Finding a Mate for a Lonely Pet Lovebird
Flock Birds Need the Right Kind of Companionship and Environment
Healthy and happy lovebirds are highly energetic, often noisy and love exploring and playing.
Unlike the solitary canary, lovebirds prefer to live in flocks and are much more sociable. When part of a couple, lovebirds pay closest attention to their mate but also bond with their owner and family.
Lovebirds feed off of attention, and maintain eye contact with their owners even as the lively birds bounce around in their cages.
When lonely pet lovebirds get bored, they often engage in self-destructive behaviour like over-preening and plucking out their own feathers. Any lovebird that scratches itself while tearing out its own feathers risks infection.
Signs of Lovebird Loneliness
In the wild, male lovebirds hunt for food then return to their nests at night. The male will tweet out a lovebird call, waiting for the female or youngster lovebirds to reply with what is known as a flock call that directs the male back to the nest. Many lovebird owners train their pet to respond to whistling commands. Lovebirds have very sharp hearing; one lovebird owner reports that he can hear flock calls from his lovebirds as soon as he turns the door knob to enter his condo.
A lonely lovebird will not issue or respond to flock calls at all. Instead, the small parrot shuns attention, moves slowly and often stays on the same perch for an inordinate amount of time. The pet will avoid eye contact, often closing its eyes rather than responding to its owner.
This is particularly true of a lovebird if it loses its mate.
Dealing with a Grieving Lovebird
When a lovebird is grieving a lost mate, the pet owner must take extra time to talk in a soothing voice to the lonely bird. Lovebirds need at least an hour a day outside of the cage in a supervised environment, free of hazards like an open pan of boiling water or any cats. Even if the cat is lovebird-friendly, cat saliva can be deadly to lovebirds.
Handfeeding the lovebird millet sprays (a lovebird’s favorite food) also helps engage the disheartened pet. Walking around indoors with the pet lovebird on one’s shoulder also helps shift the lovebird’s focus onto its relationship with the owner.
While it’s a myth that pet lovebirds must live together as couples, many pet owners don’t have time to dedicate to their solitary pet bird. So, they buy a companion lovebird.
Finding a Pet Lovebird of the Right Gender
Even when the owner knows the sex of its pet lovebird, often pet shops do not know the gender of the baby lovebirds they sell. To be absolutely sure, blood samples and genetic tests are required. Some pet owners use avian sexing kits to determine lovebird gender.
But there are some tell-tale signs that a conscientious pet store employee will notice. First, female lovebirds are usually larger and stronger than the male, as anyone who has ever been bitten by both can attest to. Females also keep their feet slightly wider apart when they roost on their perches than males do. Although certainly not true in every case, male lovebirds have prettier colors because in the wild the male distracts predators from the nest.
Female lovebirds are able to tear off strips of paper or of wood and tuck those bits into feathers in its back for carrying back to the nest. Try as they may, males are neither flexible nor skilled enough to push those strips into their backs.
The female does have a voice slightly higher in tone than that of the male, although this is hard for a non-experienced pet lovebird owner to distinguish.
Introducing a New Partner Lovebird
Separate cages are a must for at least the first two weeks. The reason? The stronger female lovebird will kill a new male lovebird if it senses any competition for the attention of the pet owner with whom the lonely female has already bonded.
After two weeks which will include some play time outside of the cage together, the two lovebirds can be introduced into the same cage during daylight hours only for another week.
Once the two pets have bonded, then they become partners for life.
Keeping the New Lovebird Couple Happy
Two lovebirds do adapt to each other’s personalities. Still, the pet owner must establish a predictable routine for the pet birds to follow. This demands changing the water every day, cleaning the cage regularly and providing a stimulating diet of different seeds, treats and fresh vegetables like spinach.
Playtime for flying outside the cage for at least an hour per day is recommended. The lovebirds need Vitamin E, so the cage should be open to sunshine. Finally, lovebirds need at least 10 hours of sleep, so covering the cage at night to encourage early sleep times is also important.
