by Polarn » Thu Sep 27, 2012 11:29 am
Even if not caged together if "agressive" behavior is shown by one towards the other having one bird losoe in the same room as the other one is caged may even end bad since a bird walking or climbing another birds cage can still loose toes etcetera. as for introducing mines I consider myself lucky.. however I recently moved my budgie and tiel to another room because the tiel started to try interact with my amazon and I dont want them to interact due to the sizedifference (I might try get em into the same room again once the hormones are over) but she would basically chase my amazon around and he would fly off, and she was a persistent bugger so after a while when he kept ignoring her she would start pulling his tail... so I chose to separate them since I 1. doesnt want the budgie to find it reinforcing pulling another birds tail because it gives her attention and 2. I do not want Polarn to bite or something causing biting to be reinforced by the fact he got left alone... So for now the little ones live in one room and the big ones in another....
Anyways as to teaching each other behavior... well yes and no If you for example have a quiet bird that gets tons of attention and you adopt a screamer, his screaming might actually decrease because your ignoring the screams but reinforces the quiet, this also means you have to reinforce the silence if the screamer goes silent. as for plucking, I dont really know weather they would teach each other that since plucking is a selfmutilating/destructive behavior... and I have a hard time seeing the reinforcement here (unless you start talkign to the bird telling him not to pluck himself etc every time you see it, then your the stimuli (atleast one of them) for the continued behavior).
Neither of the two birds you mentioned are to my knowledge known to be silent birds though... Most people (including my 10y old nephew who talks nonstop, and I consider him louder than my zon) wonder how I can live with the noise, but as of right now I havn't noticed a noise in quite some time sitting here but I know if I were to replay the audio in here I could probably hear him making noises every now and then... but there is a difference between a screamer and bird presenting their natural behaviors (as in my amazons greeting the sun ritual, that is quite loud to be honest). a sunconure I've never lived with (don't even know what their called in swedish to be honest) so I cant tell you if their "noise" is just that its frequent or if its both loud and frequent or if its just loud... I have a hard time seeing them being loud though (couse their so small) but then I'm used to my zon and RB2. They may just as well be as loud when screaming as these two though, I dont know.
Now to good habbits, My zon just the other day thought my Galah how to play with toys, he would play for a bit then back off and wait for the Galah to make an attempt then she would back off and he would do it again, this repeated itself for quite some time.. Today is the first time I've actually seen my Galah climb on the toy ringing the bell etc.
But yeah they pick up each others sounds and they may reinforce each others by responding equally loud. My zon sounds like a budgie every now and then wich is just cute to be honest... and I encourage him todo that sound couse it is the least loud sound he ever does for attention, well that and saying "wooap wooap".