Zoe's 5 months old, and in the past couple of weeks she's started this weird new behavior. It's almost like a silent beak grinding. She does it off and on all day. We've had a pretty drastic change in weather, and I know she's been molting a little bit. She's eating, pooping, talking, and playing like normal. But this new thing is weird and we just wondered if anyone else's quaker did this. Is it a form of sleepy beak, or just some new quirky quaker behavior? Here's a video.
http://s552.photobucket.com/albums/jj323/P...nt=MOV01682.flv (sorry the budgies are chirping in the background)

im not sure what he is doing. but i am not quaker wise like others on thizs forum. ps do you have a parrotlet? I have one named Rue and a budgie named Phoenix, and a quaker named Chandler.

Usually it's something they do when they are sleepy or just contented and relaxed.

Jade was doing that just last night. She was sitting on the back of the couch between me and Hubby, just grinding away for all she's worth, and Hubby said to me, "Is she choking or something? I think something's wrong with her." And I looked up at her and saw she was puffed up (happy puffs, not sick ones) and bobbing her little head and grinding away, and when she saw me look at her, she made the sound that does NOT translate to print, but that I think of as "happy parrot" -- you know, I'm sure. The sort of half-purr, half-growl, part chirp. So I told him, "She's not choking, she's beak grinding. She's happy." And she bobbed wildly and said "wheeee-heeee!" Hubby recognizes that one, so all was well.

I know that "beak grinding" is a happy noise and she does that when we cover her up at night. She'll do it for 15 minutes or so and then go to sleep, but this doesn't really make any noise. She just kind of moves her tongue around and opens and closes her beak, and like I said she does it off and on throughout the day. When we first saw her do it, we almost thought she had something stuck in her throat because of the way her tongue moved.

Its still nothing to worry about, they are just like kids and try new things all the time...she's found she can wiggle her tongue etc. Plus she could be cleaning the inside of her beak as well...Birds have little grooves in their upper mandible (beak) and that's what helps them hold on and grind their food; those little ridges get full of food so they are doing the beak grinding and the tongue wiggling to help clean those grooves out.

Sometimes birds will sit and open their beak and stick their tongues out as far as they can and they just do it over and over, I know I've had several birds that will do that when they get excited or nervous. I had a cockatoo that would stick hers out so far that you could see half way down her throat.

Thanks! After Wallace passed away, we're just extra nervous and jumpy about every little thing. We jumped the gun and run to the vet several times now, only for it to turn out to be something silly! It's just nerve-wracking sometimes! Thanks again for the quick responses and reassurance.

Olliver does it also. It's his way of mummbleing. my big parrot did it also.

My wife had the same sort of concerns. She asked if Chula was choking on something. I remembered this behavior from my previous birds and smoothed her fears. It can be a bit of a shock seeing the behavior for the first time if you are not aware, so good for you for asking. Sounds like Zoe has good, concerned parronts.

Thank you! We just were not sure of what she was doing. She has been full of lots of weird noises lately. Must be the changing weather .