Pet Forum / Birds / Parrots / April 2004

Hello,

This is my first post. Background: first-time bird/tiel owner; have a
female pearl called Fiona ("Fi") who's just lovely and is about 1 year
old.

Have discovered there's a lot more to keeping a bird than I'd
imagined, but it's all good so far. And, actually, from reading many
of these posts and from what the vet told me when I took her in for a
basic check-up - Fi has got quite an exceptionally friendly
temperment.

I'm finding she's quite expressive and generally it's easy to guess
what she wants from her behaviour e.g. thrashing her bell about when
she wants my undivided attention, but one thing I've not a clue about.

Occasionally, she has these bouts where she appears to be silently
gagging. . . not choking, but as if she's trying to regurgitate.
Sometimes it's just once or twice in a row, and sometimes she keeps it
up for a minute or two. She's never actually brought up anything. The
only thing I've come across related to this, is that tiels may try to
regurgitate for their owners as an affectionate gesture. This doesn't
really fit with the timing though - sometimes she's in the cage when
she does it and not, say, on my shoulder. She does tend to stare at me
while it's happening though.  Any ideas?

Sorry for the ramble. . .

Cheers.
SG