ok, so this is partially a behaviour thing but mostly a breeding hormonal thing. munch is driving me to insanity.

ive caged them together changed the cage, etc. theyre getting along great, theyve even stopped mating!

but munch is so darn nesty its driving me insane. ive removed anything shes seen as a nest or have tried to block it off. ive removed all things she can shred and make nests out of but she still finds something. i take anything away. except the cage corners, i cant get rid of those and those are where she is choosing to nest now! no matter what i do.


i had put in ceramic seed dishes on the floor, small ones that she cant even sit in, yeah forget about that. i had to remove the clip on ones because she throws them off the sides and makes a mess. but then she started seeing the small 2" diameter ceramic bowls as nests so i had to put the clip on plastic ones back in. so then she went back to the corner of the cage, where i put her water bowl in that corner so then she moves to the OTHER corner!!! then she tried ripping out the blocks i have for the old feeder doors because they were fleece covered cardboard.... but i blocked them with plastic pieces so she threw a fit. then she decided to take seeds and carry them to her water and dump them in on purpose to make my life miserable with cleaning the water bowl!

i try to move anything, feed her, give new water, i get chomped. i am getting really tired of having sore fingers with holes that get inflamed and swollen from her biting every stinking day. its getting to the point where i dont want to deal with anything near the cage because i get bit so hard.

i cant let her out either, she starts looking for nest sites instantly and when i try to remove her she chomps me.


i dont know what to do other than leave her in the cage all day, remove all nest materials as best i can and just be quick to get her food and water but shes faster and will climb up just to latch on my hand. and she DOES NOT let go. she digs her beak in and grinds her beak on my skin as she bites and she refuses to let go.

i just dont know what to do anymore. i cant catch her to put her in a travel cage when i deal with cage cleaning, feeding, watering. i get bit if i try!

shes on 14 hours a night of long nights treatment. i am about ready to bang my head on the wall all day out of frustration.

the wing clip has helped a bit for an attitude adjustment to the other birds, and a little towards me outside of the cage. but when shes found a potential nest spot she bites so stinking hard and i cant grab her. in the cage she is a holy terror.


so far, best option is to let her lay... but i gave a box and she attacks mango over it. gonna just give a tray in the corner she likes with aspen bedding in it. best bet.

I've never tried this myself, but I've heard that when the long nights treatment doesn't work then sometimes the no-nights treatment will do the trick. Find a room where you can leave the lights on all night without bothering anyone else and put her in there at night, or maybe keep her there all the time for a while if the biting is too much to deal with. Use a cage not an enclosed carrier because the carrier is too much like a nestbox.

If she'll step up on a stick you might be able to eliminate some biting that way. If she runs up the stick to bite your hand, you can make a shield by cutting off the top of a drink bottle and sticking the perch through the hole where the lid usually fits, sort of like the hand guard on some swords. If you have to catch her or do something in the cage, a thick towel or leather work gloves will help protect your fingers.

Cage corners are always a preferred spot for nesting since they apparently feel more protected than the rest of the cage. You can partially block them off by putting an immovable non-shreddable toy there. You're good at making toys, so maybe you could string some large plastic beads/pieces on wire and place it diagonally across the corner near the floor. If you put more than one in each corner you could block off a fairly large area. Don't leave enough floor space for her to get behind/between the wire, and don't use bead shapes that are comfortable enough for her to sit on top.

Round cages are usually not recommended for birds because the lack of corners makes them feel insecure, but this might be a case where a small uncovered round cage would make a good sleep cage.

Some birds like to drop food in their water dish all the time. It's so common that it has a name - dunking. I don't think birds can conceptualize to the point that she says "ha ha I'm gonna get revenge by making Casey change my water", but she might be doing it because she feels driven to do something and this is a fun activity if she can't nest like she wants to.

i am unable to do the no nights treatment. we have 3 full rooms. the livingroom/kitchen (connected) where the cats eat and play. the bathroom (kitty litter boxes are in there, we cant lock her in there and deny the cats entry to their toilets nor can we move the litterboxes into another room due to other pets) and the bedroom, where the birds are. so no nights option wont work. and im sure my neighbours would LOVE her loud chirps all night long. they dont know the word sleep.

we gave a nest because its been decided the stress of her trying to nest causing her to get ill outweighs the stress of her nesting.


my biggest problem is the aggression. i like the perch guard idea. she bites through gloves. and is faster than the towel.

i also have my doubts on mango being a boy now too lol. he does a lot of the male behaviours (regurgitating for munch) but lately has shown more female tendencies. he even did the female breeding posture to munch and allowed her to mount him. and hes spending a lot of time in the nest shredding the material... and hes been aggressive over the last few months too. so im getting a feeling that the test may have been wrong. well if there ends up being more than 6 eggs in the nest, i have two females. would explain the bickering. female pairs are often argumentative and bicker a lot. these two bicker a LOT. munch will sometimes attack mango over the nest box, so they have a tray this time that they share peacefully.


ive blocked the corners with rocks, toys, etc, she just either sits on the rocks or sits BESIDE the toy. she doesnt care. shes so determined and its easier to give the box and get that out of her system.

since being caged together, neither of them want out of cage time either, so they may not be let out as much. which isnt the end of the world i suppose as long as theyre happy. saves stress on me and tiels on toes

oh and they have a nest and they no longer mate since being in the same cage. they have a nest, they still dont mate with eachother

they mate with their swing

http://youtu.be/X7wxe-ZpPaQ

They might both be girls but they mate like boys!

I hope everything works out OK. If you think it would help, you can get fake eggs to put in the nest http://theeggshop.com/ Apparently lovebirds use the same size as cockatiels. The eggs are kind of expensive, but you could probably use white marbles or beads that were vaguely the right size, or smooth stones.

If I remember right, Munch was crazy hormonal in the past and never laid eggs, so we wondered if she was unable. Whether she's able or not, if you want to you could give her something to sit on and see if it makes her happy.

one step ahead, i made fake eggs, they do not work, she chews them!!

shes not easily fooled. currently fake eggs are sitting in the tiels cage because they have been nesty too. simply having them in there calmed them down, though they dont even sit on them anymore

said fake eggs



tiels are easily tricked

Those are nice eggs! What did you make them out of?

The fake eggs fool my tiels, although they don't have much effect on the number of real eggs that get laid. I bought a second set last year because there was so much demand for them. Teela and Squeebis are a particular problem - they were determined to nest last year, and they're siblings so I can't let them make babies. If they're insistent again this year, and if I decide to let some other pair have babies, I'll steal a couple of eggs for Teela and Squeebis to foster. I'm trying to get them interested in more appropriate mates but not having the slightest effect so far.

theyre made of art clay the stuff that dries, not the soft clay. then once they dried i painted them with my acrylics. assumed safe as munch has chewed a few paintings of mine without ill effect. they get chewed a little bit though

Probably not a good thing for Munch to chew on in any case, but I wonder if the clay has any mineral content that makes her want to chew it. Of course birds like to chew on stuff whether it's edible or not.

I have the impression that at least some clay has salt in it. Lately on the TC forum we've been talking about parent birds plucking chicks because of sodium deficiencies - apparently breeding birds need extra sodium. Last year I cured a plucking problem with Shodu by letting her eat all the chard she wanted, and she wanted a LOT of it. It turns out that chard has three times as much sodium as celery, which is considered to be a high-sodium vegetable, so maybe sodium was what she needed. Munch isn't exactly breeding but it wouldn't do any harm to offer her celery and/or chard in case she feels the need for more sodium.

i will get some celery tomorrow when we do groceries

they need some veggies anyways and celery is always cheap


my guys like celery too, the tiels like the leaves too