Question from a friend

[smallonion]

Hi eveyrone,
A friend of mine (non-bird person) visited someone who has 4 birds. When she came back she asked me the following question, because I'm the only 'bird person' she knows:

"I wanted to ask
you, is it normal for a female bird to pluck her mate's feathers? or
is it abusive? Her former abusive mate used to do it to her...and
now she's doing it to him...Should they be separated? He looks
terrible. '

I wrote back:

As for your question, it is never normal for a bird to pluck his own or
another bird's feathers, except on one occasion: sometimes a pregnant
female bird will pluck a small patch of chest feathers to put in the nest,
and to help the eggs get more of her body heat, without feathers in the
way. ONe of the reasons I bought Humphrey is because I felt so bad for him
being abused (and plucked) by his cage mate.

"Are you or the owners SURE that the OTHER bird is plucking her, or is she
doing the plucking herself? The reason I say this is because self-plucking
is a common problem among pet birds. Also, a male and female pair 'preen'
each other, just like they preen themselves. So, the male might be
preening her, then all of a sudden she has no feathers, and he gets the blame. Have they seen the male actually pluck her? If so, yes, they
should be separated. If she is plucking herself, the number one reason for
that is boredom. Birds who arent' played with, taken out of the cage a
lot, and don't have a lot of toys which are changed a lot, get bored and
start to abuse their own feathers. It's usually boredom, but rarely it can
be illness, so any bird who plucks should see an avian (bird specialist)
vet to rule out any illness, and then the lifestyle can be addressed. Hope
this helps - you can send it to your friend. Poor naked birdie. Breaks my
heart."

Is there any thing else I need to say to her? By the way, the male bird's name is HUMPHREY! I can't believe there's another Humphrey bird in the world.
I dont' know what kind of birds these are.
Thanks everyone,
Michele and Humph

[Crebain]

That's one big plucking problem. :shock:

Sorry, I couldn't resist. I think your answer was very good.

[The Outlaw]

Birds frequently pluck their mates. I don't know why. I suspect they are trying to make them look less attractive to other birds.

THE OUTLAW

[Joel]

Darn Nancy, still hard to tell when you are joking or not :? ........Why don't ya just bite the bullet for once and click on a smiley face. :)

My Sennies and Meyers like to pluck each other behind the neck but it is always the females doing the males......Might be trying to show them who is boss? Guess that is where the term "hen-pecked" comes from? :)

[The Outlaw]

Hmmm. I'm not sure I was joking

[Joel]

Nancy, :)

Wouldn't that be something if they were that coniving but then again, they are FEMALES!!!! :)

At least MY feather yankers are, the ones that do it to their mates that is.