nest site, being dark and a small space to squeeze under the door.
I’d suggest looking into Barbara heidenrich’s webinar “solutions to parrot behavior problems related to hormones” explains a lot of what triggers hormonal behavior, how you can help reduce/avoid that unwanted behavior in the first place and what to do when it happens. I’d highly recommend it.

Parrot Digital Media | Online Parrot Media

No 5 in the list of webinar recordings
 

sunnysmom

Ripping up the road
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
9/16/13
Messages
28,803
Location
Pennsylvania
Real Name
Michelle
Hormones can last awhile. But I would think he should be starting to stop. How much sleep does he get? You can try increasing his hours of darkness by 2 hours a day for a couple weeks to see if that helps. Once when my cockatiel was crazy hormonal, I gave him herb salad (available at My Safe Bird Store). I don't know if it was a coincidence or not but after a couple days of it he calmed down a lot.
 

AbnormalAvian

Meeting neighbors
Joined
1/23/18
Messages
48
Thanks!
I'll look into the ebooks. He gets 12 hours of light right now, but maybe it'll help if I shorten it to 10. And I'll try a salad, what types of herbs did you use?

And this is him with his girlfriend-
20181212_162522.jpg
 

Tiel Feathers

Joyriding the Neighborhood
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
9/15/14
Messages
20,193
Location
Quincy,CA
Real Name
Deanna
Top