just how shredded is shredding?

[zlatushka]

Well Friday has decided to make a bid to replace our paper shredder. :rofl: Watching him did make me wonder though, just how shredded are typical lovie paper shreddings? Friday seems to make more of a confetti, which sometimes his chews up like he's trying to make spit wads.

rachel

[bellarains]

Rachel,

Bela makes spit balls, and Lacey makes long beautiful strips. I have heard some say their males can make a strip, but Bela can't do it to save his life, he just goes over and steals Lacey's strip :rofl:

[butterfly1061]

Molly makes spit balls, but Daisy makes nice little strips. I can't tell about Piper cause he takes Daisy's strips away from her. :lol I keep telling Piper to leave Daisy's strips alone cause she usually fights with him when he does. Piper will never learn cause he thinks Daisy hung the moon. :p

[Keltoth]

Rachel,

Bela makes spit balls, and Lacey makes long beautiful strips. I have heard some say their males can make a strip, but Bela can't do it to save his life, he just goes over and steals Lacey's strip :rofl:

Yup! My male green, Melody, used to make spitwads up until the time when I put him back in with his beloved Zipper some months back. She shreads paper like it's nobody's business, and now Melody can shread paper with the best of them. He probably learned to do it just because he loves doing whatever Zipper is doing, but secretly, I believe he learned to shread the paper into nice, long beautiful strips because he finally became exasperated with Zipper plucking all the feathers out of the back of his neck in order to line her nestbox... :x

A couple of my other hens (Valencia and Anna) can strip paper to a lesser degree (although nowhere near as precisely and efficiently as Zipper), but all the rest of my birds are dirty little spitball-makers. When I let the fids out for playtime, it's funny to watch Zipper and Mel rip through their own piece of paper, and then walk around and, one by one, steal everyone else's paper a piece at a time and shread those, too. It puts me in mind every time of a couple of schoolyard bullies walking around collecting lunch-money, while their victims scream at them safely from a distance... :lol

[LauraO]

Hey! My pair of normal greens, Basil and Crusty are our schoolyard bullies. I swear there can be 100 pieces of the best paper in the world at their toes and they will run across the room, up the stairs, down the hall and into their room to attack the bird that has the 101st piece of paper :lol :lol .

Most of my hens make strip and the males usually chew wads. Won Ton is about the only exception to this rule and he can, once in a blue moon, actually chew a strip and get it tucked in his rump :x.

[shylevon]

My Nereus will take the sheet of paper and fold it in half, then she folds it again, and then again, and then she takes to shredding. That way she gets six long strips for the price of one.

Inventive birdie, or just lazy???? You decide.

[Mummieeva]

WHen Baggy laid eggs both her and her mate stripped. It was weird at first cause i thought males would not do that so worried about having 2 hens. But Whisper proved they were not both hens..lol.



Steph

[Leia1138]

Saphira likes to just punch holes in pieces of paper but will sometimes make little spitballs. Though one time she made a couple inch long strips. She never tucked them, just collected them and tried to nip me when I tried to take one. :rolleyes: She prefers chewing tissues to paper though. Rogue hasn't gotten her little beak on paper, though and she just likes to hide under tissues, she won't chew them. My cockatiel who is a girl (although her name is Guy... oops :rolleyes: ) can't make strips just makes a collection of spitball wads.

[Buy A Paper Doll]

Milo makes spitwads. Melody started out with spitwads. Now she can shred about a 2 inch strip. If Milo doesn't steal it from her, she usually drops it within a second or two, to make another one. For her, it's more about the shredding than the tucking - although tonight, she did tuck for the first time. :)

[Rubygem]

My Nereus will take the sheet of paper and fold it in half, then she folds it again, and then again, and then she takes to shredding. That way she gets six long strips for the price of one.

Inventive birdie, or just lazy???? You decide.

I'd say very smart ;) sounds like a hen that knows how to save a little time...and being a mom...I wished I could save a lot of time sometimes :D

Rubygem

[prplecandl]

HI, I have a question!! Do you all just provide some paper in cage and out of cage for them to shred, as a fun toy or what?? Thanks Rebecca... (I am getting excited I get my baby this weekend)

[sdgilley]

Hi Rebecca,
I let my hen shred outside of the cage. When I let her have a pinata inside her cage, she began attempting to make a nest. I don't want to encourage her to nest and lay eggs, so now it's just outside of the cage. It is fun for her. One of my males tries to shred, but he can't manage even a spit ball. He doesn't attempt tucking, but since he's an eye ring, I wouldn't expect him to tuck.

[Cooper]

I think that Cooper prefers strips, they look strip-like. But it's funny that you mention spit wads. Cooper likes to shred toilet paper rolls and toss them around, etc. One ended up in the bath dish, where it promptly soaked up the water. Cooper then started to strip this, found that it tears easier and went nuts tearing it apart. Wet cardboard bits everywhere!! I left a few that stuck to the window as proof to the fiance that Cooper was making spit balls.

[Paulette]

I think Jake & Sara have paper radar!.....I have (during my search of information on each species of bird that i have acquired) assembled a 3 ring binder of bird information to refer back to on all subjects: sexing, breeding/eggs, feeding, housing, behavior, basic care, good/bad plant lists, recipes....etc.....while I was out of the room for a few minutes during out of cage time, Jake & Sara flew to my desk and chewed on my birdie information sheets and it looks like someone took pinking shears to it!.....So at my house, it's little tiny beak sized pieces or 1 inch pieces, but no tucking.....of course Sara doesn't have enough rump feathers to tuck anything anyway, but she's getting fluffier all the time and I am so.....so glad.

Ps: per suggestions from this site, I put strips of white paper in the cages for chewing....and they find the stack of newspaper that is for the cage trays since it is on a shelf under their cage. :p

[linda040899]

With my Peachies, I get everything from strips, to wads, and just paper chewed in pieces. Depends on which pair and how intent they are in what they are doing. My Fischer's chew strips and carry them to their boxes in their beaks. No tucking there, not even hens. When I had Masks, they did the same thing. I had one Blue Mask hen that would start at one corner of the cage and chew the paper in half, diagonally. She created one long strip, quite a sight to see.

Now, shredded, Abby style, is pulverized. You can't distinguish strips, wads or pieces. When they are done, it's just one soft, fluffy pile of what used to look like paper! :lol

[Meliandmoe]

when they shred it where do they tuck it ? :)

[linda040899]

Peachie hens will tuck the paper in their rump feathers. Some Peachie males try but aren't usually very good at it. Fischer's, Masks, Black Cheeks and Abyssinians don't tuck at all. The material is carried to its destination in the beak.

[beansbirds]

Mango was on my shoulder yesteday afternoon at the computer and she kept wanting to get at the paper on my desk. I wouldn't let her because I don't want her to get into laying mode again. Is it safe to let them shred outside the cage even if they tuck it? I tried to distract her with kisses. She gave me one really nice kiss on the cheek, then she scurried under my neck and CHOMPED down on my neck and wouldn't let go :eek: ! I reached up with my hand to get her off and she chomped onto my finger! Her next destination was her cage :roll: .

[Elle]

My Nereus will take the sheet of paper and fold it in half, then she folds it again, and then again, and then she takes to shredding. That way she gets six long strips for the price of one.

Inventive birdie, or just lazy???? You decide.

Sam was the same way. the other thing she discovered is if chews on my books ( if they are not properly on the shelf with a blanket covering them because you know how they are if they even see the corner of something forbitten) she doesn't have to fold the paper herself and she can get 6 or 8 strips at once.

[Elle]

Peachie hens will tuck the paper in their rump feathers. Some Peachie males try but aren't usually very good at it. Fischer's, Masks, Black Cheeks and Abyssinians don't tuck at all. The material is carried to its destination in the beak.


Do fischer's shred? I haven't seen Blu shred at all. She's scared of paper. I see her chew on everything else as long as it's wood of strings (natural fibers)

[sdgilley]

Hi Elle,
My male fischers (Luka) has a big crush on my peachie hen (Peepo), so he tries to impress her by attempting to shred. He really doesn't accomplish much, but she doesn't mind the company if I have her out on her play table to shred & play. He WAS afraid of everything under the sun. I called him my scare-dy-bird. Now, after a couple of years, he's decided that things are far too interesting to be afraid all the time. I just about couldn't get him off of me tonight, which is a HUGE step for the little guy. He nips hard on exposed skin, and used to fly off when I'd jump at his pinches. Now he just moves on to other areas! We're working on "no bite". Luka is my most timid bird.

[Elle]

Thank you Suzanne.

Blu is very timid as well. And so affraid of everything new. I figured it would improve as time goes by. As for the shredding, I guess she is still a baby yet and her instincs are not yet developed. I guess I don't have to hide my books and papers yet :lol
I'm guessing she is a female, but I have no "proof" at this time. She is not showing any signs of female or male behavior yet. But her eyes are almond shaped :D. I'll have to order the DNA kit soon ( I dread pulling feathers, she won't like it, and clipping a nail is out of the question. She's missing two toes and is very sensitive about the subject)

[Booda's Butt]

Hi, sorry I'm so late on this thread and for pulling it back up, but I read it just now as I was about to post a new thread asking if anyone else had experienced this tucking behavior - I just witnessed it today and thought it was the cutest thing!

I was studying for a physics exam in my room, and Cali was out exploring like usual. She flew over to the bed where I was laying, and where all my papers were sprawled out, and decided that my assignment book was the best for chewing. I just watched her shred my book into nice neat little strips, and then tucked them in her feathers! I had never seen it before, and wasn't sure what it meant, but it sure was cute watching her hop around, shredding my assignment book with neat little strips of paper hanging off her!

So my assignment book, my physics notebook, and a corner of my physics homework all have a nice new trim. I'm really impressed at how neat her little bites are though! If I didn't know better, I really might have guessed it was done with those fancy scrapbooking scissors!

I was thinking about putting one of my old notebooks in her cage for her to play with - but now that I've read this thread and realize it's nesting behavior, I guess I probably shouldn't. Should I also try to avoid most of the other shredding toys for her cage? Like the pinatas, the weaved toys, the rolls of paper, etc?

[Mummieeva]

I allow my birds to have paper outside of the cage only. Baggy tears nice strips and Whisper is scared of paper..lol. They do not have anything they can shred in cage and do not have a hut of anything.They sleep on their swing..lol.


Steph

[DeepLikeNin]

good question though--why do they tuck? showing, right?

[LauraO]

They build a nest with what ever they tuck in their tailfeathers. Well that's the end goal, anyway :rolleyes:. My Babygirl is a master tucker and nest builder. She fancies palm fronds or banana leaves :)

[LoveBugs]

I was reading the other day, and put my book down where they were playing just for a few min. when I went to get a drink...and yes...you can imagine, I came back to an eaten book....lol