Screaming and biting

[RenLynn]

My GCC is only 3 months old, he steps up lets me rub him an likes to cuddle but he will be sitting on my shoulder and then he will screech and bite my ear. And sometimes when I rub him he will screech and bite my finger. Why is he doing that and how can I STOP him?

[Wolf]

If you are scratching in the opposite direction that his feathers lie then you may be bending a pin feather the wrong way and causing him pain at which time he will likely scream and bite. Also if you react in a strong fashion to his screaming and biting then you will also teach him to scream and bite without you doing anything just because he likes the drama of it.
This is a possibility.

[Pajarita]

Usually, when birds scream and bite your ear while perching on your shoulder, it means that he/she is warning you of something so you need to pay a lot of attention to what happened right before he/she did it. This sounds easy but, in reality, it's not because we are so used to what we deem as 'everyday' noises, things and people coming and going that we don't even register them anymore. But they do. It could be somebody entering the room, a car backfiring or honking, a sudden and loud noise from the TV, a shadow on a window that could mean a predator (like a hawk, for example), a dog barking, etc. Mind you, this is NOT aggression, he/she is trying to protect you but his/her way of doing it is nipping which, if it was done to another parrot would be just like us elbowing somebody, grabbing or gently slapping their arm or shoulder but because we have no protective plumage on our bodies (as parrots do), it hurts us.

[RenLynn]

Thank you for your advice.

[Lady]

I understand that screaming can mean many things but I do not understand how to lessen the screaming with my Severe Macaw. Let me try and explain when she (altho I think she is a he) gets vocal in her native sounds.
Sometimes Lady will get excited when my husband and I are having a normal conversation. To me she is looking for attention from us, so we try to go to another room to have daily conversation or anything important we want to discuss without interruption altho she will continue and sometimes gets louder as the minutes go by. The other room can sometimes be where she can see us and sometimes where she can not. Don't know which is better if either, as it doesn't change her noise level. When we are in the same room my husband will go to her and look her in the eye and tell her stop with a stern voice and it does help for a bit most of the time, but when I do the same seems there is no difference. When I am the only one home and she gets loud it does help for a short time but I have to go back and do it over and over till I am finished whatever I am doing. Sometimes I just have to cover one side of her cage so she can't see me and then she will calm down and mermer under her breath some of the phrases she knows or just jibberish in general. Funny tho, when I open and close the door that I leave the house from to go to work she will calm down I assume she is thinking I left.
There are also time when she is sitting arms length from me and will start to get loud when nothing is even going on. She has a perch separate from her cage but it takes a lot of patient to get her to go onto it. I will keep the perch near her cage and the cage door open but she doesn't come out on her own much. When she does it is mostly to the top of the cage door and no further.
When I leave the room she also gets loud and I even speak to her from the room I'm in so she knows where I am.

Well that is all I can think of about the screaming for now. I hope I can find some solutions soon.

[Pajarita]

LOL - She is screaming because she wants to be part of what's going on. When you are talking with your husband, she interprets this as interaction and wants a part of it so walking into another room is not going to solve it - and neither will staying in her sight. Parrots are not dogs, to them company means been on top of you or so very close that her and your body are touching. Telling her in a firm voice to shut up is something you can do with a dog but not with a parrot who is just plain lonely and is screaming for company (again, visual company is not enough for them, touch is required). Your husband is sending wrong signals and confusing her because she is doing something that comes naturally to all parrots and, even if she wasn't, ordering her to do or not to do something doesn't work with them because they are not programmed to obey (only animals that evolved to live in hierarchical societies are). We can 'train' them to do certain things but it's not training like you train a dog which has been bred for thousands of generations to live with man, it's more like tricking them into complying by making them believe is their decision to do what we want them to (and it is! Imposing our will on them only breaks their spirit).

Does she have a strict schedule and daily routines? Awake with sunrise, breakfast, bath/interaction, noon rest, interaction, dinner, sleep? That helps a lot. But, when I say interaction, that means, at least, 2 hours of one-on-one time and another 2 or 3 of out of cage roaming. Parrots were created by nature to be surrounded from birth to death by a large extended family and, to them, bonding means doing EVERYTHING with their chosen one. It's very hard to accomplish this when you have a single parrot because you become the whole family and it's a huge onus on people, especially as they get older and start to lose patience waiting for things to change when they don't (that's when they start screaming, barbering, plucking, biting, etc). People call these 'undesirable' behaviors but, in reality, they are completely natural and understandable under the circumstances. Mind you, I am not scolding you, I am just stating a fact that people are never told at the breeder or petstore where they bought the bird. It's almost impossible for a human or two to keep a needy species happy and have a normal life at the same time. With the exception of a female Senegal, all my birds have companions of their own species and the only ones that are in cages have medical issues so it's easier for me but I still have no social life of my own and all my routines and schedules revolve around theirs.

[Lady]

LOL - She is screaming because she wants to be part of what's going on. When you are talking with your husband, she interprets this as interaction and wants a part of it so walking into another room is not going to solve it - and neither will staying in her sight. Parrots are not dogs, to them company means been on top of you or so very close that her and your body are touching. Telling her in a firm voice to shut up is something you can do with a dog but not with a parrot who is just plain lonely and is screaming for company (again, visual company is not enough for them, touch is required). Your husband is sending wrong signals and confusing her because she is doing something that comes naturally to all parrots and, even if she wasn't, ordering her to do or not to do something doesn't work with them because they are not programmed to obey (only animals that evolved to live in hierarchical societies are). We can 'train' them to do certain things but it's not training like you train a dog which has been bred for thousands of generations to live with man, it's more like tricking them into complying by making them believe is their decision to do what we want them to (and it is! Imposing our will on them only breaks their spirit).

Does she have a strict schedule and daily routines? Awake with sunrise, breakfast, bath/interaction, noon rest, interaction, dinner, sleep? That helps a lot. But, when I say interaction, that means, at least, 2 hours of one-on-one time and another 2 or 3 of out of cage roaming. Parrots were created by nature to be surrounded from birth to death by a large extended family and, to them, bonding means doing EVERYTHING with their chosen one. It's very hard to accomplish this when you have a single parrot because you become the whole family and it's a huge onus on people, especially as they get older and start to lose patience waiting for things to change when they don't (that's when they start screaming, barbering, plucking, biting, etc). People call these 'undesirable' behaviors but, in reality, they are completely natural and understandable under the circumstances. Mind you, I am not scolding you, I am just stating a fact that people are never told at the breeder or petstore where they bought the bird. It's almost impossible for a human or two to keep a needy species happy and have a normal life at the same time. With the exception of a female Senegal, all my birds have companions of their own species and the only ones that are in cages have medical issues so it's easier for me but I still have no social life of my own and all my routines and schedules revolve around theirs.

Interesting to say the least. Yes to the question that she does have a schedule altho not the same as you stated.
Both my husband and I work. Lady is uncovered every weekday at 5:30 a.m. when the sun is beginning to rise. She is given fresh water and breakfast of roughly 2 tablespoons of seed mixture in her dish after I give her a piece of a walnut or a cashew from my hand because I do not include them in her food. This is what I have found to be her most motivated treat and tend on using it only as a reward. She always let's me pet her head when I go to put her water dish in it's place and will often say "open up". Before I leave out for work I check to see if she took a bath in her water and if she has she gets a new dish with fresh water. She really prefers to have a spray of water but does enjoy a bath at times. As I head for the door I always say bye, see you after work, love you.
When my husband comes home he also checks both her dishes and fills what is necessary if anything. Throughout the day she is in her cage as he works super early hours and most times when he comes home it is time for rest or sometimes chores around the house. I believe she has plenty of hanging toys, foot toys, as well as some forging toys with a corner to hide in with a hanging cloth made for birds if she wants to rest as well. I do like the idea of putting something else for her to eat like fresh/frozen or thawed fruit as well as greens and maybe some veggies. I will have to start keeping notes on what she prefers because if I am eating it she will also but I am not sure what she will eat if it just is sitting in a bowl. I have left a small bowl of veggies before but when I would come home they would still be right where I left them so I stopped leaving them and prefer to give them to her when we are hanging out.
My husband would never use the words "shut up" to her or anyone,it is just not words he would use, he just simply tells her to stop. As a matter of fact, he, in the past use to say, what's the matter, and now she has learned the phrase as well. He has also tried talking to her and when he was finished he would asking her "do you hear me?" she has since says the same phrase. I don't feel he is ordering her either. I have read that you should speak sternly when you are showing that you are not in agreement with what your bird is doing. That is the reason her tells her to stop.
As far as interaction, noon rest, interaction, dinner, then sleep, oh yes because this is what we all enjoy the most. She gets great afternoon rest under a sheet so she doesn't get distracted by anything. Dinner is my favorite time. This is the time I am home from work and can start my specific time with her. Her cage is then brought into another room from where she sleeps and the door is opened till bed time.
It is interesting that you say touch is required, because she will let me touch her but only on the top of her head and for short periods of time. If you say she is lonely due to not having another species of her kind then I don't know what I will do. I am not ready to take on another bird until I know all I can about my little Lady and get her to the stage where she is comfortable enough to step up and come away from her cage which I hope to be moving toward doing that now.
All this being said, and I do appreciate your insight, what then can we do to help her learn that screaming for attention when we are talking with each other is not a behavior we like.

[Wolf]

You and your husband have replaced others of her species, and while her being lonely and wanting attention would normally be for her own species, in this case the attention that she is craving is yours. She feels left out and therefore lonely and is wanting your attention or your husbands attention.
About the only thing that you can do is to not react to her screaming. I went through this and am still going through it, but to a much lesser degree than at first. I can't count the number of times that I have said, " I am sorry, but I have birds screaming in my ear, would you please repeat that?" I don't move away from my birds and I don't react to their screams in any way, other that apologizing to the other person and carrying on. It takes patience, lots of patience.

[Pajarita]

Well, there are three issues here:

- diet: you are feeding too much protein and at the wrong time. She should get produce every day for breakfast. You can mix cooked veggies with whole cereal grains cooked at dente to supply a low protein source but the high protein food (seeds, pellets, nuts, nutriberries, etc) should never be served for breakfast, only a small, measured amount (enough to fill their crop well) for dinner. And she should have raw produce (leafy green, fruit and veggie) every day.

- light schedule: if she has dinner with you, she stays up after dark when the days are short and, if you turn on the light at 5:30 am on those days, you are giving her a summer light schedule all year round.

- loneliness: parrots are not meant to be by themselves all day long.

These three conditions have made her overly hormonal and despondent. Simply put, she is not happy with her life and that's why she screams so much. I know it's hard to believe but parrots that have seasons, good light, a good diet and company all day long never scream. I have 27 parrots in a room and you don't hear a peep out of them except when I walk in early in the morning (they get all excited and start talking and calling to me) and later in the day, when the sun is setting and they do the evening calls but only until I walk in with their dinner. The rest of the time, everybody is doing their thing and they don't scream at all. Well, every now and then you will hear a couple of calls by the sun or the jenday but this is maybe twice during the day and just a couple of calls each time.