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New Parrot Help

Discuss the methods and techniques of clicker training, target training and bonding. These are usually the first steps in training a young parrot.

New Parrot Help

Postby chickymeg » Mon Mar 23, 2015 8:48 am

Hey everyone!! I'm a new member of this forum and have ready many many things! So here is my story... We had an Red Lored Amazon for 25 years, she recently passed away. Two days ago we purchased a 6 month old Blue Fronted Amazon. We are unsure of what to do because we are so used to our other bird. She seems to be scared of everything , She wont sit on her perch at all, she will climb around the cage and sit and sleep on her food and water bowls. We can't get her out of the cage either because that's a fight and she screams like crazy. We cant touch her either because she gets frightened, I feel bad because I don't want to scare her but I just want to be friendly with her and get her to feel comfortable around us. How can we get her to not be afraid of us? and get her to not be afraid of her perch? Do you think having a lot of toys and things in the cage are scaring her also? Any help is appreciated , thank you so much.
chickymeg
Parakeet
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 7
Number of Birds Owned: 1
Types of Birds Owned: Blue Fronted Amazon
Flight: No

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby Wolf » Mon Mar 23, 2015 10:07 am

I would remove all but two or three toys for now, make sure that there is at least one perch that is high in the cage as near to the top as possible while still allowing your new bird to perch comfortably on it and make sure that it is clear of food and water dishes so you don't get poopy food and water.
Make sure that the cage is high enough that the bird will be close to eye level when perching and you are there to interact.
this takes care of most of the physical items except that the cage should be near both a window and a wall. If now all is available near a window cover one side of the cage. This will all help your bird to feel safer. Also place the cage where she can see what is going on and join in if she wants to.
This bird is young enough that it may need to be given soft food twice a day, please consider this.
Now for the interaction part of this. Your bird is scared as it is in a totally unfamiliar place which means to her that it maybe dangerous for her and she has no flock around to help protect and keep her safe. Then there is you, a giant that she doesn't know or trust that keeps invading the only space that she has to be in and chases her around the cage trying to get her. You know and I know that you mean her no harm, but she doesn't know this.
This calls for a different approach. you should stay out of her cage except to change food and water and for cleaning. Don't reach in the cage to touch her, she is too scared and has no reason to trust you yet. You should start off slowly and look at her from the corner of your eyes and not directly as that is how a predator looks at them. You want to notice where she is and what she is doing. You want to pay special attention to her body position and how she is holding her feathers, if you are close enough watch her eyes as well to see if they are flashing.
Now you are ready to begin approaching her cage, go slowly and kind of wander towards the cage instead of the direct route. Keep watching as you do this and at the first sign of nervousness stop and start talking to her in a soft voice. Approach only when she is relaxed, if she moves away or her feathers clamp tighter to her body she is not relaxed. If she is fanning her tail, she is not relaxed. This first time all you want to do is to talk to her. do this for 10 to 15 minutes two to four times daily. After the first attempt to go to her in this manner carry a couple of long treat items for her. You may or may not make it to the cage in the allotted time but don't exceed the time limit yet as more shorter sessions will be more productive at this point than fewer longer sessions. You should talk and sing to her the whole time during these sessions as you want her to get used to you and your voice. When you make it to the cage you can start offering treats to her. Just two or three during the whole session so space the treats out. She may not take a treat at first but that is ok. After a while, maybe even several sessions she will take a treat from you through the bars of the cage. You want to stay at this level until she begins to take the treat from you calmly. The next step is to open the door to the cage and sit in front of it and talk and sing to her and offer the treats to her at the entrance to the cage. When she starts taking the treats calmly from your fingers at the open cage door, you can choose to continue by moving the treat further back so that she needs to stretch to reach the treat or step onto your hand to get the treat. Or you can opt to start target training her at this point. here is Michaels training link for this: viewtopic.php?f=11&t=227
Once you get through this part using either way presented to you, I think that you will have built enough of a trusting foundation that you will know how to continue from your previous experience. However, I would like to suggest that you don't do any more training than this for the first month or two so as to allow your bonding process to build there will be plenty of time for training later on, at this point bonding is the most important thing.
Wolf
Macaw
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is male
Posts: 8679
Location: Lansing, NC
Number of Birds Owned: 6
Types of Birds Owned: Senegal
African Grey (CAG)
Yellow Naped Amazon
2Celestial Parrotlet
Budgie
Flight: Yes

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby chickymeg » Mon Mar 23, 2015 11:36 am

Thank you so much for taking the time out to write everything out! I will definitely be trying all of your ideas,I will remove the toys for now because they are really really big and probably scary to her...I know it will take some time and I will be trying my best to get her to love me!! :lol: :lol:



:amazon: :amazon: :amazon:
chickymeg
Parakeet
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 7
Number of Birds Owned: 1
Types of Birds Owned: Blue Fronted Amazon
Flight: No

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby chickymeg » Mon Mar 23, 2015 11:39 am

Wolf wrote: This bird is young enough that it may need to be given soft food twice a day, please consider this.



What exactly is soft food for birds? Right now we are giving her a parrot blend of seeds and such, and also the shop we got her from gave us purina pellets? they said they feed her those there and we should just mix them into the seeds for a while because she is used to them, but shes been eating all the seeds fine.
chickymeg
Parakeet
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 7
Number of Birds Owned: 1
Types of Birds Owned: Blue Fronted Amazon
Flight: No

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby Wolf » Mon Mar 23, 2015 4:18 pm

Actually, I am going to tell you what I feed my birds all of the time, and then hope that you will consider this diet for your bird. For breakfast I feed my birds a cooked mix of whole grains such as winter wheat, quinoa, steel cut oats, wild rice, barley, and sometimes rye to this I add an equal portion of mixed vegetables which is sweet corn, peas, carrots, broccoli, and green beans and then I mix in some cooked white beans and lentils about 1/4 the volume of the grains and vegetables together. We call this food gloop and it qualifies as a soft food. but you can feed this mix all the time as opposed to a weaning formula which is what is normally meant by soft food. I also give them a fresh fruit and vegetable and a leafy green, such as romaine or kale. Mostly I give them the romaine as kale is very high in iron and they can get too much of that. and then for their dinner I give them a seed mix which I remove after they go to sleep.
Wolf
Macaw
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is male
Posts: 8679
Location: Lansing, NC
Number of Birds Owned: 6
Types of Birds Owned: Senegal
African Grey (CAG)
Yellow Naped Amazon
2Celestial Parrotlet
Budgie
Flight: Yes

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby Pajarita » Tue Mar 24, 2015 11:37 am

Actually, my dear, if you free-feed (fill up the bowl in the morning and just leave it there all day) seeds, pellets, nutriberries, avicakes or any other source of high protein to an Amazon, it will die young from fatty liver disease. High protein is slow poison to an Amazon...
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18701
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby chickymeg » Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:02 am

Pajarita wrote:Actually, my dear, if you free-feed (fill up the bowl in the morning and just leave it there all day) seeds, pellets, nutriberries, avicakes or any other source of high protein to an Amazon, it will die young from fatty liver disease. High protein is slow poison to an Amazon...


Thanks I've been reading up alot about this, we had a red lored amazon for the past 25 years and she ate mostly seeds but we also gave her some fruits everyday... with this bird I am going to make sure I don't give her seeds only but lots of fruits and veggies as a main part of her diet. I realized now how overweight my red lored was from seeds.
chickymeg
Parakeet
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 7
Number of Birds Owned: 1
Types of Birds Owned: Blue Fronted Amazon
Flight: No

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby chickymeg » Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:10 am

We finally got her to sit on the perch by removing everything from the cage, she still sits close to the cage , i think maybe because she feels she will fall..

She is still scared to be touched, so I need some advice on that? Also she is very quiet and I know amazons are usually very loud..is it because she is so young? We talk to her alot and sing and whistle lol
chickymeg
Parakeet
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 7
Number of Birds Owned: 1
Types of Birds Owned: Blue Fronted Amazon
Flight: No

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby Wolf » Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:14 am

I would think that she is so quiet due to both age and fear, but mostly because she is afraid. I can't say about the touching as she is afraid at this point. once she is less fearful you may figure it out, but a lot of Amazons are just not all into being touched and some are total cuddlebugs.
Wolf
Macaw
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is male
Posts: 8679
Location: Lansing, NC
Number of Birds Owned: 6
Types of Birds Owned: Senegal
African Grey (CAG)
Yellow Naped Amazon
2Celestial Parrotlet
Budgie
Flight: Yes

Re: New Parrot Help

Postby Pajarita » Thu Mar 26, 2015 11:51 am

Well, for one thing, you shouldn't force her to perch by taking everything else from her cage. It has to be a choice and you are not giving her any. For another, I don't know of a single well-taken care of, hand-fed baby that would be so very fearful of humans because, as far as they are concerned, humans are parents at that age. I don't know what kind of a breeder you got her from but it seems to me that this bird was either not hand-fed or not treated right and might even be sick - have you made an appointment with an avian vet to have her checked? It would not be the first or last time a breeder sells a sick baby, you know? I personally know of baby birds that came with psittacosis, polyoma, AGY and even PDD straight from breeders (these are not bird lovers, they are bird merchants). Have you been weighing her daily to see if she is, at least, maintaining her weight?
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18701
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

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