Hormonal lovebird - What to do to help your feathered friend
Recognizing hormonal behavior and what triggers it, will give you the opportunity to help your lovebird.
There are a few things you can do to reduce hormonal behavior, such as giving them longer periods of darkness and different food.
Influence the day/night cycle
Start by making your lovebird’s day shorter (artificially). By covering the cage or placing it in a dark room for 11 to 13 hours. Just make sure that your lovebird can not reach the cover.
Less cuddling
If your lovebird has picked you as a mate, it will display it’s mating rituals towards you. Ignore these actions completely. Don’t cuddle your bird at all.
Instead, only pet your lovebird on their head, high neck, beak and feet. The less physical contact with your lovebird the better as this way you cannot accidentally induce a hormonal trigger.
Change your lovebird’s diet to reduce the hormonal triggers
Don’t give your lovebird warmed food. Also avoid food that is starchy, sugary, or high in calories, fats or proteins. Food that is best to be avoided are breads, corn, potato, beans and nuts. Some pellets are also high in calories, so limit the amount of pellets given. Fruits are usually too high in sugar, so are best given in limited amounts. Instead, give them fresh vegetables.
Keep in mind that not every lovebird is the same and you should see what works best for your bird.
Change up the content of the cage
Lovebirds will display their hormonal behavior more when they are comfortable in their environment. So in a way it is a nice compliment your lovebird is giving you. You can limit this by changing things around, removing and changing the location of perches and toys. By doing so, your lovebird needs to re familiarize themselves with their cage again.
Remove mirrors and nesting options
When changing up your bird’s cage, remove any mirrors as they can be a trigger for your lovebird.
Also remove any nest boxes or any thing similar and material that your lovebird can use as nesting material.
Give your lovebird distractions
Distract your lovebird with activities to reduce its urges. You can do this by giving them more toys that they can chew on or encourage foraging behavior.
Another way to let your bird rid itself of its energy is flying. If there is not enough space for them to fly in their cage, let them out in a safe place.
