Night Frights

[spiritbird]

My little guy Chipper has had 3 episodes of night frights. They seem to happen about one or two hours after bedding them down. It is a terrible sound because when one is in a fright the other one is also. I place a cover partially on the top of cage and night lights just behind the cage. Last night I watched him and Gypsy flapping in their separate cages. Chipper kept on going for a while. I waited until he stopped and he was very still on the bottom of the cage. Then I picked him up (normally never lets me do this) and cuddled him with reassurance and he calmed down.
Night frights often have such a subtle reason. My cat was lying on the bed not even near the birds.
I see no signs of mice around. I am going to take out their ladders each night now just in case.

Anyone else having Parakeets with night frights????

[Debra]

I haven't had any of my budgies/keets have them, but I have had cockatiels that have had them. My tiels and keets are cage free in their own room so when one gets a night fright, they all start flying around. It sounds scary having 10 birds flying all in a panic in the dark. Hard to calm them all down too. Luckily, they don't happen very often. We keep a night light on for them too.

[Turquoise]

None of my budgies ever have night frights. None of any of my birds do., My budgies are all in one big flight cage, I never cover it & it sits between the area we have our computers & t.v. and the kitchen sink island. When we are home at night there is some sort of light on almost all night since we stay up nights. Then the kitchen light will come on all hours of the night. The silly things will get up, eat, sing & act as if it were day until the big light goes out. Then they are back to being quiet & snoozing.

My GCC is the same way since her cage is located to the side of the sink island. I never cover her cage & she gets up when the lights come on & goes to bed again when they are off. No problems with this set up so far. The big kids are only 20 ft away in the same large room, but I do cover them. If I don't they will make noise periodically throughout the night. I don't worry about the up & down routine my birds go through the 4 nights we are home, the 4 we are at work gives them plenty of quiet time to sleep & all are very used to the chaos on home nights.

[spiritbird]

No frights last night. I must put a partial cover on their cages as the AC is also running in the living room where the cages are. The cool air is directed away from them but I can still feel it moving.

[tiffnmango]

My first budgie Chipper (what a coincidence) had what I thought were night frights, but they actually turned out to be critters living in the walls of my apartment. It wasn't a very good place lol

After we moved into another place they continued but they would only happen on nights where I felt weird things as well. I know this sounds crazy...but is there any chance your house maybe haunted? Chipper was very sensitive to this and like I said when he would react I would feel weird things as well. I promise I'm not crazy, but it's not abnormal for birds and other animals to be more sensitive to that kind of stuff.

[spiritbird]

Thanks for your response Tiffany and I do not think your are crazy for this suggestion. I used to live in a house in Wisconsin with similar activity as I truly think it had evil spirits. Our birds are so sensitive to their environment I would not rule out anything. I live in a small apt. that was constructed in 1954. It could also be noises I cannot detect. This estate began in the 40's, started by Quakers and has a long history. Thanks again for this suggestion as I never thought of it.

[Blancaej]

Hope the night frights have gotten better. When researching birds for my daughter, I read that night frights are common in tiels. Perhaps budgies, too. A night light was the most common suggestion for helping with that.

[spiritbird]

They have night lights on behind cage. I took my plants out of the window so I can close the blinds completely and just partially cover the cages. As a precaution I remove the toy ladders for safety. X fingers no more have happened. Thanks Blanca