Stories- ringneck, quaker, and gcc

[Wolf]

It can get to be overwhelming at times, especially when you have things needing to be done and have to try to work around the birds. The girls are needing to regain their balance. I don't know but, if you all would work together it might relieve some of your stress. Perhaps each of you could spend an hour while doing home work to also take a bird with you so that no one has to deal with all three of the birds. They may still be a bit of a distraction, but it should be manageable. At times like this the answer is most often found through creative cooperation, instead of putting it all on one person. I would hate for you to give up your birds for a temporary situation.
With Fajr in regards to his puberty, if you keep him to yourself you will enhance his chances of fully rebonding to you and then it should remain pretty constant. I can only say have patience with him this too shall pass.

[Pajarita]

We all know how hard it can be sometimes... We think we have a good plan and a handle on it and then life happens and the whole thing goes down the drain. As to been overwhelmed, yes, I know that feeling too! I am only now beginning to get my feet under me after months of overwhelming conditions in my house (not the birds, sick kittens and cats plus the old big dog that is, by himself, a full time job with his incontinence). Don't worry too much about the birds, they are very forgiving and will not hold it against you that you cannot spend as much time as you did before. But, if things do get bad, Liz is right in that you are not alone. Let us know if you decide to rehome Clover and Lemon and we will all try to help as much as we can.

[shiraartain]

Anybody deal with a bird crying at night? Fajr is always reluctant to go back to his cage at night (he will try and cuddle into our clothes or burrow into our blankets) and some nights he will eat his dinner, settle down to sleep, and start crying a few hours later. It's a slightly screechy, needy sound. I respond to him with his name and "sojao".
After a bit, he usually cries for about a minute more after I respond and then goes to sleep after a bit of talking. If I don't respond, he continues for a while.

This happens despite a dark room, a covered cage, and a usual sleep schedule.

I'm very weak against it, it makes me want to take him it and cuddle him. Except I KNOW that would just reinforce the behaviour and encourage it. (Made the mistake once...never again.)

[liz]

I would give him a sleeping cage in my room so he knows he is not alone or get him a friend to be with him.

[Wolf]

I don't have any answers for you on this or at least I don't think that I do. Every now and then I hear one of the birds beeping or such at night and I know that the bird is asleep because I have checked. At those times I figure that they are dreaming. I have never met any other animal that doesn't dream.
Birds also sleep part of the time with just have their brain just like they are watching over the rest of the flock at night. I know that they do this in the wild and I have watched them do it when they nap during the day, so I suppose that they do it at night as well and I think that accounts for the noises that when I check on them at night and find them watching me back.

[Pajarita]

Does he sleep in a birdy hut? Because the one thing I have noticed in GCCs is that they always sleep leaning against their mates in such a way that their entire body touches the other's so maybe the reason why he makes that 'needy' sound is that he needs a warm something to lean on. Why don't you try rigging up a small heating pad on the lowest setting - maybe covered in a thick material and then kind of folded so it makes like a triangle that he could get into and sleep feeling a solid and warm 'body' next to his?

[shiraartain]

Liz I would love to bring him a companion after getting him tested, but I want the current situation to settle down first. By this time next year, I'll be getting him DNA tested and searching for a companion. (Ideally I'll be taking them with me to grad school)

Wolf, I'm sure he's awake at these times, as he calms down after I talk to him.

Parjarita, I've been searching for a heating pad for a while for human use and am very hesitant to use one for him as the reviews for many of them state that the heating is inconsistent and they flare up sometimes. I don't want him to get burned.

I will out his hut back in tonight after washing it! Hopefully it helps.

[Wolf]

It took me a while to find a heating pad that doesn't turn off every 2 hours, but I found one and I hung it with plastic clamps to the outside of the cage ( only clamped the covering of it). I clamped it so that it doesn't touch the metal part of the cage and then I cover the cage with a couple of towels, it is a table top model for the budgies, and it is placed so that it is actually taller than I am. The female came to me plucked and I don't think that she will ever grow her feathers back, which is why I got the heating pad and by covering the cage it traps the heat inside the cage. You might be able to get a perch heater that hangs on the outside of the cage or a heated perch that you can slip in the cozy hut to supply heat.

[Pajarita]

I've been using heating pads with the birds for years and years and I've never had a single problem with them... I even use a heating pad of sorts outdoors in the winter for the feral cats (it's not a heating pad per se, it's like a little house with a warm liner inside that has a heating element all over and under it so it stays warm inside) and it works great, too.

But, if you are afraid of the electricity part of it, you can always use some of that thin silver thing that 'reflects' body heat (you know, like what they use for soldiers wounded in the field)

[shiraartain]

Wolf/Parjarita, would you mind sharing the brands of the electric blankets you use?

Also, Parjarita, I will look into that! And brainstorm a bit on how to incorporate it without scaring him.

Ran the hut through the wash (plain, no detergent) and put it in, came back into the room today after sister informed me I forgot to cover him and thought he was gone- until I realized he had decided to sit on the perch so that he was between the hut and the perch. I think it really is a security/comfort thing, he likes to be covered/wrapped in something. Or close to something solid and soft? He came out when I got closer to the cage, but I'm really considering one of the sugar glider huts. He could easily slide in and be safely comfortable.