Bird"sitting" agressive eclectus

[parrot_junkie]

Well this might be an unusual question, I just started "birdsitting" my friend's parrots for her. I'm one week in and about 7 weeks to go. Well my problem was really unexpected, her female eclectus who always seems to like me a lot, I can even hug her and I guess that's one thing I might want to have clear, her bird is really touchy "feely", maybe too much.

Well the bird started showing these mating signs when near me, then she would ask for me to pick her up, puts her foot up and then when I get her she seems to try to rub her butt against my hand and I then when I don't allow her to do that (which I never do by the way) she will bite me just quite viciously, I've been trying to redirect the behavior, but I'm afraid still that I might reward the behavior that way. I'm really lost and was wondering if anyone had any tips for me. Is it possible that her bird likes me too much, she also seems to get jealous when I interact with other birds. Which is really weird since this bird isn't even mine and she only has met me a handful of times when I visit my friend.

[dohcsvt]

True love...how sweet!
Seriously though, from what I understand she is trying to mate with you, but I am not 100% sure on this. I don't even let my birds do it to each other if I see it going on. I can't figure that it is a good practice to allow her to do it to you. Hopefully someone with more experience that me will chime in.

[alliethebirdnerd]

Oh yea, she's trying to mate with you. The fact that she is so cuddly might actually be part of the problem. You have to be careful with birds that will let you touch them a lot, especially under the wings (from what i've seen, this makes birds "excited") If you can distract her with some sort of toy, maybe an interesting foot toy or something, before she starts to do it, it could redirect the behavior. I wouldn't encourage it, because when her owner comes back, she might get aggressive towards her owner because she wants to defend you (her "chosen mate"). It also could make her frustrated and that also promotes aggression.

[parrot_junkie]

Thanks for the replies..

I've been doing my best to just keep things interesting with toys, treats and play when she is out of her cage to prevent it from happening and keep touching to the minimum. But when she starts showing mating behavior I've had to towel her and put her in her cage right away.
I think you are right that the fact that she is so cuddly is exactly the problem, and her owner has trained her to be, I guess I had no idea what I was getting into when agreeing to watch her birds for 2 whole months.