Hello! You guys can call me Peculiur, (yes I know, I spelt it that way on purpose), and I am an Intermediate level Bird Owner, not a beginner but certainly not an expert and I'm still learning on how to take care of my 3 green cheeked conures.
That being said, I need your guys' help. I wasn't all too prepared when I got my first conure, Chappie, who was given to me as a gift on my 16th birthday. Chappie is the sweetest, most loving bird that I've ever come across, and we quickly became best friends.
The only problem was that I, being a teen, had to go to things like school and other stuff, and Chappie started showing signs of seperation anxiety each time I would leave the room, and would constantly try to escape my room to follow after me. I allow Chappie to fly, since I'm the oldest of five siblings and––although none of them are allowed in my room without my permission––I have severe anxieties about my Chappie finding itself on the ground and unable to fly to safety. So I let Chappie fly.
So in order to prevent Chappie from escaping my room, I make sure to always close the door, plus I have something to block the little opening at the bottom (yes Chappie has actually managed to squeeze through), and now I have a screen that I installed so that I can have my door open without worry. But Chappie still fought to come with me wherever I went, and it broke my heart to have to leave my bird alone all day. So I decided to get Chappie a friend.
Thats where my next bird Cheeto, comes in. Now, I must tell you, that when I got Chappie, his birth-certificate stated that he was male, and Cheeto's birth-certificate also stated that he was male aswell. So my mother agreed to allow me to adopt Cheeto and he and Chappie got along just fine!
Until I started noticing some odd behavior.
Next thing I knew, it turned out Chappie was actually female, and he had now laid an egg and I was kinda freaking out and was really peeved that Petsmart had misgendered my bird. I admit, I could have handled the situation better, I should have just gotten rid of the egg and swapped it with a dummy. But I just...couldn't.
So, this is where my third bird comes into the picture. I named him Babe, because thats what I called him when he hatched and it just kinda stuck. He's healthy, though timid, and doesn't like to be pet, though he loves to perch atop my head a lot while I'm on the computer.
How do I know that Babe is a male? Well, he keeps trying to hump his mother. Which I try to prevent as much as possible. And now Cheeto has been biting me and being severely territorial whenever I'm cleaning their enclosure, and he's started bullying Chappie in some sort of weird pecking order. And lately Chappie has been trying to escape the room again (e.g landing on the floor and trying to claw her way through the door)...
Now that comes to the part where I need your guys' help with. I know I made mistakes, but I'm willing to learn for the sake of improving my birds' quality of life. I love Chappie very much, and I'm worried that maybe Cheeto and Babe--them being both males-- is stressful for her and I don't know what I should do.
Should I re-home both males to fellow Parrot owners? I live in Washington, and if anyone has any advice at all, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thank you.