Lisa Shea Forums Parakeets Non-Budgie Pets and Animals 3 keets 1 tiel?

I've always wanted a tiel! but when i saw how much they cost in the pet store (petsmart) i just decided to get keets!! Lately i've seen tiels that are 70!! so now i'm back to wanting one...... but i currenly have 3 keets! (( i love them all) and i'm wondering if they would get alone or be ok in the same room together... and when i take them out to play would it be ok for them to play together? i've haven't asked yet i'm still thinking about it..... i'm willing to take care of all 4 birds! all i need is to buy a cage for a new tiel.. food, toys, etc. ((i'm saving already)) so i was wonder if i should get one or not? and would it be safe around my keets?

bump

Well we have 13 keets and 1 tiel. Nacho our Tiel has his own cage and really does not want anything to do with the keets. They don't bother with him either. Sometimes they seem curious but if they get to close they bite at each other so I do not push them at each other at all. There is really no reason why you should not get a tiel if you want one. Some tiels will play good with keets and some don't. Nacho wants to be by one of us all the time anyway I guess we are his birds. Nacho is much more of a people birds than any of our keets.

aren't tiels much nicer than keets? and aren't most of them already trained?

It really depends on the personality of your bird. I wouldn't think that 'tiels could be classified as "nicer" than 'keets, beause it all depends on the bird. I would say though that parakeets are alot more jerky and busy bodies, while 'tiels seem to be a little more laid-back. As far as handtaming goes, I think it depends on the place where you get your bird if it is handtame or not. There could be handfed cockatiels at a pet store, but that haven't been handled in quite a long time. In that case, I would say it would take a longer time for them to become hand-tame. Then again there is also the pet store that could actually care about the birds and in that case the cockatiels may already be hand-tamed.

My parakeet and cockatiel are really great friends (but I can't let them out together because my parakeet, Skittles, gets overly friendly), and then there are those who aren't. Depends on your birds.

It definitely depends on the birds. I know that doesn't really help much, but you can't tell how they will act together until they are together. Some keet flocks might try to gang up on a tiel; some will try to bring it into their flock; some will mostly ignore it.

If you are able to give the keets and the tiel separate times out of their cages (and keep them away from each other's cages), in case it turns out they fight, then go ahead and get the tiel.

If you want a handtame tiel, definitely ask to interact with the bird before you commit to buying it. Skittles and Peaches is right, that you can't count on even a handfed tiel to be fully tame if it hasn't had a lot of additional human time spent with it. And $70 seems to me very inexpensive for a tame tiel, so I would not just assume it's tame if I were you.

I'm not saying it can't be tame; just that you should verify it.

I think it would be fine. before you do that though, you will ofcourse have to have them all trained. Then if you want to see how they react to each other, put their cages side-by-side, and see how they react. That would be my guess. I have three keets and am soon wanting to get a tiel also!