About my parakeet Pico, that I’ve had for 1-1/2 yrs. He’s a character and sometimes a bully. 1) He bites me really hard sometimes, and I can’t figure out what prompts this behavior. He flies to my shoulder, and sometimes bites my neck, even breaking the skin. 2) He doesn’t have a friend, and he’s protective of his toys that he feeds regularly. The problem is that he regurgitates a lot to feed them, and he is quite thin.
Hi Rae,
One thing that would probably help is to have a minimal wing trim done – just enough to slow him down. Flight feathers on both wings would be trimmed just a little bit, and evenly. You would need to communicate this very well with the groomer so the trim isn’t severe. This can settle a bird down quite a bit without taking away the ability to fly. And of course the feathers will eventually molt and grow back. A fully flighted bird can get to the point where he realizes he is totally in charge and he ignores any training he has had. A slight wing trim can bring him back down to Earth and give you time to reinforce his training.
I am not a fan of birds on shoulders for the reason you are dealing with. A bird on your shoulder is in charge – he can get where you can’t reach him, and he can bite you without you seeing any warning signs. When he flies to your shoulder, remove him every time. He will get the point. But you can’t allow it sometimes and not others. It’s either shoulders or not.
It’s time for some tough love as far as the toys go. Remove all toys that he feeds and replace with different types of toys. The constant regurgitation is not healthy and the toys are keeping him in a hormonal state. He doesn’t need a friend – you are his companion. If you get another bird and put it in the same cage, they will bond and not want human contact. If you want to get another parakeet, I would recommend another male, and each bird needs his own cage. Dr. Lamb just presented a webinar on birds and hormones, so I would recommend viewing that to learn more about hormone triggers and how to avoid them, or divert your bird from hormonal behavior. It’s actually unhealthy for a bird to be hormonal for an extended period of time.
Thank you for asking Lafeber,
Brenda
