Sun conure biting

[norbie]

Hello,

My siblings and I have adopted 3 Sun Conures and hand raised them from 7wks. Now they are just over 6 months old and biting is becoming a serious problem.

We have tried many methods to stop the biting, but none have been working. At the moment we are just telling the bird "no, that's naughty" calmly and sternly, and giving them a really dirty look. This seems to be very effective for two of the birds, but I'm wondering if it is only a short term solution to the problem.

The third bird is more aggressive and nothing seems to stop him biting, apart from hissing - which we don't like doing because it's not a long-term solution, it just surprises him enough to make him stop for a minute. The problem is that their beaks are becoming too sharp now and it's too painful to put up with the biting without jerking our hands away (which we know only encourages it). We've ordered some gloves, but are worried that this will only make our hands more interesting to them - or scare them.

Please let me know what the best method is to stop the biting. Grabbing them and holding them upside down stops the biting, but seems to make them scared of our hands - what do you think?

[pennyandrocky]

grabbing is not a good idea for making hands a good thing to birds and if they don't like your hands the biting will get worse. what's happening when they bite? it could be babies exploring with their beaks like human children when they get teeth. if it's aggressive biting watch their body language birds almost always give some kind of warning when they are about to bite. with my cockatoo she does a dance, looks cute if you don't know what it means. when she does this dance i walk away or tell her to get up when she's on my lap. with my greencheek conure it's a hiss or a headbob when he used to do that i gave him a push off my shoulder, his favorite perch, it did not take him long to figure out biting meant losing my shoulder for a minute since i let him fly back right after until he bit again.

[janetafloat]

I am sorry to say this but purchasing unweaned birds is never a good idea and no reputable breeder would engage in that practise. That aside I think you need to go right back to square one and start training your birds as though you'd just got them, as per Michael's guide at www.trained parrot.com/Taming. Use a hand held perch initially. Start teaching your birds some tricks, again as outlined in Michael's blog so that when you're interacting with your birds they are focusing on something, which will help a lot. Grabbing or hissing, as you say, are not long term solutions and will only serve to further damage your relationships with your birds.

[norbie]

I don't think it's aggressive biting, I think we've just accidentally taught them that it's okay to bite. They don't really give any warning..

Maybe it would be a better idea to separate them? Because it's very hard to train all three at once, there are too many distractions. I think they get too excited when they're all out together - there's lots of flying around and fighting each other - and they just love to chew on our hands/ears/arms.

I was just worried that separating them would be a bit cruel..

[janetafloat]

Well, that's good, that it's not aggressive biting. However, I don't think that you've taught them that it's ok to bite.....birds bite, they have to be trained not to. My Sennie came to me at 6 months old & he hadn't been taught anything, he's like a toddler who'd always had his own way, cute but annoying and he chews on me a lot too though he's getting better with training. When he first comes out of his cage we do some training - flight recall for a bit then trick training - and that settles him down. Also he's not allowed on my shoulder if there's any nibbling/biting at all.

Are your three conures all caged together? I think you're right that training 3 birds that are bonded together is going to be really difficult, but I think if you don't train them you're going to have a real headache with 3 completely untrained birds. That's just my thinking anyway. As well as giving you some control over the birds behaviour training also is enriching for the bird and makes a stronger bond between you & the bird. Perhaps you could put them in separate cages next to each other.

So you and your siblings live together? So my question is, are you going to be living together for the next 20+ years? And if not, what happens with the conures then, do you separate them or who keeps them?

[norbie]

Well I hadn't thought of it that way.. In the future I would love to take my bird with me. But I would like to do what's best for him, do you think it would be mean to separate them?

Meanwhile to do with the biting, I think we'll keep them all together in one cage, but separate them for training. I did notice that when we have them separate they are much calmer and less hyper. It might even be more effective training if they understand playtime is with friends and training is by themself

Thanks for your help

[Hayden1987]

My personal opinion is that it is near on impossible to train birds when they have too many distractions around them. This can be other people,animals and other sun conures, when i was training a team of cockatoos a few years back i found out what they love food wise and cut it from the regular diet and used it as a treat when training only. I then crate trained each bird, and transported it to a different room where i did the training. This one on one time forms a bond with the bird and also gets teaches the birds when to concentrate... once you have the foundations down and feel that the behaviour is up to your expectations you can introduce distractions and other birds. Remember baby steps and if something isnt working re asses and try a different approach. Also keep training sessions to a maximum of 15mins and keep everything positive and always end the session on a good note

[Pajarita]

Unfortunately, neither body language nor food will help you with Sunnies because although they can 'signal' when they are annoyed (their neck and head feathers become semi-erect, they separate and curve their wings and turn around in circles while vocalizing), they can also attack without any display. And food is not a high value item when it comes to sunnies and they are one of the bitiest conures, in my personal opinion -at least, mine is a little jerk who delights in biting for no reason at all. But six month birds should not be biting. Babies are usually VERY mellow until they develop sexually and sunnies do not develop until they are two so something is going on that is making them bite. Are they been handled regularly, on schedule and consistent in terms of activities and reactions? Are they been allowed to fly enough? Have you been able to identify a trigger for the bites? And, most importantly, are we talking bites or nips?

[norbie]

Recently we separated the birds into different cages. They still sit next to each other during the day though.
I have been letting my bird (norbert) out a couple of times a day, but if anything he is biting me more often than he was. I don't know what's causing it, I try very hard to totally ignore the bite and focus on positive reinforcement. How long should it take for this to stop the biting?
He is biting my neck, cheeks and all over my hands. It's like he is trying to gnaw me to pieces! It seems as though he thinks he's the boss, he crawls all over me and chews my skin.

I have been reading a lot about sun conures, and found that maybe I shouldn't be letting him on my shoulders? But I can't stop him because he just crawls around like I'm a play gym. Should I be letting him out more for playing on a special bird play gym? If so, how can I separate training time from play time in a way he will understand?

Thanks for all your help!! Sorry I have so many questions, I assure you I've been reading lots though, and when I do get experience I will give back by answering some!

[Cockatielsongs]

Okay lets get this out of the way, never ever let a biting bird sit on your shoulder, even with tame birds its usually not recommended. With that aside I would train them one by one, get one in a small room preferably empty so there are no distractions, on a T stand or back of a chair. Begin clicker training first, simply click the clicker and reward, that way the bird will know that when he hears the clicker a treat comes. Keep each session short at 5 minutes max as their attention span is very short. Clicker train them all before you move on to target train. Keep them away from your body, including arms. At this point just use your hands to reward or move them to different places.