How Normal is Normal??

[loyal]

:confused: My lovies are hilarious to watch (still haven't named the pair) but some of the behaviors thet exhibits make me wonder. So, is this normal...?

1) she chases the male off the food bowl. The male can be eatting peacefully and the female will come off the perch and "scream" at him, he'll move and she'll follow him back to the perch. At no point does she as much as take a seed out the bowl, just makes him stop eatting. ( I personally think my male could eat all day though, so maybe she's stopping him from getting fat?)

2) They are constantly "arguing". My female likes to be inside the nest box, so much so that I put a shirt through the nest box hole just so that I can see her thru the day. (she's not shredding paper, building a nest or anything) My male will stick his head in the nest box hole, while standing outside of the nest box and "scream" so she'll come back onto the perch with him. Then he'll ignore her and run around the bottom of the cage.

lastly...

3) My female is a master exscape artist in the making... She has quickly learned that where ever the food bowl is, there's a door. So she stands on the food bowl and pulls the the bars up. I have no clue how she figured this out because she's normally in the box when I switch food/water.

So, is all this stuff normal. I come from a world of outside aviary finches. My lovies are proving to be way smarter then I ever thought they would be.

[thebubbleking]

"1) she chases the male off the food bowl. The male can be eatting peacefully and the female will come off the perch and "scream" at him, he'll move and she'll follow him back to the perch. At no point does she as much as take a seed out the bowl, just makes him stop eatting. ( I personally think my male could eat all day though, so maybe she's stopping him from getting fat?)"

She chases him off because she wants him to feed her and to preen her etc hens can be very demanding. ever hear of the term hen pecked? XD

"2) They are constantly "arguing". My female likes to be inside the nest box, so much so that I put a shirt through the nest box hole just so that I can see her thru the day. (she's not shredding paper, building a nest or anything) My male will stick his head in the nest box hole, while standing outside of the nest box and "scream" so she'll come back onto the perch with him. Then he'll ignore her and run around the bottom of the cage."

He is sticking his head in and calling her paired lovebirds constanlty call each other "contact calls" and once he know where she is and thigs are ok then he does his own thing.


"3) My female is a master exscape artist in the making... She has quickly learned that where ever the food bowl is, there's a door. So she stands on the food bowl and pulls the the bars up. I have no clue how she figured this out because she's normally in the box when I switch food/water."

Lovebirds and parrots in general are VERY smart most have atleast the intilect of a two year old human they figure out how to get in and out relitively easy thats why myself as well as many forum member use clips zipties or plastic clothes pinds to lock the doors not in use (i use sisal rope)

Now everything i mentioned is from my experiance and nothing is 100 percent..every birdie is different and do things for different reasons but thats some of my general observations :)

[personatus]

Are you 100% sure they are a male x female pair?

Do you want to breed the birds? If not, remove the nestbox asap.

If you do want to breed them, have you researched the in's and out's of breeding lovebirds and are they in breeding conditon?

[loyal]

@bubbleking, thanks. As long as their in eye sight of each other they seem to be fine.

@Personatus, I got them from an exotic bird expo in orlando. The breeder said they were a male/female pair and although I'm not necessarily looking to breed them, I wanted them to have a safe place to go when they needed space or were scared. They're cage is in my living room.

[michael]

.......They are constantly "arguing". My female likes to be inside the nest box, so much so that I put a shirt through the nest box hole just so that I can see her thru the day. (she's not shredding paper, building a nest or anything) My male will stick his head in the nest box hole, while standing outside of the nest box and "scream" so she'll come back onto the perch with him. Then he'll ignore her and run around the bottom of the cage.

As mentioned by Personatus, nest boxes can encourage breeding behavior (egg laying), even if there's no other available nesting materials. .. In turn, egg production greatly increases the risks for "egg binding". .. If your not breeding, which is another occupation in itself, I would remove the nest boxes. ... Also, unless a breeder can provide a record of DNA, you have no proof of their genders, unless of course, you find an egg/s, whereas afterwards, hopefully you can figure out who laid them.


......My female is a master exscape artist in the making... She has quickly learned that where ever the food bowl is, there's a door. So she stands on the food bowl and pulls the the bars up. I have no clue how she figured this out because she's normally in the box when I switch food/water........

Typical Houdini lovebirds! ...:rotfl... If there's a way out, they'll find it! ... Important to know, is that entry ways that slide up and down are refered to as "guillotine" style doors/windows. .. As you can imagine, we've lost a few birds who got trapped in them as well. ..These really need to be secured with either zipties, or clips specially made just for that purpose. .............:)

[linda040899]

Geesh! Sounds like you and I are practically neighbors if you went to the show in Orlando! It's about a 1 hr drive for me when I go there.

3) My female is a master exscape artist in the making... She has quickly learned that where ever the food bowl is, there's a door. So she stands on the food bowl and pulls the the bars up. I have no clue how she figured this out because she's normally in the box when I switch food/water.
I have several lovebirds that have learned this trick. I have to make sure I clip food/water dish doors closed with some kind of clip or they will be flying around and getting into anything/everything. I even had one hen who figured out a way to lift the nest box peep panel and I had to put something on it to weight it closed!

Make no mistake about it. Lovebirds ARE smart!

[Z28Taxman]

Geesh! Sounds like you and I are practically neighbors if you went to the show in Orlando! It's about a 1 hr drive for me when I go there.

I have several lovebirds that have learned this trick. I have to make sure I clip food/water dish doors closed with some kind of clip or they will be flying around and getting into anything/everything. I even had one hen who figured out a way to lift the nest box peep panel and I had to put something on it to weight it closed!

Make no mistake about it. Lovebirds ARE smart!

Ditto knows that trick too. He even learned to unscrew the quicklinks that I used to keep the doors closed. Thats another reason he has his huge cage. Can't escape this one.

[loyal]

okay, got the doors securely tied down, I'm going to stuff the shirt back thru the nestbox hole so that they can't get back into the nestbox and start looking for a larger cage.

@linda, the show is about 30mins from me. I actually went to look for some fawn java finches for my dad who lives in Palm Beach and fell in love with these two. I need to name them. :confused: