who's plucking who ?

[jusdeb]

The Musk Lorikeets have been getting very intimate lately , lots of preening , feeding and scratching about in the nest box . The girl is spending a lot of time in the nest lately .

The problem is the girl is being plucked . Theres feathers on the aviary floor and try as I might I can not catch them at it to see who is plucking who .

Is she plucking herself or is he plucking her ? The feathers are missing from her front upper chest area and no where else .

All else is good , eating well , recently wormed , in a suspended so no funky ground thingies to worry about , aviary is always clean and wet food /fruit is eaten well before any chance of going off.

Sprayed for mites recently also .

Any ideas ? Is this as I suspect some type of mating thing that they do ?

[Buzzard-1]

If this is her first time she is more than likely plucking herself, Hormones and all that woman stuff

[jusdeb]

She had already bred once before I got them .

[Buzzard-1]

Could be a multitude of things, is he the same mate? is there material in the box to chew down ie; bark etc, is there a choice of nests. plucking is quite often a sign of frustration. (Except in Eclectus)

[jusdeb]

Yes to all except no choice of nest ...Might pop another nest box in tomorrow .Thanks Buzz

[djb78]

I found that if the feathers are picked from chest or rump mostly due to the female, one of red rump hens did this every year ,had nest lined with sawdust twigs and leaves but she would always have her feathers around the eggs- she was my best breeder, when I placed feathers in the aviery they would ignore it. Wouldn't worry to much deb but keep an eye on them, if you see blood on the bald areas definitely intervene. If feathers start to go missing around her head or back of neck then the male has done this. Female parrots that pluck feathers around breeding season are common but just make sure that its not due to lice.

[jusdeb]

Thanks Danny , I had a Green Cheek that did the same thing with the feathers .Maybe an inspection of the nest might tell if thats what they are up to .

Mites and Lice are not high on the suspect list as all the birds have been sprayed a few times in the last couple of months .

I was thinking of also adding extra branches for her , maybe Im not putting enough in the aviary for them .

[djb78]

The extra branches with leaves won't hurt at all, could also try feathers like I did might be more of a success than for me.

[Myzomela]

I agree with Buzz and Danny.

Definitely go with more forage for them. Many lorikeet hens bite off leaves from some of the more aromatically leafed natives and rub it through their plumage. many also chew the bark from branches. As well as flowering natives ( branches, leaves and flowers) it may be worth trying tea-tree, paperbarks etc. Also provide some chunky pieces in the nest for the hen to chew out.

Some hens just pluck at breeding time, but it's worth trying to keep her occupied chewing other things.

[jusdeb]

Agreed , the Cypress Pines are great for the Parrots , they spend hours chewing them whereas the Lorries aren't too fussed sooooo today I'm going on a T tree and bottlebrush / grevillea search around town .
Wish me luck .