Help with lovebird aviary situation

[madbutterfly]

Hello. My name is angela and i am living in lombok, indonesia. I started out with 7 lovebirds 8 years ago, and now we have 52 lovebirds living in a large aviary type setting. Recently i found several young lovebirds dead when i entered the aviary early in the morning. According to the vet, it seems that perhaps the older lovebirds are being aggressive towards some of the young lovebirds who have just learned how to fly, and they are pecking at thier heads and beaks until they die. It is a traumatic situation. So far i have found 4 dead lovebirds. From that time i have moved all the young but still able to fly lovebirds to small, separate cages so that they are protected while still young. I have built a new, larger aviary, approximately 10 meters by 6 meters by 7 meters to house the birds. There are about 30 feeding and water stations in the lovebird cage, which we will move to the new cage. But my question is this- i have 11 of the small wooden sleeping boxes that have eggs in them, and i have about 14 babies right now. How can i move the birds to their new, larger cage if i don't know which birds are parents to which eggs and babies? I can move the sleeping boxes with the babies and eggs inside of them, and then move all the birds, but if i do so, will the parents be able to identify their boxes with their own eggs inside, versus the eggs of other parents, and will the parents of already born young birds be albe to identify their babies? I am not a lvoebird expert at all, so i want to make sure they do not die. Thank you for any help or advice you can offer, angela

[linda040899]

Hi Angela. I'm very sorry to hear about your lost young lovebirds!

Based on my own personal experience, your vet is correct about what happened with the deceased birds. When there is a youngster or unpopular bird in with other lovebirds, what you saw is what happens. I've had this happen a couple of times and I've been lucky enough to find a couple of badly injured lovebirds quickly enough to save their lives.

When you have large flight cages such as yours, you have to remember that flight cages are what I consider "closed" living situations. No new birds in and you have to be careful when taking birds out. Once any bird is removed, it cannot go back into the same flight. You are asking about how to moved some of the lovebirds from one flight to another and how you can tell which birds go together. Since lovebird pairs tend to stick together, you need to watch and see which birds sit next to each other. Best time to do this is later in the evening when the lovebirds are getting ready to go to bed. If a hen has a nest with babies, she will normally be in the nest with her babies. Her partner may go in with her or he may be right outside guarding his family. Once you have established who goes with who, I move my nests by closing up the entrance to the nest with anything that will prevent the parents from leaving the nest and then move the entire nest to its new location. From what you are saying, you use the same kind of nests that I use so you just have to wait until everyone settles down for the evening. If you see birds sleeping on perches within the flight, you will find those that belong together sleeping side by side. The easiest way to "mark" pairs that belong with each other is to spray the pair with water (do this one pair at a time) so you are looking for the wet birds.

I had one flight cage that I set up quite a few years ago and the flight contained 5 lovebirds, one pair and 2 hens that shared 1 male. I had 3 nest boxes, all on different walls of the flight cage and each nest box had its own food and water stations. I was lucky that everyone got along very well and the babies produced quickly learned where in the flight that they could or could not go. Their parents taught them well.

Please feel free to ask any questions you may have. I live in the US and I'm well aware that not everyone globally keeps parrots in the same manner. I help as much as I can and the only dumb question is the one that was not asked.....

[madbutterfly]

WOW LINDA- THANK YOU FOR ALL OF THIS VALUABLE INFORMATION! I HAD NO IDEA THAT LOVEBIRDS BEHAVED LIKE THEY DO. ITS SO COOL TO FIND THIS OUT, BUT I AM ALSO CONCERNED BECAUSE WITH 50+ birds NOW IN THE AVIARY, THERE ARE BABIES BEING BORN EVERY MONTH! I HAVE BUILT TWO LARGE AVIARY'S THAT ARE SEPARATED. DO YOU THINK I SHOULD SEPARATE THE YOUNG BIRDS FROM THE OLD ONES, OR WHAT DO YOU THINK IS BEST. I NEVER IMAGINED THE POPULATION WOULD BALLOON INTO SO MANY BIRDS, SO I NEVER PUT ANKLE BANDS ON THE BIRDS TO IDENTIFY THEM. NOW THEY ARE TOO OLD TO PUT ON THE NORMAL ANKLE BANDS. DO YOU KNOW OF ANY OTHER KIND OF ANKLE BAND THAT IS SAFE FOR BIRDS, ie- will not be injested- THAT I CAN PUT ON THE BIRDS ANKLES TO IDENTIFY THEM? I APPRECIATE ANY ADVICE YOU CAN GIVE ME AS TO HOW TO HANDLE ALL THE NEW BIRDS BEING BORN EVERY MONTH TO KEEP THEM SAFE FROM OLDER BIRDS. THANK YOU VERY MUCH. ANGELA

[madbutterfly]

The other problem is that there are new birds being. Born every month!!! I have built two new, separated aviary's that i thought i would keep one part that is young birds and one that is older birds. But i don't think this will work now because the young birds will grow up and be old birds with new young birds being born all the time that might get beaten up by the older birds! Is there birth control for lovebirds??? Hahaha but i wish there was for their own safety. I must be responsible for the birds and i don't want to have any more poor birds go through the pain of being pecked to death!!! Thank you for any advice you can offer!

[linda040899]

When I first got into breeding lovebirds, I had my lovebird pairs in individual cages so I could control what was happening. I let my pairs have 2 clutches/year and then I put them on breeder rest for at least 6 months. Breeder rest meant 6 months in a cage with no nest box and nothing to encourage breeding. I had swings and other toys to keep them occupied but I found that lovebird hens can get very creative when they want to start a family. Food dishes made wonderful substitute nests so I had to get just as creative. The minute I found a new egg in a food dish, I would candle the egg to make sure nothing was developing inside and I would do one of 2 things. You can hard boil the egg for about 2 minutes, let the egg cool down and then return it (you aren't killing anything because nothing was developing) or you can replace the egg with a small white stone that is similar in size to a lovebird egg. You can also buy fake eggs. If you have a flight cage situation, you can use this same routine but you have to check each box every day, no exceptions.

You may have to try 3 flight cages. One for active breeders, one for breeder rest and possibly a 3rd one for completely weaned babies. I'm not sure I have a good solution to the problem but I can give you information that you may find helpful.