The Water Bowl and other odd things...

[synch]

Hi,
just a newbie to this board and came upon it surfing. my husband has 3 lovebirds (mango, kiwi, and nemo) in which i apparently adopted once we married. i consider them his "children" b/c he owned them before we lived together. he originally had mango and kiwi which were already a "couple". he eventually got nemo b/c he realized the 2 were too into each other to get close to him and wanted the 3rd one to be more close to him (haha!)honestly i wasn't too fond of them for a while(b/c of their piercing voices!). i was always a parakeet person since i grew up with them. however, i have grown to respect them more and appreciate them since we moved in together.

anyways, enough background. i've been curious to know these "odd" behaviors they demonstrate. the main one is the tossing of the "fresh" water bowl sometimes 2 times in a row!! it's the most frustrating thing for me and my husband to see and deal w/ and of course makes an immediate mess. what is the reasoning behind this? i also noticed how vicious these birds can get and have never seen this in other breeds at all so it was pretty scary to see. apparently the new bird which is nemo is the 3rd leg while the other 2 are true "lovebirds". after we found out or assumed nemo was a girl, we noticed that may be why she(or he?) always fights w/ our girl, kiwi.(nemo's also become a major brat and bites since she was picked on by the other 2 growing up) mango's the cool mellow male (and therefore, my favorite:rolleyes: ). a funny thing i tend to see is when the other two are "gettin' it on", nemo sometimes makes a fit and screams to throw them off, it's funny!:rofl: i think she gets pretty needy and lonely b/c they really don't show any affection to her as much as she appears to crave it from them, esp. our boy, mango. fortunately they all tolerate each other on the most part, but introducing nemo to them while she was still a baby was frightening. oh, another question is w/ the eggs. what is the proper thing to do when we see eggs that i assume aren't fertile? we hope they don't lay fertile eggs as we are all new to lovebirds. so all in all, we've had these birds for about 2 years and i've had to get used to their ugly piercing cries on weekend mornings. i'm so glad to have found this board and as you can see, i've held a lot of questions waiting to be answered. thank you and i apologize for the jumble i've written, i know it sounds very sporadic!>o

[butterfly1061]

Hi and welcome to the board. I'm going to try and answer your questions.


the tossing of the "fresh" water bowl sometimes 2 times in a row!! it's the most frustrating thing for me and my husband to see and deal w/ and of course makes an immediate mess. what is the reasoning behind this? It's fun, that's why. Lovebirds are like 2 yr olds, they do things just because they can and it's entertaining. I'd suggest getting a bowl that attaches to the cage bars like this one http://www.drsfostersmith.com/Product/Prod_Display.cfm?pcatid=14400&N=2003+2012 I use these and they are great! You attach them to the cage and you can take the bowl out of the cage without taking off the bolt it attaches to. They come in various sizes.


i also noticed how vicious these birds can get and have never seen this in other breeds at all so it was pretty scary to see Lovebirds can be aggressive and territorial, especially when you have an odd number like 3. Sometimes 3 works and sometimes it doesn't. It didn't with me so I have 4 and they have paired up just fine. Nemo does what my Piper does when he see's another lovie doing "swishy-swishy". He gets vocal and tries to jump into the act and then they all argue :rolleyes: Sounds like Nemo needs a friend ;)

As far as eggs go, I'll leave that to an expert. My girls have not laid eggs (yet) and I'm trying to hold them off for as long as I can. Do you have a nestbox? Are your birds (all 3) caged together?

[Janie]

I also have three but all of them are males and they do all happen to get along. That said, it is an odd number and one can not only get left out of the mix but also injured, even killed, by one or both of the other two so be sure to supervise closely. I didn't not let mine out together w/o standing inches from them for at least 6 months.

As far as the eggs, you can remove, boil them, and then replace them. That will keep a fertile egg from hatching. If you remove the egg very soon after it's laid and boil it then, you are not killing a chick since a chick has not yet formed inside the egg. You can also addle the eggs but a word of caution with that method, some addled eggs on this forum have hatched! :D One more thing you can do is to remove and destroy each egg after it's laid and replace it with a plastic egg the same size. You do not want to merely remove the eggs w/o replacing them because the hen will continue laying, trying to reproduce they eggs she lost. She'll do that even if they are not fertile. If you have a mating male and female, chances are good that you are going to get fertile eggs.

[synch]

Do you have a nestbox? Are your birds (all 3) caged together?


We intentionally didn't get a nestbox b/c we don't want them to have babies. They are all caged together and most of the time, it's a civil co-habitation. However, we just got back after 2 days away, and saw blood on the perch. Lo and behold, the oddball, Nemo got her toenail bitten off. I feel bad for her but don't know if it's too late to separate them (they've lived together for over a year). Thank you for the info so far! I will make sure to tell my husband about that water bowl!

[butterfly1061]

I think it's time for you to separate Nemo from the pair or you might find an injured or dead bird next time. It doesn't matter that they have been in the same cage for any length of time. They will still remain a flock, but just in separate cages. I have four birds, four cages and I can put my females together for the entire day most of the time. I can't do this with the boys as one is much more dominant and fusses when he doesn't want the other in the cage. Please consider a separate cage for Nemo.

Not giving your pair a nestbox will not prevent them from laying eggs. When a female gets the urge to lay, she will lay even if they are not fertile. If you take away her eggs, she will continue to lay. This is her goal in life. Next time, give her a nestbox, let her lay and sit for approx. 23 days. This is the normal cycle for sitting. She will become more vocal and and will come out of the nestbox more when she is ready to abandon the eggs. :2cents:

[Janie]

I agree, I would separate them now. My three are never ever caged together. As well as they get along out of the cage, I don't think for a second they would get along caged together. When they are caged, the two younger brothers are caged together and Oliver is in his own separate cage.