Strange bedfellows

We are bird people, as in no cats, dogs, children or horse type things, we have birds. Lots of them and lots of different types including three species of quail, six species of pheasants, three parrots, a pair of Black Orpingtons and a Von der Decken hornbill.  They all have their own environments and specialised diets, Quite a few of our birds are also rescues who need careful care and consideration, not only about their physical needs, but also their emotional needs and who they can share an aviary with. We have built up a good balance and as a result, have very few fights although quite a few of them would murder the other were they in the wild.
An incident that occured earlier today made me realise exactly how much like people birds are (or visa-versa)

A rain quail

Among the flocks, we have a male Rain Quail named Bumblebee, who is ridiculously oversexed. And no I am not joking (the vet thought it was pretty funny too!). He doesn't care what species the other bird is, let alone gender, if he can get on top, that is all that matters! This is such a problem that we have not only moved him out of the outside aviaries, but are going to give him a course of estrogen injections as it is practically the only option we have now. (castration is very expensive and very dangerous with birds)

So we first moved him in with Milo the Kakariki (a hyperactive little parrot from New Zealand) as personality wise the seemed a good match and Milo has a huge cage. Milo did not like that idea.
So we moved him in with Bob, the hornbill. Who is a girl, just for the record. We watched them carefully for a few days as we were worried that Bob would consider Bumblebee as a small feathered snack, but they settled down happily together pretty much immedietly. Bumblebee sits under Bob's food bowl to steal little bits of fruit that she drops and Bob hops down to plunder Bumblee's food if she thinks that he has something better.

Today we decided that because Bumblebee still calls for the other quails, and since we can keep an easy watch on them, we would move one of the other male rain quails in with him. We choose Rooster who is a very sweet, gentle little guy who gets bullied no-matter where he is. We put Rooster in the the cage and let the two quails acclimatise to each other and then moved away to see how Bob would react. She immedietly hopped down onto the ground and tocked poor Rooster on the head with that huge beak. I chased her back up to the top of the cage again and as soon as I was out of sight, she was back on the floor trying to have a go (read: eat) at Rooster. We quickly took him out of the cage and put him back in the outside aviary.
Bob and Bumblebee settled down immedietly like nothing had ever happened and are now happily living together again.

It was a rather surprising experiment that a preditor and prey species can live together and that birds are so fussy over who they will share their house with, and that some people like little Rooster will always get bullied no-matter what. Which is sad, but true.

A pair of Von Der Deckens