Just Checking - what's he doing?

GaleriaGila said:

Sounds like good stuff to me, as far as the play and independence. That hide 'n'seek stuff is nesting behavior. Hormones may not be heavy yet... it may be practice. GCCs hit maturity at 1-2 years, most will say. So be ready to address more aggressive or intrusive behavior if it occurs. I would personally suggest avoiding the hiding, even though it is as cute as it can be, isn't it? The Rb loses his MIND over hidey-places.

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EllenD said:

My Bowie (DNA male) just turned 2 years old, and a couple of months ago he started wanting under the covers of my bed, under my shirt, under everything...Yeah, it was cute...Word of warning, lol...

Last month I couldn't find Bowie (he's fully-flighted), he just disappeared, and he wasn't returning my calls to him. Scared me to death, and he suddenly appeared. Okay, whatever...yeah. Then he disappeared again, same thing, couldn't find him, and he wasn't returning my calls. And this time I couldn't find him. I was totally freaking-out, looking everywhere in the house, and I finally said to myself "He's either dead somewhere, or he got outside somehow". I was actually in tears looking for him with a flashlight. I got Lita, my Quaker parrot who is pretty bonded to Bowie, and put her on their T-Stand in my dining room and kept asking her "Where's Bowie Lita, where's Bowie?", and I swear I'm not making this up, she flew to the top of the couch and started doing the "Quaker March" back and forth on top of the couch. So I looked behind the couch, nothing...then I shined the flashlight under the couch, and there was Bowie...He was fluffier than I've ever seen him, I mean he was so fluffed-up he looked like a Puffin', and he must have been collecting stuff and piling it up under the couch, as he had made a little "nesting" area for himself...and he was continuously talking to himself in this half-English, half-Birdie speak, while looking right at me. And even though he was looking right at me as I was shining the flashlight in his face and saying "Bowie, come out of there. Come on Bowie, come. Bowie, come on out, time to come out Bowie", etc., he just totally ignored me and kept talking to himself. He was NOT coming out. It was freaking me out...So I got a yard-stick and used it to sweep him forward...And as he was almost out from under the couch and I'm still shining the flashlight at him and telling him to come out, he suddenly CHARGED AT ME, and bit me so hard that he attached himself to my hand. When I pulled my hand out from under the couch, Bowie was hanging off of it. It hurt so badly that I had to consciously tell myself to not swat him off or grab him...So I used my left hand to pry his beak off of my hand, and the little jerk ran back under the damn couch...So after I cleaned my hand up and put a bandaid on it, I went back to the couch, looked under it again with the flashlight, and there he was again, mumbling to himself, occasionally I'd here a "Baby Cheeky Cheeky Bird" or "Gimme Kisses Baby", but he was not listening to anything that I was saying, it was like i wasn't even there...Before I could even think of another way to get him out, he suddenly came charging out from under the couch on his own, this time attaching himself to the skin on the top of my bare foot...

Now I love Bowie very, very much, he's my little baby Boy and he and I are probably bonded more closely than I am with any of my other birds (Kane is close, though this hasn't happened with him yet, he's younger than Bowie and recently he just wants to mate with my hand, I can handle that..and he's a Senegal with a MUCH BIGGER BEAK, so we'll see how things go, lol)...However, at that moment, the pain searing through my foot was enough for me to not care about Bowie's feelings at that point in time...I reached down and just grabbed the little jerk this time, and immediately and suddenly he just "snapped out of it", like he was himself again, and he knew he was in trouble too...He went in his cage while I cleaned and bandaged my foot...We had a long evening that night...

Sooooo...since that happened I have "Hormone-Proofed" my house, there's nothing that Mr. Bowie can get underneath anymore, and honestly I think that was actually "puberty" for Bowie, as it had never happened before, he was the right age, and since then his hormones have calmed down significantly...He has his moments, usually when he manages to sneak under the comforter on my bed, but since then he now seems to come to me when I tell him to come out from under the covers.

So just a Red-Flag kind of warning to you, if your little guy is 15 months old now, it's sounds just about right for puberty, and his behavior right now matches how Bowie was acting pre-couch incident...I cannot imagine having what happened to my hand or my foot happen to body-parts under my shirt...so...HEED MY WARNING...

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