# New cockatiel owner.



## manowar (Dec 30, 2010)

Good morning, This is my first post here. 

I was given a hand reared cockatiel for Christmas - alarm bells ringing, I know! It's not as bad as that, I have kept trained budgies virtually all my life so I am fairly confident that I can rise to the challenge of cockatiel ownership and provide the necessary attention, and also put up with the extra decibels when he has his morning shriek. 

Our new bird is called Frank. As I said, he is hand reared and he has been in our local pet shop for several months, in a cage with a couple of other cockatiels. This one made caught our eye as he has a hilarious habit of walking forwards and backwards, a little moonwalk. We've been told he's about 5 months old, but we haven't got a hatching certificate. He's completely hand tame, doesn't even complain too much when I have to grab him away from his favorite pastime of destroying my laptop keyboard. He loves to have his head scratched when he's in the mood, and gets upset when we have to leave him to go out as he loves being around people and even decided to have a shower with me yesterday. 

So I count myself very lucky, we've only had him 7 days and he's already settling in well without any real problems and I'm looking forward to a long and happy future with our new birdy.

However, there are a couple of things I'd like some opinions about, mainly because I don't want to spoil the birds good nature this early on and have to put up with behavior issues for years ahead. 

Frank likes to look at his reflection. We have not put a mirror in his cage in order to allow him to bond with us and we hide the other mirrors around the house as far as practicable. However, he likes to sit on our towel rail in the bathroom which is made of shiny chrome and always trots over to the toaster which is also chrome when he's in the kitchen, amongst other objects around the house which can't be hidden away that easily. 

The funny thing is, unlike some budgies which we've had that view the mirror as a mate and chirp happily to it (and destroy your fingers if you dare to go near it) Frank gets angry with his own reflection - but always wants to go have a look whenever he sees something shiny. First he will stare for a while then he'll have a hissy-pecky fit at , run backwards and forwards to it and then start over again. 

He would do this for hours if we let him but when we remove him, he tends to have a little snap at us and flails his beak around . His peck isn't violent compared to what he's capable of, it's sort of an expression of annoyance or displeasure more than an attack, but is it something we need to be concerned about or nip in the bud early on before it escalates? If so, how?

Along with Frank, we have a little budgie caledl Raul. They exist side by side ignoring each other most of the time. They'll eat from the same bowl without any problems, but sometimes Frank gets startled when Raul flies and occasionally has a bit of a hiss and peck at Raul. Should I be concerned that Frank may try to harm our budgie? We don't leave them alone unsupervised but is it something we need to watch for?

Also, if anyone can let me know if there are any tricks to lower the volume of the cockatiel call a little I'd be most grateful! Coming from a pet shop, he makes all sorts of noises he's mimicked from canaries and finches, along with the occasional wolf-whistle from the customers and these noises are quite pleasant and tolerable. But sometimes, usually in the mornings, he has a little moment of agitation and discontentment, and screams as if he's calling for other tiels. This is when he makes the "flock call", the loud, eardrum piercing whistle. After a little while or giving him something which distracts him he'll stop and settle down. Of course, these noises are part of the deal when you own a cockatiel and I'm willing to put up with a fair amount of noise. I'm seriously concerned that my hearing could be damaged if exposed to it for too long though. Can anyone offer advice? 

Thanks for reading, sorry it's a bit long.

A happy new year to all!

Matt.


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## lperry82 (Aug 2, 2010)

Hello and welcome to the forum and i would love to see some pics of your birds 
Its very nice that he has bonded with you so much and some do tend to get aggressive with the mirrors, my cookie don't really bother with the mirror.
They are very loud i do agree but when cookie is loud i will walk over to him and sweet talk to him and give him kisses lol
I don't think he will hurt your budgie he just telling him to back off, believe it or not its the budgie who bullys the tiel. Take my tweety she hates my tiels bullys them and peck them for no reason, she is evil lol


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

It sounds like things are going pretty well! I'm not sure what to make of Frank's relationship with the mirror, it sounds like a love/hate situation. With this bird you're probably better off not putting a mirror in the cage and not letting him spend hours and hours with the out of cage mirror, but it probably isn't a problem to let him have some mirror time. 

It's natural for birds to squabble with each other, and budgies do tend to be more aggressive than tiels. The current situation doesn't sound like a problem, but if one bird starts to constantly bully the other then you might need to keep them apart.

It's also natural for birds to take a peck at you when you do something that displeases them. Most cockatiels won't bite hard unless they're absolutely driven to it (for example if you grab them bodily when they're frightened). The little "fake bites" are your bird's way of saying that he doesn't like what you're doing, and shouldn't turn into a problem if you treat him well on the whole. Neither bird nor human has to win every single argument so it's OK to respect his feelings or insist on having your way according to the needs of the moment.


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## manowar (Dec 30, 2010)

I promise I'll get some pics of Frank as soon as I can, unfortunately I've had to work abroad for a fortnight. He seems to be happy enough without me - I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not! My family give him plenty of attention though. 

Thanks for the reassurance. As an update, things are going pretty well to be honest, we're slowly getting used to the extra volume - especially the super loud "wolf whistles" which someone at the pet shop has helpfully taught him! He doesn't seem to get agitated and shrieky when we put him in his cage any more as I think he's coming to realise he'll be released again soon enough. He's still aggressive in the presence of all things reflective but it's not a great problem, he doesn't bite hard. Certainly not as hard as an excellent and dearly missed budgie we once had who used to leave your fingers oozing blood if you took his mirror away.

In terms of his relationship with our current budgie Raul, they just ignore each other most of the time, even if they're both sitting on the same hand. They still happily eat from the same millet or bowl (Raul prefers cockatiel mix). On occasion Frank will hiss and show his beak at Raul, and Raul will hardly care. So I don't think there's any real danger of damage being inflicted on either bird.

I'm just looking forward to getting back home soon and seeing them both - my two little timewasters!

All the best to you and your birds, Matt.


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