Taming/Training One Bird with Two People?

[KimberlyAnn]

I also agree with cml who is a great at multitasking, I might add. I can barely walk and talk at the same time. Lol

Also, let your husband give the most favorite treat when he greets Skeeter. That way Skeet knows the treat your husband is holding tastes better then your husband. jk...but it does really work. Emmi was scared of strangers so I made everyone give her a treat...even the guy who delivered our new couch. He was scared, but I kinda forced him. But it did work!

[Pajarita]

Personally, I think you started training too soon and are overdoing it because you mistook the honeymoon period for complete acceptance. And he is resenting this and letting you know it the only way he can. I strongly suggest you both study his body language closer to avoid situations like these -for your benefit and your husband's, yes, but mostly for Skeeter's. I also do not believe that forcing him to work/train with your husband instead of you is the way to go. Parrots are smarter than that...and, although under the right circumstances they are VERY forgiving, they can also hold a grudge for a loooooooong time. Especially if they perceive you are trying to get your way with them. In your husband's case, he might think he is the one keeping him away from you and that's not something they forgive easily...

My female Senegal bonded to me and would attack my husband (fly out to bite him) every time she saw him nearby (and this is the reason why she was given up in the first place, only with her previous owner, the man was her love and the wife was the enemy) but she is not only fine with him now, she has even tried on several occasions to make friends with him by flying to his shoulder. All we did was inure her to his presence and, eventually, she accepted him as a flock member. She doesn't love him to pieces and she never will but she no longer hates him.

So my suggestion to you is forget about the training for now and concentrate on getting him to love you and accept him - just let him out of his cage and interact with him without asking him to do anything, talk and sing to him, offer him a treat, share food, etc but don't try to make him do anything. Target training is, in a way, a double-edged sword. It can do good but it can also do bad if you don't handle it correctly.

[cml]

I disagree with Pajarita here. We have different point of views as how to keep a parrot, and I believe that while Pajarita is very often knowledgable, caring and wants the absolute best for parrots, that she misses some of the stuff thats important when you keep a companion parrot.

I believe, and correct me if I am wrong here Pajarita, that its because Pajarita doesnt keep parrot as companion parrots, but rather as a flock in a parrot room. She also doesnt train with them, but let them learn behaviour from the rest of the flock. I also think, and again correct me if I am wrong, that she has A LOT of parrots, and dont have time to interact very much with each individual.

This is all very nice, but it doesnt really work when you have one or two parrots, at least in my opinion.

So my suggestion to you is forget about the training for now and concentrate on getting him to love you and accept him - just let him out of his cage and interact with him without asking him to do anything, talk and sing to him, offer him a treat, share food, etc but don't try to make him do anything. Target training is, in a way, a double-edged sword. It can do good but it can also do bad if you don't handle it correctly.

This I agree with (save from target training and step up training which is great) getting Skeeter to know you guys, and especially your husband should be a top priortity atm. Though I do not see any harm in continuing target training, but dont push the training further than that and step up for the moment.

Also, prioritize that your husband spends time with Skeeter, over you. Unless he comes in and takes over, I very much doubt that Skeeter will percieve it as Mr Weka stealing you from him.
Thats why I said that your husband should train without you in the room, atm you are a distraction for skeeter and hindering him from accepting your husband .

I strongly suggest you both study his body language closer to avoid situations like these -for your benefit and your husband's, yes, but mostly for Skeeter's.

This is also very important, you will learn to see when you are provoking bites and learn to avoid such situations.

I also do not believe that forcing him to work/train with your husband instead of you is the way to go. Parrots are smarter than that...and, although under the right circumstances they are VERY forgiving, they can also hold a grudge for a loooooooong time. Especially if they perceive you are trying to get your way with them. In your husband's case, he might think he is the one keeping him away from you and that's not something they forgive easily...

I believe this is because you dont believe in training in general, and I very much doubt that Skeeter will understand or perceive it that Weka is being kept away by her husband. Thats why she shouldnt be in the room to start with, rather than hand over training half way like described, because THAT might be perceived as her husband interferring.

Training is super important with companion parrots. I dont train mine because I want them to be able to perform tricks, but because it strengthens our bond and my parrots learn that working with and hanging out with me is worthwile. We also work on boundries and trust, all essential things in a relationship with a parrot.
Just skipping training will not work if you have a companion parrot, I think the only reason you are getting away with it Pajarita is because your parrots live in flocks, which most companion parrots in reality do not. We have to adapt to the situation as it is, and do the very best we can from that, rather than lay the seeds for trouble later on by ignoring bad behaviuor and hope for the best.

Also, let your husband give the most favorite treat when he greets Skeeter. That way Skeet knows the treat your husband is holding tastes better then your husband. jk...but it does really work. Emmi was scared of strangers so I made everyone give her a treat...even the guy who delivered our new couch. He was scared, but I kinda forced him. But it did work!

Very good idea, let your husband be the bringer of the most tasty of treats !

[Weka]

Thanks for all the helpful advice, everyone.

Yes, we were probably asking too much too quickly. We've only had him for just over a month, after all.

To answer the question about courtship behavior: After further research, I'm fairly certain Skeeter hasn't been doing any displays that would indicate that he thinks I'm his mate, but he does step up for me, hasn't bitten me yet, and will invite me to preen him from time to time. I oblige, but only for a brief moment and only on the top of the head.

When Mr. Weka comes into the room however, he is still doing any of the following:

*taps his beak on his perch
*bangs his beak against the cage bars
*raises and stamps his right foot (husband made the mistake of encouraging this, thinking it was a "wave")
*makes a sort of warbled, guttural sound or mutters
*attacks his toys or throwing out the food in his dish violently
* "guards" his food dish by raising his wings, neck feathers ruffed up and eyes pinning

That said, he has no problem with Mr. Weka bringing him his food (if properly distracted) or getting his favorite treat from him through the cage bars.

After a break of a few days, all I've done with Skeets training-wise has been getting him to step up for a few minutes every morning; Mr. Weka has not directly handled him at all, even with me out of the room, due to the continuing displays of aggression.

Also, Skeeter had apparently been going through a light molt which seems to have stopped this week -- he's on a solar schedule, whereas I'm not sure about the lighting he had previously at the bird shop -- so we're hoping that this was perhaps one of the additional reasons he was feeling so cranky.


Well, that's it for the update for now. Thanks again for your help.

--Weka

[Pajarita]

Actually, CML, all my parrots are my companions. I think you are confusing 'companions' with 'pets'. I don't have pets, I have companion animals. I don't have them because of what they 'do' for me, I have them for what I can do for them.

And, of course I spend time with them! If I didn't, they would not be happy and would scream, pluck, bite, etc. I spend hours with them everyday (I bet I spend more time with my birds than most people who have one or two as pets) and I interact with almost all of them (I don't interact with the canaries, finches or budgies), only with some is just verbally and with others (the tame ones) is physically. And all my parrots are trained. Even the wild-caught breeders know commands, only the commands I teach them are not useless things (like waving and playing dead), they are practical things -like going back to their platform when they leave it to bother another bird or get into a cage when I need to clean their space or (the most important one!) not to attack me. And the tame ones know a number of 'pet-like' commands. I don't believe in training as an activity. I don't set aside time to train any of my animals, I don't use a clicker, a target stick or rewards but all my animals are well-behaved and know lots of commands which they have learned through repetition, consistency and positive reinforcement. You don't need to target train an animal for that animal to be well-adjusted and happy. And, when you talk about parrots, target training doesn't benefit the bird directly because learning to step up or down doesn't actually make the bird happier or healthier. What it does is teach the human to interact with the bird because, if you leave it up to most people, they would just stick the bird in a cage and forget about it so it's good for the birds because it provides a time out of cage doing something other than sitting all by himself in a jail. But it's easy to overdo it and flood the bird. Formal training should not start until the bird is a juvenile when bought as a baby or, in a rehome case, when it feels 100% comfortable with his surroundings and the new people in his life and that takes months.

Yes, you tend to disagree with me but you have changed your mind on a couple of things that you did not agree with me in the past (air purifiers and light schedule) so I still have hope for you -LOL

[GreenWing]

I happen to agree with Pajarita and I own ONE bird. MY two cents is that I think it's a good idea to calm the training, and allow more bonding time with Mr. Weka. One good start is to have Mr. Weka sit near Skeeter's cage and hum or sing or whistle.

Chance HATES men for the most part BUT she accepts my husband as part of the flock. Skeeter is obviously still getting settled in his new environment after being in a pet shop with little attention. Chance was in a similar situation and ONLY let women handle her, with maybe one exception.

Weka is doing a *fabulous* job in caring for Skeeter but since Skeeter prefers her (like Chance prefers me) it's a good idea to slow the training and focus more on bonding and settling for Mr. Weka.

[cml]

EDIT:
I see you've edited out your face palming gif and the comment against me Greenwing, but oh well, I think my post below is understandable non the less.

Weka is doing a *fabulous* job in caring for Skeeter but since Skeeter prefers her (like Chance prefers me) it's a good idea to slow the training and focus more on bonding and settling for Mr. Weka.

That's pretty much spot on what I've been saying.

That's a lot of assuming, cml.

I think not.

Pajarita has many times stated that she keeps an unknown number of birds in flocks in a dedicated bird room. This means, although she cares deeply for her parrots (I assume this, because its obvious that she does), that she also doesnt deal with how it is to keep a parrot in a "normal" household.

That is also something I often find quite obvious from her posts, such as disregarding training and her way of dealing with the parrots. If there's a problem, she expects the parrot to learn from her and the flock, rather than making a training effort to solve it.
I think it works for her, she sounds successful in many cases, but its not the way to deal with a single or two parrots in my humble opinion.

Here's some of the stuff she says I completely disagree with:
She's said that it's harmful for birds to be outside many times and reccomends people not to let them experience that.
She is against training and reccomends different methods, which I do not think work at all when keeping a companion parrot.
She stresses her natural light schedule over a human created one, which is complete BS unless she lets the parrots experience the sun without blocking windows. UV light is great, but they wont benefit from it forever locked indoors.
There's been tons of other stuff here that I cant be bothered writing down as well

Yes, you tend to disagree with me but you have changed your mind on a couple of things that you did not agree with me in the past (air purifiers and light schedule) so I still have hope for you -LOL

No, I agree with you on purifiers which seem to help my allergies, but I dont believe in your preaching of your light schedule for a second.
I DO believe in regulating the length of days etc, but not that they should wake or go to sleep with the magic of light from the natural sun (which incidently doesnt pass through glass ((UVB or UVC))).

I havnt bothered posting a reply to this thread until now, and havnt in fact posted at all here in a while now. I've kind of lost the good feeling I've had for this place for a couple of years now.

Have fun and good luck with your parrot(s), I am sure I will continue to visit from time to time.

[GreenWing]

EDIT:
I see you've edited out your face palming gif and the comment against me Greenwing, but oh well, I think my post below is understandable non the less.

I did, yes, because while it's pretty obvious I like posting reaction gifs -- because they're funny and Imma goofball and have like, a sense of humor, and stuff -- but I also didn't want you to take it personally (however it seems like I was too late and you saw it and may have nonetheless... so... I apologize...)

That's a lot of assuming, cml.

I think not.

That was just my interpretation. I wasn't, and am not, trying to stir up trouble but... you haven't visited her house, or seen her with her parrots - you only know so much from conversing with her on this forum. And, so, yes, you really don't know how she really interacts with her parrots. She obviously is knowledgeable and loves her parrots so I don't think it's fair to judge her. Disagree with her, yes. But saying she's this-or-that is a bit of a judgment and, yes, an assumption IMO.

Please don't take it personally, cml, you're very respected around here and we're all friends, I just think we shouldn't assume so much about each other, y'know?

Yikes. Sorry for this mucking, Weka.

[cml]

That was just my interpretation. I wasn't, and am not, trying to stir up trouble but...

I think you did anyway.

Yikes. Sorry for this mucking, Weka.

Dont worry, from the looks of it she's already left the forum.

She obviously is knowledgeable and loves her parrots so I don't think it's fair to judge her.

I know she loves her parrots deeply, which I also wrote was obvious in my post above.

I also dont JUDGE her, I DISAGREE with the way she hands out her experience as the only true way and scientifically proven facts.

I feel this is a bit pointless, we are talking about someone, it's much better to talk with them.

Pajarita: You and I will probably agree that we disagree most the time. I respect you and your knowledge, but I've tired of it being presented as fact. I know you love your parrots and provide for them a loving home, for which I am thankful - you have saved many a parrot and that makes me glad. All the best to you and your flock.

I'll be taking a break from the forums now, so this is my last entry for a little while.
Again, good luck to all of you, and I am sure I will be back soon.

[GreenWing]

I think you did anyway.

Dude, you outright called out Pajarita on something related to parrots and I merely disagreed with you on your point. I apologized for the reaction gif. I removed it because I didn't want to hurt your feelings even though my intentions were not meant to do so. Let it go. We can disagree on this forum for many things and that's fine -- your way may not work for others, and vice-versa. Not everything is so black and white in the world.

Dont worry, from the looks of it she's already left the forum.

How do you know?

I'll be taking a break from the forums now, so this is my last entry for a little while.
Again, good luck to all of you, and I am sure I will be back soon.

That's your choice, but I hope you return sooner with no hard feelings. I just praised you in another post.