I Recently Got A Diamond Dove And I Wanted To Ask Stuff Beyond What I Could Find Researching Online:

I recently got a diamond dove and I wanted to ask stuff beyond what I could find researching online: what will the first few weeks be like? Is there any effects a too small cage can have on the dove? (Bought the biggest I could with upgrades planned) when can I expect cooing if at all? Mine gain some weight/ looks fatter. Should I be worried/vet visit for that? And I haven't found much info on it- are there ways to hand train them? Or are they 100% against being touched and scritches? Thank you!

Diamonds are in the parrot boat of still being wild animals.

Their shorter maturation period has put them further along the path to domestication, but expecting unsocialized adults to accept being cuddled is asking too much of most of them.

Expect that it will be VERY quiet the first few weeks. Moving is harder on Diamonds than domesticated doves and it takes them a while to settle.

Once yours does, hand taming will be a VERY slow process. Diamonds are spooky and tiny and prone to panic, so don’t start until your interaction with its dishes or floor stops visibly scaring it.

When it’s at the point of ignoring your hands during feeding and maintainence, you can begin to very slowly reach for it from below.

This will take careful observation on your part, as you’ll need to withdraw again well before the Diamond EXPLODES into flight! At the first shift of its body away from your aproach, stop and withdraw.

It needs to learn that it can trust you to pick up on its discomfort and leave it be when it needs you to.

Eventually, it will lower its guard and let you get closer bit by tiny bit. When it does, try to touch its feet before anything else and coax it gently to step up and sit on your finger.

Diamonds being still basically wild means that they haven’t been adapted to confinement the way Pigeons and Ringnecks have. They need space to legitimately fly so that they don’t atrophy. And being too confined will make a neurotic mess of a Diamond!

Telling a fat diamond from a contentedly fluffy one is tricky without a gram scale.Average weight for an adult is about 32grams, which is less than a one week old Ringneck.

If the Diamond is poofballed, it may be ill or cold.

Diamonds can and do stress to death at the drop of a hat, so fiddle with the temperature and up its feed a little before you take it to the vet.

When traveling with a Diamond that hasn’t been trained for it, use either a dark box or a cloth carrier wrapped in a towel.Being in the dark is like an off button for birds. They automatically go to sleep, which negates a lot of the stress of travel.