Can you help me out wiht choosing another bird.

[expressmailtome]

Originally Posted by Abby

My princess lives with the 'tiel colony and gets along with them brilliantly. Ok she can be a little bossy at times but I certainly wouldn't say aggressive. As far as pet quality I have heard some good reports. They have a beautiful whistle to them and certainly aren't a terribly loud bird. They are a lovely gentle bird.

Is yours a normal or one of the mutations? I am just curious as they are all beautiful!

Matt

[Abby]

Originally Posted by expressmailtome

Is yours a normal or one of the mutations? I am just curious as they are all beautiful!

Matt

She's a blue mutation. Queen (named by the kids) was a fly in who no one claimed. I have thought about whether to get her a partner or not. Still tossing up what to do there. For now she seems happy enough with the cockatiels. I had a green (normal) girl about 20 years ago that I called Peggy and she had a partner Jake who was a blue when I was living with the parents. They were such a sweet pair of birds. I can only speak of princess as aviary birds, haven't had them as companions but even in the aviary the colour and nature of them just made a lovely bird.

Here's a photo of Queen taken a week or so ago. Umm, yeah she's a little chubby.

[Kolkri]

They are pretty but they do not have any of the traits she listed and your are right they do best as an aviary bird.

[Jwhear]

Unless you adopt the only bird that I think would fit in your price range that I know of for sure is a lovebird. Mine does get cuddly and is quite the character and she is very smart. She undoes the screw and nut that hold her food dish cover on to make her escape. She likes to boss my tiels so they need to be watched very carefully because tiels tend to be very timid. When the lovebird gets in their cage they just make a fiy for it and go to safer ground, but it could be very stressful if this happened too often.

So I have 2 tiels, 1 lovebird, 2 conures, and 1 Amazon and by far my favorites are the conures. They can be nippy or at least my sun can, but they both love to cuddle, play and are so much fun, but again unless you rescue they are all too expensive. The Conures are very loud.

Good luck, but please remember that they will be with you for a long time.

[amanda143]

Having hand fed and raised small Australian birds I have found them to be quite cuddly and sweet. In fact, everyone I know that has these hand fed birds rave about them. This includes bourkes, princess of wales, scarlet-chested, red rumps, rosella's, etc. Definitely not only for aviaries. Personally, I'd have any of these over a love bird any day. :D

[Abby]

Originally Posted by Kolkri

They are pretty but they do not have any of the traits she listed and your are right they do best as an aviary bird.

Actually I was just answering Matt's questions. We kinda sidetracked.

I've only had princess in an aviary situation. I can't say from personal experience how they would go as a companion. My gut feeling is they'd be quite good going from their nature and 'tiel like tendencies, but having not had one in that companion setting I can't say for sure from my own experience.

[Tx mommy]

Our lovies are bullies to the other bigger birds, but sweet and adorable to the humans. Love my Conure & Lorie but they can be noisy and both are very messy in their own ways. Price wise on birds you need to really look around, I noticed where I get my birds locally are cheaper than many of the online places especially when you include shipping, and you have to be very careful who you buy from online. You are doing the right thing though research, research. Oh and have fun looking I went through probably 10 different species adn learned so much looking for my Lorie.

[expressmailtome]

Lovebirds are great. They are beautiful and can be very cuddly. Just know they they also have their downsides. The biggest one of these is that females tend to be very, very territorial (cage aggressive). It will take a good amount of work to over come this.

Matt

[Eliza]

Originally Posted by cockatiel92

It also has to be a medium to small bird $200 or under. the cage is no problem because i have a huge spare cage free.

What is the bar spacing on the cage you have free? That might help narrow down what would fit best... If it's 1/2" or 5/8", why not give it to Petrie?

Another cockatiel might be nice for Petrie, of course.

Pyrrhura conures are nice; green-cheeks are fairly easy to come by.

I'll always be a fan of lovebirds and think that they make for great companions.

Keep in mind the like most things, the cuddle-factor will depend on each individual parrot. I've known lovebirds who love nothing more than to snuggle with their humans... but I've known others that could care less. The same goes for every species of parrots. They are prey animals, so being cuddled doesn't always come as easily to them as it does for dogs and cats.