# Tail Feathers



## uki09 (Jul 3, 2009)

Hi All,

My Uki is just over five months old and still has not had her full molt yet and the condition of her tail feathers are appauling. she hardly ever takes care of them and is always fraying them when she climbs around her cage. I was just wondering whether this is normal behaviour and whether she will take better care of her new feathers when she has her first molt?

Thanks


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## Raven2322 (Mar 1, 2008)

uki09 said:


> Hi All,
> 
> My Uki is just over five months old and still has not had her full molt yet and the condition of her tail feathers are appauling. she hardly ever takes care of them and is always fraying them when she climbs around her cage. I was just wondering whether this is normal behaviour and whether she will take better care of her new feathers when she has her first molt?
> 
> Thanks


I'm not sure on this and would actually like to know this as well. My Edward is 6 months, he only seems to be molting wing feathers and small feathers and has not moulted his tail at all. He has torn/rip/frayed/stain feathers; his tails looks horrible too. Can't wait to hear what people have to say about the tail issue.


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## Lovin_the_tiels (Jun 10, 2009)

I bought 2 cinnamon females a month and half ago,both tails were in total disrepair,,the one female is finally starting to molt,and her pretty lil feathers are coming in nice,,the other crazy little cinna loves to hang upside down on the cage and crawls upside down all over,and i think i might have a lil more difficulty keeping her tail nice,its funny to watch her hanging upside down,spreading her wings and flippin her head backwards as i talk to her,,the whole time shes trying to use her stump of a tail to balance.She has plenty of room ,a super condo cage thats 4ftx3ftx3ft,and no-one is attacking her tail,its just taking longer for her to molt,,Its a hurry up and molt thing!!


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## xxxSpikexxx (Jul 30, 2007)

Young tiels are really clumsy so it is normal to have a messy tail. At one point I thought that Spike would never have a nice full tail but he is starting to get less clumsy and his tail is looking better  Also make sure that your tiel has a big enough cage, I think 24X24X24 inches should be the minimum cage size for a tiel


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## Birdlette (Feb 25, 2009)

I heard someone call that "teenage tiel tale bashing" one time, and rest assured they grow out of it. My really active young male was a mess for awhile!!!  Now he is a graceful, full-tailed mature bird!


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## uki09 (Jul 3, 2009)

Thanks for your help everyone . it gives me a little reassurance!!!!!!


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## atvchick95 (Sep 17, 2007)

I think it has a lot to do with the fact they have Long tails all my birds are in nice big cages but when they climb around their tails go through the bars (all my cages are 1/2" spacing with the bars)

even my budgies get frayed tails every now and them but some of them have really long tails , longer then most Budgies.


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## srtiels (May 1, 2009)

I absolutely hate to see a messy and broken tail and it drives me crazy when I would see one of my birds like that.

Many many years ago when I first started breeding I had noticed different feather qualities to tail feathers. Some birds had long beautiful and very flexiable tails, and since these feathers were very flexible they were less prone to getting bent or breaking. Other tiels tail feathers were thinner and more brittle and very prone to bending and breaking. Also some tiels wound up with very frayed and ratty feathers from climbing up the sides of the cage. I got to looking at these particular birds and noticed when perched that they did not have a perfectly straight topline and at the rump their tails would just slightly point downwards. And when climbing these birds did not keep the tails parralell (lack of proper word) to their body.

Now when I see a broken tail feather I will pluck those feathers out. Plucking them out does not harm the bird and in under a month they have a beautiful new tail. If I am selling a baby that has a broken tail feather I will pull it out in front of the buyer and explain why, and what I am doing, and that the feather pulled will be replace with a new beautiful one soon. I remeber how unsightly some of my first tiels were because of feather quality and broken tails and feel that my customers shpould not have to look at or deal with it waiting for the bird to molt, which can take months.

On a side note, when a tail is completely broken off I will pluck out most of the tail feathers and arrange the perches so that the tiel has less trouble getting around in the cage. I once had a poor weaned baby that had broken tail feathers fall off the perch landing on it's tail. One of the broken tail feathers got rammed into the body. The tiel lived, but boy did it bleed and it was scary at the time.


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## kevncaz (Mar 25, 2009)

yes our honey has a habit of dipping her tail feathers in her water and they end up looking terrible till they dry
we wouldnt dream of trying to pluck them though as she is a very young girl and will learn to keep herself beautiful , we hope , well thats the plan


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## atvchick95 (Sep 17, 2007)

another thing - at least with my tiels for some reason they love to step on each others tails while moving around the cage, instead of just waiting a moment for the other one to get out of the way, they just barrel right over them stepping on their tails, back it doesn't matter to them LOL


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