Patch can get no peace

[Loz]

I'm hopefully worrying over nothing but better that than ignoring a problem that does exist.

Here is Patch, who is six to seven months old.




He has his active moments, but he spends more time resting than the rest of the flock. And his feathers seem somewhat ruffled to me. He doesn't have much of a voice that I have noticed, although he was loud enough when I first got him!

The most obvious issue I can see is the insane, 23 hours a day obsession Eeyore has for Patch. Eeyore will not let him rest unless I physically intervene. Eeyore's obsessive behaviours include beak-bashing, regurgitating and pulling Patch's wing, tail and body feathers, constantly. I believe this would explain the ruffled-feathers look plus the bouts of sleepiness or lethargy.

Patch's appetite is good, he takes part in group foraging sessions, flies well and otherwise seems well. No tail bobbing and no sign of worrying forms of poop. He just wants to sleep more than the others.

Separating Patch and Eeyore will be a problem. If I isolate Patch, he won't do well without his buddy Squeak. If I isolate Eeyore,  the big lad will lose his mind and rip his own feathers to shreds. The boy is not playing with a full deck, if you get my meaning.

The most obvious solution seems to be to just push through and let the budgies sort it. I'm encouraged by Hibs and Squeak's example. Hibs was obssessed with Squeak same as Eeoyore with Patch but that relationship seems healthier these days and Squeak is allowed to be a budgie now.

Any thoughts or advice? And yes, telling me I have too much time to over-think stuff is legitimate.

[tweetiepiesmom]

You might try separating Patch from the rest of the others for a short period of time to see what happens. Otherwise just let them sort it out while keeping an eye on things.

My Buddy is very energetic, always chirping, singing, running around. Tweetie Pie is very calm, quiet and takes many naps during the day but otherwise he eats well and flies around and plays when he wants to. He also has perching places outside the cage to get away from Buddy. Buddy used to constantly be after him to play. Tweetie Pie ignores him and now Buddy will go play with a toy or me. If I see it happening, I'll hold my arm up to Buddy and he'll come onto me to play with my eyeglasses or kiss my thumbnail. I just think of them as Buddy being the extrovert and Tweetie Pie being the introvert.

[Loz]

Thank you, tweetiepiesmom. I spent quite a bit of this afternoon, when I wasn't with Herman, disuading Eeyore from hassling Patch. It was pretty full on.

Right now, the budgies are all together in their aviary. Patch is on the rope ladder, head under wing and Eeyore is next to him with his face pressed close. It's kind of sweet. Hibs is up, serenading the flock. Chocobo has the other aviary to herself.

I worry for Patch's health and sanity. Squeak is getting some alone time at last and I need for Patch to get the same.

[criswell]

I'm don't know what the best course of action is for you and your boys but I wanted to share my experiences with a boisterous budgie. Eeyore's behaviour with Patch reminds me of how Criswell was around Dexter. He was so excited to have a new little friend that he was really full on with him, always wanting to feed him or beak bash with him. It took him quite a few months to calm down. They first met at the beginning of April but I didn't let them sleep in the same cage until the end of June. I only let them spend time together when someone was in the room. That may have made Criswell even more excited when they did play together but he was so boisterous with Dexter that I couldn't risk it. But he did calm down eventually.

It does tend to worry me if one of my budgies sleeps more during the day than they usually do. My boys have all liked different amounts of sleep during the day. I almost never see Dexter nap, but Dean Stockwell used to like a long nap with his head in his bell. Randolph Carter liked a nap too. But any time Randolph Carter was ill he was sleeping more than usual, and that was the most obvious sign that he wasn't well.

[Hezz]

It sounds to me that rather than separating the two permanently or leaving them together permanently, that the middle ground of time together/time apart would be of the most beneficial for both parties. How big is the aviary they are in? How much out of cage time do they get? Let Patch have time to himself to chill, time with the other two to be social and some time with the nuisance to be kind. The same with the Nuisance - some time with Patch, some time with the other two without Patch and some time alone to give the others a break. Are all four homed together, or are they in two separate cages?

[Loz]

Thank you for sharing your experiences, criswell.

When Patch is active, he appears perfectly normal. He runs around, flies, feeds with energy. My hope is that Patch is using sleep as a means of escaping attention or as a result of not being allowed to have a normal sleep pattern.

I'm hopeful that like you, another month or two will see Eeyore moved on to some other obsession.

[Loz]

Thanks for your thoughts, Hezz .

There are two identical aviaries where the flock lives and both are open to all. They are something like 60cm x 60cm x 150cm tall. The flock gets most of the day where they can be in or out of the cage, except on occasions when I am out of the house for a couple hours or more.

Most nights, recently anyway, the budgies sleep in one aviary, the kakariki in the other. The kakariki, Chocobo, interacts fairly freely with the budgies - to the extent that Chocobo was attempting courtship behaviour yesterday with a mostly uninterested Eeyore. He nibbled her tail feathers briefly which she seemed to tolerate or even enjoy.

I have in the past tried closing the aviary door when Patch and Eeyore have been either side of it, to give Patch a break. This led to both budgies getting agitated at the forced separation - I can't win for losing.

The problem may be in my mind. Patch occasionally objects to Eeyore's attention but mostly tolerates it. My worry is that Eeyore constantly tries to wake Patch up if he's napping and that doesn't seem healthy.

On the other hand, I do see Eeyore leave Patch alone on occasion. I think I will time such periods to get a more objective view of the situation.

I need to get this all sorted out, either Eeyore's behaviour, or my perception of it. In about a month, perhaps longer, young Herman could be joining the flock and I worry about potential obsessional behaviour from Eeyore and Mr Hibs.

[Loz]

Hezz here is a pic of how one of the aviaries looks today. The other is very similar and is located half a metre away. Together they are like a single large aviary and the birds treat it as such.

[Hezz]

So they are not the biggest cage, but if they have out of cage time most of the time, it shouldn’t be an issue. Wider is better than taller for budgie cages as they all like to be on the top most perches all the time which can lead to bullying from the more aggressive or obsessed birds. The one being harassed has the option of being lower down, and generally that means lower down the pecking order and no one wants to be there. Have you ever tried laying them length-ways on something like a table top? I wonder what would happen then. Maybe nothing, maybe something. It would give them more exercise space, and all a high perch for sleeping if nothing else.

[Loz]

I agree that width is better than height for budgies and I have often considered what you've suggested but the cages won't tolerate that position, they are designed to stand upright.
Spacewise, I'd have room for only one cage if horizontally aligned. This might work in theory but I have a kakariki in the mix and I need to have the option for two separate cages for bedtime. Sometimes she wants isolation, sometimes she wants company. In addition, she makes full use of the height of the cage, she is as vertical as the budgies are horizontal.

The harassment occurs in and out of the cage. I believe it stops at night when they are all tucked up in bed and under cover. I hear very little kerfuffle, most nights none at all.

I observed Patch closely yesterday. The harassment is definitely undesirable but I do see Patch pushing back at times. At other times he seems very tolerant - or perhaps, resigned? And I did notice periods where he is left alone to his own devices. I would still like to see him left alone more but I will continue to observe. The situation is perhaps less dire than I thought but he needs to become less passive.

[Loz]

I will see about placing more of the perches at the same highest level. This will provide the possibility of more distancing when the budgies are loafing in their aviaries. Might help.

[Hezz]

It might help. Dynamics will probably change again once the latest joins the flock, as well.

[Marianne Marlow]

I agree with this. Things change all the time here!

Mar 18, 2022 0:40:30 GMT Hezz said:

It might help. Dynamics will probably change again once the latest joins the flock, as well.

[Loz]

I may be losing my mind here.

Patch has been sitting on the salad cress for an hour or so, perhaps two. It's a nice spot so why not but hes been about as animated as a toy budgie.

Needless to say, Eeyore has been pulling his feathers and being an absolute pest. I spent nearly an hour trying to dissuade this behaviour but you may as well ask a computer program to change its function and make tea.

I'd had enough. I managed, with huge disruption to the flock, to separate Eeyore and Patch - splitting atoms is easier - and locked Eeyore in one of the aviaries. The rest of the flock took shelter from the commotion in the other aviary, where Hibs proceeded to pull at Patch's feathers. I had no idea Hibs is the substitute tormentor. At this point I was doubting my sanity.

It seems plain to me that if Patch is to have anything approaching a healthy, useful life, he'll need to be re-homed. I don't think he is sick, I think he is disastrously passive and timid and unable to cope with this flock.
There's a chance that Herman joining the flock will re-jig the dynamics as has been suggested but I have two catastrophically dysfunctional budgies - Eeyore and Patch - and I don't know how much longer Patch will hold out. He's already close to catatonic for a good chunk of each day. He has moments of activity but he's clearly less active than any of the other birds.

As I type, Eeyore is climbing up and down his aviary. I suspect he will start doing his stressed-budgie behaviours soon - yep, there he goes, as I typed that. The feathers will be next, no doubt.

Not sure what I need. Guidance? Hope? A miracle?

Perhaps I just need to keep Patch isolated but I have no idea how he'll react to that. He gets upset when he cannot be in contact with Eeyore, if Patch is awake and active.

[criswell]

It's a tricky situation.

If he was my budgie I would get him a check up at the vets just to be absolutely sure that he's not sick.

I don't have a huge amount of experience with budgies but being quiet and passive and letting the others pull their tail is how my budgies have behaved when they weren't feeling well. It can be so difficult to tell when a bird is ill and I still don't think I'm very good at it but after our experience with Randolph Carter back in 2020 when he turned out to be very sick, any budgie being quiet and not so active is a real worry to me. I've only had one vet trip when it turned out that nothing was wrong but it wasn't wasted as it stopped me worrying.