scarlet chested parakeet behavior Q:

[paul-inAZ]

I have a half dozen scarlet chested parakeets -two adults and 4 youngsters now in their first molt.
They are all somewhat skittish but they also have one peculiar trait. Whenever anyone approaches close to the cage they all turn their backs, facing away from whoever is approaching.
I'm wondering if my birds are peculiar or if this is a typical behavior for scarlets.

One thought is that this could be a concealment mechanism, turning their green backs towards any potential threat and hiding the brilliant red breast and yellow belly.

[MiaCarter]

This is actually a relatively common behavior among the larger, more intelligent parrot species.
Less common amongst the smaller parrots and 'keets.

I have no idea how it arose evolutionarily speaking. Seems counterintuitive to turn your back on a threat, right?
I suspect it may be a behavior that has emerged amongst captive birds. So a behavior reserved for humans.

The poorly socialized birds do this.
I've always assumed it was a child-like mentality of "if I don't acknowledge and see you, you don't exist to me."

I see this most often in the birds who've been ignored and neglected or just never socialized, leaving them frightened of humans.
These birds just don't know how to interact with a human and they're too frightened to try, so they just turn their back and ignore you.
These guys are the most challenging to tame. But you can do it. It just takes persistence. They will, eventually, turn around to face you and once they do, they can become accustomed to your presence. Once that happens, you can start working to tame them, just as you'd work with any other bird for taming.

[cindy]

I breed and raised scarlet chested off and on for years....the young are slightly skittish upon fledging and should be provided a large enough flight to move about it. Upon approaching the flights the fledged young will scatter, go to the farthest corners or go back to the box.

As they mature they will calm down run away from you less. They will get use to your feeding schedule, your placement of where the foods and treats go and will often wait in that spot if the sense you are bringing their food. Some once skittish males even the hens will be on the plate of soft food before I set it down. Just be patient, soft spoken and do not move quickly, they will get use to you. They will run the bottom of your flights, I insert trays overtop of the grates, using butcher paper as liners so that the feet and legs do not get caught up in the grates as they are running.

Mine are all socialized with and raised within our home, even if not hand raised they are very use to me being in the flights....I have 4 pairs, each pair has a 5ft long flight, young are left with the parents for about 2 to 3 weeks after weaning or removed after weaning if the adult male starts to chase them, they know which offspring are sons and want them gone from their territory.

You can not house mature males together, so be prepared to remove your youngsters soon. A mature dominant male housed with other males can harm or kill off other males.

Scarlet Chested are very different from bourkes, bourkes interact a bit more, more calm. Scarlets tend to be a bit shy and timid at first but give the young time, as they mature they will be more inquisitive and calmer.

[cindy]

some of mine

[MiaCarter]

cindy - Very lovely!

[cindy]

Paul, what mutations are you working with? I have normals, cinnamons and one male is split to blue.

We do not see many normals though the demand is coming back for them and people are asking for them... some of the color mutations are stunning though I know many working with them.

How do you have yours set up....cages, long flight, aviary?

[paul-inAZ]

Cindy:
A long delayed response d/t a year lost to surgery and chemo. Still surfacing.
I started with one normal and one cinnamon that was perfectly fine for close to a year and then just dropped dead. Could it be the mutations are fragile?? Replaced her with a normal hen and they raised 4 normals.
I now have 5 normal scarlets, 3M and 2F.
They are indoors in a largish cage about 5 feet long. I haven't thought about breeding as long as I was sick.

[cindy]

I am sorry to hear about your illness and do hope you are feeling better.

I do find and others as well that the mutations in scarlets are more delicate, especially when you get into the blues, lutinos. Hens tend to be less hard in mutations than males, probably because the demands of breeding. I find the normals are more hardy than cinnamons.

I do keep mine indoors, some here in Florida keep them outside in buildings partially screened.

I have lost in the past two cinnamon hens in their second year of breeding, one to prolapse due to an egg that was to large to pass, as she tried to push the egg out, due to the size of the egg it took the uterine lining with it, and the egg and the lining acted like a glove and stayed over the egg outside the body. Only a ti of the bottom of the egg was showing. We drained the egg by gently piecing the egg bottom, this caused the egg to collapse within itself and drop out of the lining to the sink. It would have been the third egg in the clutch. The prolapse was difficult, we tried to push it back in after a few days of supportive care and the swelling going down, it was not repairable and guaranteed with surgery. Even with surgery the prolapse can reoccur and would have possibly required a few more procedures during her life time (she would have likely passed while under due to how sensitive they are)... we had to let her go humanely with the help of our avian vet and daughter.

The other hen - the egg broke within her, despite efforts to save her she passed. The scarlets can be very prone to egg binding. As explained by my vet... even with supplements and good care it can still happen.

[paul-inAZ]

the original pair I bought were outdoor raised in Phoenix so Scarlets can obviously withstand extreme summer heat of the desert and our occasional night time freezes in winter. We can get to 115 to 120F in mid summer but as everybody jokes, its a dry heat. Ha. Still hot in mid day. Mine are pampered by living inside, with A/C.
The Scarlet and Bourke trait of feeding and being most active at dawn and evening must be a hold over from their hot climate adaptation in the Aussie wild.

Small hookbills are tough. There are large flocks of feral budgies/"parakeets" and peach faced lovebirds that thrive and breed in parts of the valley.

[cindy]

mine are more active during the morning, early late evening, sleep during the afternoon.

I lived in Tempe on summer, it is very warm... scarlets do not do well in very damp chill wet days.... dry heat may be more to their liking.

Living in Florida we have feral flocks of conures, quakers, macaws, small tropical hookbills.

[finchandlovebird]

so much to learn about Scarlets and hearing Paul & Cindy talk helps me a lot

[Teagarden]

Ditto what Dolly said. I enjoy learning about experiences other members have had with different species.
Mary

[Jen]

Agree with everyone's comments. Very informative thread. Thank you.