Hormonal Behavior...Help

[KimberlyAnn]

Well, gone are the days of letting Emmi play under pillows and long cuddles. At least for now. She's decided that she wants to take our relationship to the next level and kept snuggling up to my hand in inappropriate ways. She's five and a half months old! I read this could happen this early, but she's just a baby to me!

I've been so careful to just pet her head lately after doing some more reading on the subject. She has a sleep cage that she knows is just for sleep. She does nap in my hand with my fingers curled around her back. Should that stop too? She did it once today after lunch time. Just snuggled up, yawned, and fell asleep. The mating behavior didn't start until before bedtime and before peek-a-boo pillow game. In fact...she went to bed soon after. LOL

The only changes are to her diet. She's on a ton of fresh foods and some pellets, but she would rather eat her greens and fruits.

We just hit a heat wave. We are almost to 100℉ (38℃) and just a few days ago it was normally 75℉ (24℃). Could that have done it? Maybe the air conditioning? I heard two things, GCCs mate in the winter, or they mate in the spring. I should either keep her up later, or I should make her sleep more. Which one should I do? Besides putting her in her cage when she does it and making sure she does not make the pillow her nest...anything else I should do?

I'm sad for her about the pillow game. :/ She tried to hide in the corner of the couch, but gave up soon. I guess running back and forth between us, just didn't have the same impact as running through a cave. We still played with toys, but she was looking for the pillow we think. She looked kinda lost. Lol this is our nightly routine, but it's best we give this up maybe? For a bit?

Other then that, she's been normal. She didn't look for nesting spots. Blankets on the couch are just boulders to climb over to get somewhere else. The pillows were ignored all day which is normal. Just twice she backed up into my hand and dropped her wings and made strange sounds, tail up. I don't think she knows exactly what to do yet, but it was obvious. She tried to give me food too, but I just put her back on her cage and ignored her. I just hope I can stop it before any egg laying happens! I want her to live a long life. I read if they start early, it's not good!

[Pajarita]

Just keep her to a strict solar schedule and she will be fine in a couple of months. She's a teenager (hand-feeding formula and pellets made with soy cause them to mature earlier), her hormones are flowing for the first time and she is getting all het up -and she does know EXACTLY what she is supposed to do because she is doing it, what you describe is what bird people call 'presenting' -LOL- You are doing all the right things so don't worry. We all go through this once a year. You'll get used to it.

[janetafloat]

Can you explain this solar schedule thing, Pajarita? Here in the UK it is now getting light around 4 a.m.and is not full dark by 10 p.m. How is it possible to keep a bird on that kind of schedule because he...and I....would be getting very little sleep?

[KimberlyAnn]

My solar schedule is sunrise at 5:45am and 8:30pm it stays pretty dark on the livingroom side of the house (She goes from our dark bedroom to the livingroom) so it looks like dusk when she gets up at 6:30-7. Can I get away with her going to bed shortly after 8:30 (She naturally wants to anyway) and getting her up later so she gets almost 10 hours? Or should I just get her up with the sun no matter what? Sometimes she just goes back to sleep in the livingroom if we get her up too early, I think since it's a little dark. But if she needs to get up early...Half hour before sunrise, right?

[KimberlyAnn]

I should add our bedroom is very light proof. My husband needs zero light to sleep in the day time if he needs to for work. We have blacked out the window and there are no windows near our door down a dark dark hallway. I feel blind when I go to bed if he's sleeping. Lol I have to feel my way around. That's why we never rearrange the furniture in there. Hehe