# Please Help with Hormonal Behavior Modification



## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

I've been asking about this in the Health forum, but I think it was getting lost in the end of a rather long thread. 

I'm concerned because my single female Roo has lately been doing a mating posture/courtship display to my hands when I have her out. I'm certain this is what it is. However, she is not being nesty or hormonal at all in her cage. 

I DO NOT want her to lay eggs, so do I need to be worried about this? Or do I just ignore her when she does it and assume things are okay so long as she doesn't do anything nesty?

I'm in sort of a predicament because she is a rescue bird, so I'm limited in what I can do to modify her behavior. I can't limit her food because she's underweight and malnourished. I can't rearrange her cage because she has mobility issues. I have been trying to get her about 11.5 hours of sleep, but I can't do more than that because I leave for work at 7 am. To get her 14 hours, I'd have to cover her the minute I got home, and then she'd get no time out with me.  

Please help. I've never had a female before, and I'm looking for some sort of guidelines. I feel like I'm between a rock and a hard place. If she lays eggs, it would be very hard on her body. But she is still traumatized and healing, so I can't limit food or disorient her, either.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

There are things that you can do when you hold her to prevent the hormonal reaction. She obviously views you as her mate. So when you take her out, DON'T touch her back at all whatsoever, because this is where the males mount to mate. I had a female where all I had to do was scratch her head and she'd get hormonal. You don't have to limit her diet, you just have to limit the amount of soft foods you give her. Hope this helped!


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

I wonder if I set her off by picking her up with my whole closed hand. I do that because her balance sucks and she can't always climb my arm, but maybe she sees it as being mounted. :/ 

Can I still give small amounts of soft food? Her vet wants her on brown rice and pasta for weight gain. 

Also, how likely is she to lay eggs if she's just displaying to me occasionally and not being nesty? It's been a couple weeks and the behavior doesn't seem to have escalated. Will the season change eventually make her less hormonal too?

Thanks for your help.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

Yes you can still give her small amounts of rice and pasta. Since she's only nesty with you, I doubt she'll lay any eggs, so just keep an eye out. If she starts looking for dark corners that's when you should be worried. My hen laid behind the couch once. So it just depends on the bird. If you don't change her daytime hours with the season change then the seasons don't affect her. Its the amount of light that they get every day that tells them when breeding season is. So since you already have her at pretty long nights, she already thinks its fall. It does sound like the whole hand grabbing could be what's setting her off, maybe try getting her to step up and then placing your hand over her but not touching her back incase she slips and falls you can catch her?


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

Thank you so much. I know not to touch her back, but I hadn't even thought about grabbing her as a potential problem. I'll definitely change that. 

She isn't nesty in her cage at all, so hopefully this won't get out of hand. She runs around the bottom sometimes, but it's just to look for scraps she's dropped. She nevr shreds the paper. She can't have a grate because of her balance issues. 

She also has a wire rest shelf which I got to help her mobility. Do you think I should remove it? It is well lit and not solid, but I'm just not sure. I want her to be comfortable in her cage but not so comfortable that she starts nesting.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

I don't think you need to remove it. If she's not nesting there, then its not a problem and there's no need to take it away.


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

I don't think she is. She spends a lot of time on it but I think that's just because it's comfortable. She also has shreddable toys hanging, but she doesn't seem at all interested in nesting with it. She just chews on them.


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

Also, what do I do when she displays this behavior toward me? Do I just ignore it, or is there some type of "punishment" I should be giving her? Should I move her off of me? Put her back in her cage? I want to still be able to spend time with her.  How do I convince her that I love her but I don't want her eggs?


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

Also, if anyone else with a hen wants to/can weigh in on this, I'd really appreciate it. I'm sorry for so many posts, I'm just really worried. Every time I have her out, I feel like I could potentially be hurting her by making her too hormonal.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

Just avoid touching her back...you can stop scritching her and ignore her when she does it (as soon as she does it) and see if that helps. She may not understand it though.


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

When I ignore her, she'll run back and forth on my chest/lap continuing to display at me for a few minutes. Then usually she goes back to playing with something else. But she still tries again the next time. Although she's only been on the long(er) nights for about a week, so I'm hoping if I continue that and continue to ignore her, maybe the behavior will calm down.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

It usually takes about two weeks for the long nights to take effect so hopefully it kicks in soon!


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

Well it was also sort of interrupted last week because I had to go out of town. She's been doing the courting thing for about a month, though, and it hasn't escalated. So I think that's probably a good sign. On some level I'm happy that I've made her feel well enough to gt hormonal, but.


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## elinore (Jul 22, 2010)

As far as picking her up without touching her back, have you tried offering her both hands to stand in like a bowl? When my bird got ill and unable to balance whatsoever, I would ask her to step up onto my two hands, give her the time she needed to get her feet onto them and stabilize herself, then slowly move her. I would brace the hands against my body to make a "wall," with my wrists providing extra "walls," and if she became unstable I could move my hands quickly if she started to fall over.


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

That's a good idea, although it's not so much stepping up that's a problem. She can step up fine, but she can't always climb to my shoulder/up my chest/up the couch successfully. So then if she starts slipping, I'll scoop her up in my whole hand and put her where she was trying to go. But I will definitely try some modifications of that.


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

Picking her up differently doesn't seem to make any difference, nor does avoiding scritches. This morning when I went to uncover her, she was already awake and eating. Maybe I need to work on making it darker in her room?


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

That could help...I put black curtains in there room so almost no light comes through at all.


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

Yeah, the blinds that came with my apartment suck. I think I'll work on that when my parents come visit next week.  Is it possible that she could continue to just give me the display occasionally, and never have it progress beyond that point? It's been going on for about a month now.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

Its very possible, especially if the only time she's stimulated is when she's with you. Then you really wont have anything to worry about except her displaying to you occasionally.


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## enigma731 (Aug 12, 2011)

It seems pretty stable so far, so here's hoping. And she gained a gram this week.  Go, Roo!


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