Pairing hand-raised with parent raised parrot

[Meli]

Hi! I own a hand-raised male lovebird lutino fischer, I would like to pair it but I cannot find a hand-raised pair of his age and species. So I am thinking of buying a parent-raised one.
Has anyone idea how this combination will be? Will my hand-raised bird become less interactive and friendly? Does the new bird have any chances of growing calm with the years? Thank you.

[Wolf]

I think that you will find that any time that you have a mated pair of birds that they will prove to be more bonded to each other than to you. Does this affect how responsive they are to you? Yes, it does. To what degree this effect will be depends on you and how much time that you are willing to put into bonding and socializing with them.
The parent raised bird, in my opinion, will likely be the healthier and more emotionally stable of the two and if you are pairing them in hopes of breeding them you will have one bird that knows what it is supposed to do and one bird that has no idea of what it should do to raise a family.
I am not a breeder and it is not my forte', so don't take this as anything more than what it is; my opinion.

[Pajarita]

He will, most likely (and Wolf is correct that it depends on you), continue been affectionate with you but male lovies are VERY focused on their wives (she flies to one perch, he flies after her - she eats from one bowl, he eats from that bowl, too, etc). I had a hand-raised female lovie which was given up because of aggression (she was the sweetest thing on this earth so I don't know what they were talking about) in a flock of parent-raised ones and she stayed as sweet as ever with me, stepping up, riding on my shoulder, etc -even when she was nesting!

Now, if you want to breed, hand-raised birds don't do as well as parent-raised but, aside from that, you need a lot of knowledge and experience because breeding birds is not a matter of putting a male and female together and 'letting Nature take its course'. Nature does take its course in the wild, not in captivity where birds are kept under such unnatural conditions and you can end up with dead babies/dead mother or with a chronic layer very easily.

[Meli]

Thank you very much both Wolf and Pajarita! Very helpful posts! I am not interested in breeding birds but if it happens to have babies I will try my best to take care of them taking advice of vet & breeder forums etc. I am a new parrot owner and it is just that I was given the male one because a friend couldnt keep it, and as I see how lovely and afectionate he is with me, and how lonely and sad he feels when I leave the house or not pay attention, I am trully convinced that he should have a bird to love to be happy and cheerfull even when I am away. )

[Wolf]

That is, in my opinion a wise and considerate thing to do for him. Thank you for thinking of him.

[Pajarita]

And you should get him a mate, lovebirds are not called that for nothing! A well mated pair absolutely adore one another. They are never more than a couple of inches from one another, they eat, drink, fly and sleep together, often leaning against one another and preen and kiss one another all the time. People could certainly learn from their utter devotion, total acceptance and mutual love! But that doesn't mean that you should allow them to procreate. They can go through all the motions, courtship, nesting, laying and incubating only no babies should be born. And that's easy to prevent as all you have to do is switch the real eggs with fake ones. Knowledge about breeding can not really be acquired by reading answers to one's questions. You need to have hands-on practice for a couple of season under a good mentor (and that doesn't mean a commercial breeder, either). I cannot tell you how many people think they can do it and end up posting problems like parents plucking or pecking the babies (some even kill them), abandoning them (and then you would need an incubator and know how to handfeed proficiently -which is easier said than done and, when done incorrectly, can cause crop burn, rupture or cyst, sour crop, punctured air sac, etc), hens becoming chronic layers, babies born with splayed legs, crooked feet or toes, etc.