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meg832
Fledgeling
Joined: 16 Jun 2006
Posts: 365
Location: Ohio |
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quote:
There is no such thing as a "clumsy" molt. Yet another unscientific and baseless expression made up by breeders.
Nope, I made it up to save time, since this thread was supposed to be about fullfilling lives for captive birds. My experts, who have probably 60 years of experience (and quite a bit of education) between them, assure me that some parrotlets who never had the opportunity to see their own species go through a molt may do exactly what mine did, simply because they have no role model to follow-- no one to teach them how to handle it. I did some research, too, and learned that this can happen to other kinds of parrots as well. Even observing parrots of a different species (or pluckers!) when they are babies can teach them the wrong way to groom themselves during a molt.
quote:
Your parrotlet might have had an allergic reaction, or temporary stress, and might very well never pluck again...Regardless, what happened to your parrotlet was not a molt.
She is still molting, but is handling it more gracefully already.[/quote] |
Tuesday June 12, 2007 12:30 am |
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shirin
Moderator
Joined: 27 Apr 2005
Posts: 7405
Location: Canada, Toronto |
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quote:
Originally posted by meg832
quote:
There is no such thing as a "clumsy" molt. Yet another unscientific and baseless expression made up by breeders.
Nope, I made it up to save time, since this thread was supposed to be about fullfilling lives for captive birds. My experts, who have probably 60 years of experience (and quite a bit of education) between them, assure me that some parrotlets who never had the opportunity to see their own species go through a molt may do exactly what mine did, simply because they have no role model to follow-- no one to teach them how to handle it. I did some research, too, and learned that this can happen to other kinds of parrots as well. Even observing parrots of a different species (or pluckers!) when they are babies can teach them the wrong way to groom themselves during a molt.
What you are describing, and probably what you found in your research is that birds who have been hand-raised, and have not been taught by their parents how to properly groom themselves may "over preen", or "over groom". It's just a nice way of saying they may pluck. So it's not really a molt. The feathers aren't naturally falling out in that fashion. The molting of feathers is a natural process that doesn't have to be taught to the birds, since it's involuntary. It's not like the bird has to pull out the feathers, they just fall out on their own. What you have described, and confirmed with your own research is that your parrotlet plucked her feathers, you just don't like to call it that. The molt, and the hormonal changes associated with it may have triggered the plucking, but ultimately she plucked. |
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Tuesday June 12, 2007 12:54 am |
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meg832
Fledgeling
Joined: 16 Jun 2006
Posts: 365
Location: Ohio |
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quote:
....It's just a nice way of saying they may pluck. So it's not really a molt. The feathers aren't naturally falling out in that fashion. ...
My bird is at the proper age for her first adult molt. She is loaded with pinfeathers everywhere, not just on her belly. She is growing in wing and tail feathers (which I have observed falling out by themselves when she is exercising) although she never pulled any of them. All the feathers that have been lost are old ones. The feathers on her head, which she obviously can't pluck, fall out by themselves during scritches and are being replaced with new feathers. All feather loss and replacement has been symmetrical. All the people who have actually seen my bird agree that she is molting, and they have dealt with literally thousands of parrots and parrotlets.
We disagree on semantics. Because she plucked for one day at the beginning of the biggest molt of her life, and has not pulled even one feather since then, letting the feathers fall out naturally instead, I do not think my bird is an example of the frustrated plucker that Shirin described:
quote:
... things like the need to mate, the need to procreate and raise their young, the need to forage, and build nests, and the need to be social animals are things that they are born with, instincts that are encoded in their DNA. And because these instincts are either suppressed by us, or not fulfilled because it's impossible to in a home environment, then the birds get frustrated and their frustration comes out in the form of depression, plucking, or aggression, or some other type of damaging behaviour.
When Fluffy Sue commented:
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I also think that they, as they're so intelligent, have so much spare time (they don't have to forage, something you also mentioned) and because of that they might have time to think of other things, develop other kinds of behavior.
and
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I doubt if some animals act from their instinct, because they stay with their parents for such a long time even when they can eat themselves. I think they have to learn things?? Before they can survive?
I thought she touched on the theme of this thread.
Birds (yes, even parrotlets) are intelligent. With mental stimulation, they can develop kinds of behavior other than those dictated by instinct. We are their surrogate parents, teaching them how to survive in our world. Rather than trying to duplicate life in the wild, we have the choice to give our birds experiences which offer them a life better in some ways than life in the wild could ever be. If you read the first post of this thread, perhaps you will get the impression I had when I observed my bird’s behavior. It occurred to me that the bird, by giving of herself, was getting something out of the interaction—something far richer than she could ever get as a wild bird. That is why I started this thread. |
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Friday June 15, 2007 8:30 pm |
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shirin
Moderator
Joined: 27 Apr 2005
Posts: 7405
Location: Canada, Toronto |
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quote:
Originally posted by meg832
My bird is at the proper age for her first adult molt. She is loaded with pinfeathers everywhere, not just on her belly. She is growing in wing and tail feathers (which I have observed falling out by themselves when she is exercising) although she never pulled any of them. All the feathers that have been lost are old ones. The feathers on her head, which she obviously can't pluck, fall out by themselves during scritches and are being replaced with new feathers. All feather loss and replacement has been symmetrical. All the people who have actually seen my bird agree that she is molting, and they have dealt with literally thousands of parrots and parrotlets.
We disagree on semantics. Because she plucked for one day at the beginning of the biggest molt of her life, and has not pulled even one feather since then, letting the feathers fall out naturally instead, I do not think my bird is an example of the frustrated plucker that Shirin described:.
In my last post I admitted that your bird's plucking (even that one time) was triggered by the molt, which means that I agree that she's not a frustrated plucker. Your own previous post stated that birds that haven't been taught properly how to groom by their parents can groom the wrong way, meaning "overgroom", or in other words chew or pluck their feathers. And this is true, and could very well have been the case for your parrotlet. I'm not denying that. But she still plucked!
Now you're saying that she is molting naturally and feathers are falling out on their own and symmetrically, and I don't doubt it. I understand she is going through a molt right now. All I'm saying is that one time that you made a thread, in which you, yourself, said
"she started pulling out feathers, and Tuesday she had no colored feathers left on her entire chest and belly-- just gray down"
that was plucking. That's all I'm saying! It's great that it was a one time thing, and it's great that she's no longer doing it! But that incident definitely was not a molt, and to say that it was a molt is misleading to people who aren't familiar with what a molt is supposed to look like, and what plucking is supposed to look like. A bird would never molt in such a manner that all the feathers on the belly and chest are suddenly gone in a matter of a day or two, and the bird is left with only down. So again, just to make myself clear, I am not talking about the molt she is going through right now, or the feathers that are falling out naturally. I'm talking about the feathers that
you
said she pulled out. And again, I agree with you that she is not an example of a frustrated plucker.. even though I never really said she was, I just put out the question as to why she plucked.
quote:
Originally posted by meg832
Birds (yes, even parrotlets) are intelligent. With mental stimulation, they can develop kinds of behavior other than those dictated by instinct. We are their surrogate parents, teaching them how to survive in our world. Rather than trying to duplicate life in the wild, we have the choice to give our birds experiences which offer them a life better in some ways than life in the wild could ever be. If you read the first post of this thread, perhaps you will get the impression I had when I observed my bird’s behavior. It occurred to me that the bird, by giving of herself, was getting something out of the interaction—something far richer than she could ever get as a wild bird. That is why I started this thread.
I highly doubt that a life in captivity could ever be richer, or even come close to being as rich as life in the wild. Evidence tells us otherwise. Do you think you could have a richer life being in prison as oppsed to being free? I doubt it. |
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Friday June 15, 2007 9:41 pm |
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shirin
Moderator
Joined: 27 Apr 2005
Posts: 7405
Location: Canada, Toronto |
Oh, and just as a side note, the fact that any bird would pluck their feathers as a way of coping with their first big molt, is yet another drawback of life in captivity. Pulling out feathers is a self-destructive behaviour, and it doesn't happen in the wild. So it's just another example of how bird's are worse off in captivity than in the wild. |
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Friday June 15, 2007 9:48 pm |
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