Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have two peach faced lovebirds. They were housed together when I bought them and are still sharing a fairly large cage. Recently, one bird has started plucking feathers from the other bird which seems to hurt -- at least the sound the birds makes makes me think it has been hurt. I've had these birds since the middle of March 2007. They are probably under 1 year old. Any ideas why this behavior may have started and what I can do to put an end to it?

We have had this happen with peach faced lovebirds before. Usually it is the female plucking the male. We have found no way to "cure" this except for separating them. You could try adding in some new preening toys and see if this helps at all, could be that each one is different. Our female would much rather pluck the male then the toys no matter how many different choices she had.

well, it sounds to me like the is a case of over preening. I would separate the two for a little while just so the over preening doesn't continue, that was you don't have any bauld birds!