Lovebird issues

[Ira]

Mainly a question for Hezz, but also for anyone really who's owned other species of bird.

My colleague has a lovebird who was hand-reared and tame as anything until recently. Jeff is around a year old, so I'm assuming he's hit his hormonal teenage stage, and has gone from being sweet and loving to not wanting to step up and attacking my colleague's hand when she tries to change food bowls.
I was trying to figure out if he's mainly being territorial of his cage but she's been reluctant to let him out as they have high ceilings and she needs to do it when the children aren't around as she's worried he might go for them and hurt them, and they might injure him during their reaction.

I was wondering if Loki had had a similar phase, Hezz? Or any general advice I can give her on how to manage his behaviours/maintain a positive bond until he hopefully comes through the other side.

[Hezz]

Loki hasn’t been anything like this at all. Occasionally he had been a bit funny about his food, if I have gone to replace something on his bamboo stick, but only if he had been feeding at the time, so we have just had a little ‘push and shove’ withe me telling him not to be a git as I’m giving him more, not stealing from him.

Is he getting enough/needing more attention? Has anything happened to change that recently? I don’t know a lot about love birds, but I do know that they can be vicious to others, and they do require a lot of attention if kept singularly. Jealous of the children and the attention they require? I do think hormones will be a lot of the problem, but how to navigate through? Has Joe bonded with all the family or just your colleague? Is there someone else she can get to try changing his food and water to see what the reaction is? Is he reacting to her in/near his cage, or anyone?

[Ira]

I doubt he's really getting as much attention as he needs. She works the same hours as I do.

He's only really bonded to her. He was okay with the children as long as they didn't try to touch him, and was sometimes defensive of my colleague, so she was always careful about him coming out.
He has a Piano 6 cage because I gave her mine when I ended up with 2 spare cages to make sure he had suitable cage space.

I might have a look at our work rotas and see if there's a time when she has 2 days in a row that I can go over for the evening to take a look myself. I don't know lovebird but might at least have some idea of his body language.

I've lent her my net in case she tries letting him out to see his out of cage behaviour and he refuses to go back. Although I will point out that he should go back when he gets hungry.

I also don't know how many hours of sleep he gets.

[Hezz]

I meant to say there at the end, is he reacting to her specifically around the cage, or is it anyone who might go near it? You might have to put yourself in the firing line to work that one out.

If she can’t give him the time and attention required, you might need to raise the subject of Love Bird #2.

[Ira]

Yes, and then there's the question of whether he'd accept another lovebird...

Thanks Hezz!

[Hezz]

I’m not much help, I’m afraid. I hadn’t even thought that he wouldn’t accept another of his kind, but I suppose a first love could be that strong.

It sounds like the typical situation of how many parrots end up being rehomed, unfortunately. I was reading something not long ago, looking at ways for Loki to become more accepting of my son, but he, son, isn’t all that interested and for anything to work the human has to make the effort. Maybe you could relay this to your colleague: each member of the family is given one thing whether task, treat, scratches etc that the bird gets only from this one person. For Loki I would choose peanuts as his favourite all-time food, head scratches, his favourite flowers, a shower, if I had to spread special treatment throughout the family. I know this isn’t strictly Joe’s problem but I do wonder if his bond with your friend could include the rest of her family, and then he wouldn’t be so reliant on her for his world being perfect. It does take commitment from the rest of the family, but if it works it is a win for everyone, and may help through the next round of hormones, because it is likely that this will end up being an on-going problem.

[Ira]

I'm just conscious of him being a hand-rear, and if he wasn't socialised well with birds then he may be entirely convinced he's human and not take to another bird. Or he may be totally fine with it. Trouble is, like with Piper and Loki, you don't know until you try.

I don't think she entertains any thoughts of rehoming him. He is very loved, I just might need to help educate on his needs a bit. Bless, he has to share attention with the kids, two dogs, and a rabbit.

Technically Jeff is her son's bird, but of course he decided that she was his human. And the rabbit's her daughter's. At least she's the type of parent who doesn't buy pets for children that she isn't prepared to take care of herself.

But yes, I shall see what advice I can offer. I think Jeff would accept treats off of the children, and he used to love them swinging his swing whilst he sat on it. Hopefully they can find a way to work through his adolescense that helps him mature in a positive direction.

I might jot down some ideas to give her in writing instead.

[Hezz]

Sorry, my comment on rehousing wasn’t aimed at this situation, but pet birds bonding with a specific human whose circumstances and/or priorities may change. Budgies and their relationships are so much easier to handle than many other parrot species, especially hand-reared ones.

[Ira]

Don't worry, I know, I was just explaining.

Oh yeah. I am so glad I love budgies more than larger parrots. Munchy was 8 when we moved out and was still able to slowly be convinced that having another budgie around was a good thing. And other than convincing them I'm not going to eat them and the daily clean up they're not that much work. I was all geared up for a hormonal, chomping Yuki and it never came, and I swear that's partly because he's in a flock. Possibly also because he was already the boss.