FEMALE eclectus will not stop regurgitating

c3honey84 · Feb 7, 2017

Add this to the list of hormonal things that Roxy does (egg laying, feather plucking). For almost a year Roxy has been regurgitating and RE-EATING her favorite foods. She does not regurgitate on top of anything. Just sits there and plays with it in her mouth. It looks gross and it sounds gross. Has anyone seen this before in females? I know that males are known for regurgitating on their owners, but have not heard of this. I did know of an animal at an aquarium that used to regurgitate its food because it was positively reinforced when it saw more food, and would re-eat it. Any ideas on how to get her to stop? She does it most often with things she loves (sweet potato, pistacios, etc).

Yes, she has been to the vet and they found her to be normal. Crop and fecal gram stains, bloodwork, etc were all fine. They gave me antibiotics for a week just in case.

katie_fleming · Feb 8, 2017

Jasper regurgitates ALL the time for his toys, never for me. Doesn't bother me any, I just clean off his toys and he repeats the process lol.

GaleriaGila · Feb 8, 2017

Maybe this might help?
Ever since the Rickeybird hit sexual maturity at about 3-4 years of age, I've had to manage his hormones! If kept on too steady a long day, and too much light, he stayed "in the mood" (REGURGITATING like crazy, being aggressive, even louder than usual, pleasuring himself on my neck ) year round. If I keep him on a natural light schedule... up with dawn, down with dusk, year around... THEN he's only a little monster rooster from July to September). He has his own room, so I can do that easily.

Teddscau · Feb 9, 2017

Well, as Rickeybird's mom said, regulating the number of hours of darkness she gets is one of the best ways to discourage hormonal behaviour. She should be getting fourteen hours of darkness every day to discourage this hormonal behaviour. Although I will say it's unusual for a female to regurgitate.

c3honey84 · Feb 12, 2017

Thank you all for your responses. She does get at least 12 hours with the cover on her cage. I am just not sure this is hormonal, since she is not regurgitating ON anything. Not on me or her toys. She just sits there and brings the food up in her mouth and plays with it in her beak for up to an hour at a time! I swear someone needs to write a book on this bird...

Anansi · Feb 13, 2017

I've never heard of anything like that. An hour at a time just chewing?!? Wow. Does she tend to do it more around anything or anyone? It could be that the instinct is taking her only partway through the behavior. For instance, it could be that seeing you triggers the response in her (only for a bird would that not be insulting!), but she doesn't, for whatever reason, follow through and actually present it. Kind of like a precursor to the full out behavior?

How old is she?

c3honey84 · Mar 4, 2017

She will be 9 in May. She regurgitates when I am around but also when I am not home, and my husband is there. She is a typical hormonal female eclectus. She has laid eggs in the past (the last one was about a year ago) and about a year and a half ago, out of nowhere she started to pluck her feathers out a little on her chest, back, and under her wings. She has a huge cage, plenty of toys, and I let her out every day for hours on her tree stand. I also only feed her fresh food, no pellets. It is possible that it is a precursor...here I have a video of it.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QV61dDBHEMc"]Eclectus regurgitating - YouTube[/ame]

Sunnyclover · Mar 4, 2017

That doesn't look like normal regurgitating movements to me. My birdy looks like she is having some sort of crazy fit when she regurgitates. Hmmm.....

FEMALE eclectus will not stop regurgitating

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Meeting other pets....

Didn't I teach you manners?

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