# trying to stop breeding behaviour.. need some help



## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

hi, i'm trying to stop breeding behaviour, need some help. here's the background..

i started with 1 female, then added a 2nd male, then a 3rd male.
the 2 males will occasionally fight.. but not with the female.. i never had any issues with mating behaviours before.

couple days ago, i got my 4th cockatiel.. both the males were very friendly with the new bird. at first my female seemed just normal, not overly friendly or anything like that.. then this morning i noticed she did the high tail against the cage and the new 4th cockatiel was climbing on top of her. she never did that with my other 2 males. so i separated the 4th from them this morning.

this afternoon, i put all 4 of them back together again.. then within the hour, the same thing.. female bending low with tail high, and the 4th cockatiel trying to climb on top of my female.

the 4th cockatiel, i don't even know if its male or female, since my other 2 males are so friendly with it, doing the grooming thing, and favours returned by the new cockatiel.

if its just 2 females fooling around, then its not so bad, cos i don't want her laying any eggs. is there any way to tell? the bands are still there under the tail.

i checked today about how to discourage breeding, and realised that i was giving them too much greens the last couple days, and exposed them to direct sunlight, which was discouraged.

so my question is:
should i return the new 4th cockatiel? or is there any way to keep it since the 4th one is so popular with the 2 males.. and of course the 1st female too

any help is appreciated. really undecided, not sure what i should do.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

just saw this thread about how to discourage breeding.. very informative.. thanks

http://talkcockatiels.com/showthread.php?t=32330

still not sure if i should just return the 4th cockatiel though.. any advice would be good

the female is the one on the right of the 3.. and the new one is alone, with pic of the bands below


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## Paul C (Sep 27, 2016)

Hi , I am no expert but I think the one alone is a female as it looks very similar to my girl with the same face colour and tail..


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## ParrotLover2001 (Dec 30, 2016)

Your new one is a pied isn't it?
If so, it will be very hard (if not impossible) to tell whether it's a male or female.


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## Haimovfids (Sep 19, 2012)

The new one looks male to me.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

Paul C said:


> Hi , I am no expert but I think the one alone is a female as it looks very similar to my girl with the same face colour and tail..





ParrotLover2001 said:


> Your new one is a pied isn't it?
> If so, it will be very hard (if not impossible) to tell whether it's a male or female.


thanks.. if the pied was female would be better.. but 2 females, one on top of the other.. its not common or is it?

and those 2 males just stand there looking and not doing anything.. 

and my original female just not interested in those 2 males, which was good for me.. until this 4th one came along.. 

and if my female wanted to mate, at least do it with one of the white faced pearls.. but no, just had to be the pied.. sheesh, what's going on?


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

Haimovfids said:


> The new one looks male to me.


thanks.. but apparently my 2 males like preening with this new one.. kinda weird


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

Regardless of gender, tiels do mate for fun. And two of the same sex will mate. This is actually NOT a good thing, as they can stimulate each other to lay eggs and then you have two hens laying instead of one. Twice the chance of complications. 

Being a pied, it's impossible to tell gender visually, you will have to do it by behavior, which can take a while to come out. How your other birds treat the new bird won't really give an indication to gender either. You could do a DNA test, which will get you answers a lot quicker.


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

> i checked today about how to discourage breeding, and realised that i was giving them too much greens the last couple days, and exposed them to direct sunlight, which was discouraged.


I'm not sure where you got this advice but it's wrong. Greens and sunlight are important for nutritional reasons, so please keep up what you're doing with those. When it comes to breeding triggers, it's the abundance of food that's relevant and there's no indication that the type of food matters. When it comes to sunlight, the only thing that matters is the apparent day length. 

I have an addendum to my hormone control article with science geekery about breeding triggers. You can read it here: http://www.littlefeatheredbuddies.com/info/breed-hormones.html#geek Day length is a primary breeding trigger and food abundance is a secondary trigger.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

roxy culver said:


> Regardless of gender, tiels do mate for fun. And two of the same sex will mate. This is actually NOT a good thing, as they can stimulate each other to lay eggs and then you have two hens laying instead of one. Twice the chance of complications.
> 
> Being a pied, it's impossible to tell gender visually, you will have to do it by behavior, which can take a while to come out. How your other birds treat the new bird won't really give an indication to gender either. You could do a DNA test, which will get you answers a lot quicker.


thanks.. maybe just return it, save me some headache.. will give it a couple more days.. but they all get along so well with the new one.. so still not sure what i should do.. hmmm


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

tielfan said:


> url]http://www.littlefeatheredbuddies.com/info/breed-hormones.html#geek[/url] Day length is a primary breeding trigger and food abundance is a secondary trigger.


awesome.. thanks again.. and for that previous post too..


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

i reduced direct sunlight and light in general, no more buffet style food dishes out all day, so food intake also reduced, i'm hand feeding them all now, while still trying to tame the new one.. seems to have an immediate impact.. awesome.

so have decided to keep it.. especially since it gets along with all my 3 previous ones.. thanks all

.........................

dang, didn't work, still hormonal.. am still keeping 4th one though.. will probably need more time.. keep them separated for the moment


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

My personal guess is that your first two males just aren't interested in the female for whatever reason, or maybe they court her but she's not interested in them. But the new bird is probably a male who likes her very much, and she likes him too. Love at first sight.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

tielfan said:


> My personal guess is that your first two males just aren't interested in the female for whatever reason, or maybe they court her but she's not interested in them. But the new bird is probably a male who likes her very much, and she likes him too. Love at first sight.


heartbreak too for me.. the female is my favourite.. haha

and caught in the act again.. haiz.. had to split them up.. maybe i shouldn't touch my female one too much.. i take care not to touch her back, only the head and face


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

and now the 4th one preening with another male.. so popular


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

so much work to constantly monitor them, or i have to split them up and they get unhappy.

If i do put all 4 of them together, the female keeps going over to the pied.

also noticed when i put the female alone there's less commotion, but when i separate the pied, the other 3 gets agitated.

just wondering if i do let them breed, the WF cinnamon pearl female with the WF pied.. what offsprings will i end up with?


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## ParrotLover2001 (Dec 30, 2016)

Have you checked the underside of the tail feathers? 

Stripes=female
solid color=male


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

> Stripes=female
> solid color=male


Unless the tail feathers are pied. Pied feathers never have any markings regardless of sex. 



> just wondering if i do let them breed, the WF cinnamon pearl female with the WF pied.. what offsprings will i end up with?


All chicks will be whiteface. Anything else depends on what splits the parents have.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

ParrotLover2001 said:


> Have you checked the underside of the tail feathers?
> 
> Stripes=female
> solid color=male


stripes still there, but the pied is still quite young i think.. probably needs a first molt before i can tell? i think



tielfan said:


> All chicks will be whiteface. Anything else depends on what splits the parents have.


ah.. maybe i'll just let them breed.. dun wanna breakup true love.. although i think my female just hormonal and horny.. haha

hopefully after your advice on the hormones control with light & food, etc.. it'll go away in a week.. kinda sad i can't let them all play together, have to split them up when i'm not around


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

Pied birds don't follow the usual rules. It can take years for males to lose all their baby markings. 

You can put them in separate cages that are close together. They'll still have each other's companionship but can't get together to do the deed.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

tielfan said:


> Pied birds don't follow the usual rules. It can take years for males to lose all their baby markings..


ah, ok.. and that's what i'm doing now.. cages side by side

i actually got the 4th one hoping it'd bond with my grey WF pearl.. it seemed like the male & female WF cinnamon pearls were closer even though there was nothing sexual.. and now this, back to square one

reconsidering exchanging the 4th for another now.. so much hassle.. but then the next one could be worse or have different problems.. decisions decisions

you've got 13 tiels right? do you breed them? then give/sell away or just keep them until you get more and more?

any issues with offsprings living together with parents? that'd be a whole set of different problems i'm guessing


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

apparently i've been having it easy for one year.. alot more to learn.. started looking up on breeding and came across alot of stuff i've not been noticing

just saw this from another thread
http://www.silversageaviaries.com/handlinghormones/

anyway.. thanks.. need to brush up on this real quick


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

I've actually got 14 tiels now, and need to update my profile. Life with cockatiels is a soap opera and most of them are pursuing hopeless romances, so I've only got three breeding pairs. I try to limit each pair to one clutch a year, but it's hard to stop Shodu that early so there's usually a second clutch from her. I sell the babies because I don't have room to keep them all. But four of my current birds (Teela, Squeebis, Snowy and Henry) are the children of Buster and Shodu.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

tielfan said:


> Life with cockatiels is a soap opera


i only just realised.. i've been having it easy for a year..


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## ninfatiel (Jul 22, 2016)

I dont know the age of your tiels,but I think the middle cockatiel is a female,,not male, I can see the perfect pearls and male over 1y.o should loose them. The new pied one just may be young male judging by the tail,here is good article about sexing pieds..http://www.justcockatiels.net/pied.html


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## ninfatiel (Jul 22, 2016)

Another thing I wanted to say- I dont believe in reducing the quality of food,putting tiels on dry food only to stop breeding,they need a balanced diet breeding or no breeding, So when unwanted mating happens with my tiels- I have to keep them separately..I have never seen two birds of the same sex mating,if there are birds of opposite sex around..-your female and new bird may be a pair, and if you ever decide to breed them-they may become good parents,mine 'love at first sight''couples always turn out to be successful.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

ninfatiel said:


> I dont know the age of your tiels,but I think the middle cockatiel is a female,,not male, I can see the perfect pearls and male over 1y.o should loose them. The new pied one just may be young male judging by the tail,here is good article about sexing pieds..http://www.justcockatiels.net/pied.html


you know what.. i never even considered that before.. i'm an idiot.. thanks for pointing that out, that explains some things

i've only been getting problems when i introduced the male grey WF pearl couple months ago.. the grey fighting with the middle, the 1st avoiding the grey, and suddenly both my WF cinnamons going really high up to perch for sleeping.. probably explains them avoiding the grey male.. i see the middle bickering with the grey i tot she was a male, so fierce, fighting over my 1st female.. and i also see the middle always looking for the 1st female, i tot she was trying to court the 1st one.. now i know better.. probably going to find the fellow female for company instead of that grey male

and its all my fault too.. i've been playing more with my 1st female, she's the closest with me.. that explains why i could have triggered her hormones.. so now every time i see her getting hormonal i feel kinda guilty.. dang.. really need to pay closer attention.. did i say i'm an idiot already


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## ninfatiel (Jul 22, 2016)

Dont be hard on yourself,we all do have our favorites.. I have 20 tiels but play with some more often then with others. female birds may fight with male,especially if they are not tame..on that same site 'justcockatiels.com there is plenty of info on how to determine true sex of the birds,so you may be surprised once you learn their true identity)) As for your grey male-he hast found his match yet))) some of them are really picky when it comes to partners. but since you have few birds and good conditions, its inevitable that they will want to breed,so you may have to keep males and females separately


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

ninfatiel said:


> Dont be hard on yourself,we all do have our favorites.. you may have to keep males and females separately


haha.. thanks

i didn't consider the breeding thing.. just thought since these are flock birds, they'd like to hang out in bigger groups.. so i added a couple

the first 2 wf cinnamons didn't seem to hit it off too much.. added the grey but also the same, in fact, more bickering and fighting over sleeping perches.. so added the 4th but getting unwanted consequences with the breeding.. although this 4th one is like the glue, everyone likes him.. haha

they all have distinct personalities, i just have to be more careful letting them play together when i'm around.. otherwise, like you said, separate them by sex

really, thx for that.. not sure how i could have overlooked that..


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

tielfan said:


> .. Life with cockatiels is a soap opera..





ninfatiel said:


> ..middle cockatiel is a female..


oh man, definitely soap opera.. today caught my 1st female trying the deed again with dat pied.. so i split her by herself from the group.. now 3 hrs later, i catch the 2nd wf cinnamon doing the bending over and dat pied actually tried to mount her.. so its pretty much confirmed the middle cinnamon is also a female

which means i got 2 females trying to mate with the stud of a pied.. man, but none successfully cos i've always been there to stop them.. feels wrong trying to stop them.. what should i do now? haiz

have you all ever had one male mating with 2 females? i thought i read somewhere they bond for life or something.. so it doesn't seem like this is normal behaviour


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

I adopted a foursome of three males mating with one hen, although after they came to me she picked one of the males to be her mate and rejected the other two. 

I have a threesome of one cock and two hens who serve as foster parents because the male can't even figure out how to mate. But they get along very peacefully, and the two hens get along with each other better than they do with the male. He gets overenthusiastic sometimes and tries to defend the nest against his mates lol. 

So yes, threesomes do happen and they can be very successful if all the partners are willing. If one or more partners aren't willing, you'll have a fight on your hands.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

tielfan said:


> I adopted a foursome of three males mating with one hen.. have a threesome of one cock and two hens..


so complicated.. don't know how you manage 

i've been reading other breeding threads, and seems like i have to permanently do the hormone reduction techniques if i don't want to breed

right now i have to monitor them every time i put them together.. for play, for meals, etc.. and i constantly monitor with a webcam.. i noticed a couple times, i leave them together for 5mins and my females keeps going over to that pied male.. if i keep the males in a separate cage by the side, my 1st female will climb all over that cage looking for that pied.. haiz

the pet shop i bought it from said it was ok to exchange for another.. i might just go change and hope its a female.. my females don't seem to like that older 1st male so less issues for me.. wonder if my females will miss that pied

its that or keep this popular pied liked by all, and constant monitoring or separating.. got a decision to make by tomorrow


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

Following the natural light cycle is enough to limit hormones in my flock for most of the year. They lose interest as soon as the days start getting shorter, and don't regain interest until the days have been getting longer for a few weeks.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

tielfan said:


> Following the natural light cycle is enough to limit hormones in my flock for most of the year. They lose interest as soon as the days start getting shorter, and don't regain interest until the days have been getting longer for a few weeks.


i live near the equator, so we get pretty much the same daylight year round.. maybe cos its spring time now


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

the pied is so popular.. surrounded

1st female keep looking for him for mating, the 2nd female keeps looking for him for grooming, even the male too

i think i shouldn't break up the family now.. ok decided


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

on a side note, these 2 cages with castors that i got, like

i remove one side from each, can combine them into one big cage or open them up side by side for a big play area

i move up the bottom part so wing flapping doesn't disperse the crap below too much

i can even lean it again one wall and separate them into 2 different cages

awesome..


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## ParrotLover2001 (Dec 30, 2016)

philiplolc said:


> on a side note, these 2 cages with castors that i got, like
> 
> 
> 
> ...




I love those cages, what brand? I'd love to get one for my tiel.


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## philiplolc (Sep 20, 2016)

ParrotLover2001 said:


> I love those cages, what brand? I'd love to get one for my tiel.
> Sent from my iPod touch using Tapatalk


i just went to check, apparently there's no brand on these.. i bought it locally

its actually a 5 tier cat cage but you can use it for small animals

Measurements are:
91cm (w) x 56cm (d) x 171cm (h).
36" (w) x 23" (d) x 68" (h).
Mesh Gap is 1cm.

you should be able to find something similar on Amazon or Ebay i think


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