My Too's and the Adjustment

[Kimamelia]

I posted a few weeks ago in the nutrition forum about food for my adopted African Grey, and talked about my rescue Umbrella Cockatoo and Yellow Crested Cockatoo. Since then, there are circumstances that have changed and I am no longer in possession of Emmy, the African Grey. She is in Alabama with my boyfriends grandfather and Uncle, who is the one who wanted her. Sadly, there isn't much I can do about the situation but she is in a nicer cage with perches and toys and and that's the most I can do. My flock now consists of my Umbrella Too, my Yellow Crested Too, my Mitred Conure, and Green Cheeked Conure. Since there is nothing I can do about Emmy until they are ready to give her up, I've been focusing on the other birds.

Milo, the Mitred Conure is very well behaved, but in no way, shape or form socialized. He is happy and content, plays with his toys, eats all the time, loves peanut butter and enjoys the hell out of veggie pasta. He does not like it when the other birds are having out of cage time and get near his cage, he gets territorial and snaps at the bars. That is the only aggressive thing I have ever seen him do. He will chirp and talk to you through the cage as long as you don't open it. When you open it, the game is over and he runs. I've managed to get him to let me hold my hand near him with a treat in it for a few minutes at a time and he calmed down but won't take treats from me or anyone else, and the one time I touched him he freaked out and fell off the wall of his cage and started running around the bottom. Any tips or tricks on helping socialize him would be much appreciated. He is 28 years old, and once, was boyfriends Nana's favorite bird. So once he was well socialized. He is also the only one of the three my boyfriends isn't afraid of and would very much like to get to know him. Right now I have his cage separated from the row of everyone else's, and he is happy with that. He has two toys and his original food and water troughs since I didn't want to freak him out too much by putting tons of new things in there and taking things away. For now I'm just going to be adding new perches and toys and then switching his bowls out later. His cage is up against one wall a few feet from a window which he seems to enjoy quite a bit.


Conner, our Green Cheeked Conure, is behaving better than ever. He had his first initial reaction of jealousy and then calmed down once he realized he was still getting his treats and to eat with us and to sit on boyfriends shoulder all the time. Some of his more basic commands though have gone the way of the wind. He no longer Steps Up when asked, but doesn't get upset or flustered when he is picked up either. He also won't sit on the counter or table with a bowl of his food any longer, but will give up the food and sit on boyfriends shoulder instead and boyfriend feeds him while he sits there. Other than wanting to know how best to get him back to performing the basic tasks, he seems in excellent shape. He no longer bites or snaps at anyone, myself included and will willingly spend time with me as long as boyfriend isn't a few feet away, because then I'll have him for maybe two minutes and he hops back over there. He doesn't screech unhappily and joins in with the other birds in the morning when they are all chirping and singing when the sun comes up.


Angel, the Yellow Crested Cockatoo, bonded immediately with my mother. Absolutely no one in the house can get him to talk and sing and dance like when he is spending time with her. He wrecks absolute Havoc on his toys. It's a nightmare. A $30 toy was in pieces in just a few days. Fortunately it was a giant toy and I just reassembled it and he keeps tearing it up. His feathers haven't improved yet as far as the shredding goes and I see him preen a lot but I can't tell if he is still shredding. I make sure they have an abundance of cardboard things and paper things to chew up and destroy which they do. It takes him a matter of minutes to destroy a paper towel roll and look pleased with himself. At first he was the aggressive between the two of the Too's but he doesn't snap at anyone anymore and the clever bugger excels at finding ways to undo the locks I put on his doors. Just this morning I went in there and he was sitting on top of his cage looking all proud of himself with the three locks I use laying on the floor. I believe I may have to start wiring his cage shut at night. He is still in his original cage, (after an intense three and a half hour scrub session and overhaul) and that is the next thing to be replaced as his cage easily has the weakest latches which is why I use so many locks. The only time we see any aggressive behavior from him is when his partner in crime is out and about at the same time and being aggressive. He will put himself between you and the other Too when we are trying to reprimand Shortie. If Shortie is biting and snapping at people, Angel will chase Shortie around at first, ignore him for a few minutes, then join in. Really though I feel like his adjustment has been pretty optimal. He plays and spends several hours a day out of the cage and I have no bites from him, nor does anyone else. The ladies in the family have to be careful though, we've discovered that taking rubber bands or scrunchies from a pony tail is just about his favorite thing to do while out of his cage and getting people time. It's wildly amusing. He doesn't screech much, he does show off a good bit, and he is the ring leader that gets them all singing in the morning. My main concerns with him right now are going to be his feathers and working on the shredding, and his deciding to gang up on people with the other Too. They play nice together though, preening and nuzzling one another when they first get some out of cage time.


Shortie, the Umbrella Cockatoo is the terror of our household. If anyone has been in the bird room that morning, once they leave he screams. Ear splitting screams that go on and on and on. His longest streak so far was 19 long screams in a row without a breath with a 28 second break followed by 13 more. It's enough to make me want to cover his cage but I don't. I try to give him something to occupy him, it doesn't always work. Paper towel rolls, paper, the nuts from the food mix that he spends forever trying to open. Sometimes he just screams. My hands AND my feet are absolutely covered in deep bites from handling him. My boyfriend is terrified of him and he definitely terrorizes him on purpose. Any time boyfriend is in the room Shortie will track him and snap at and bite at him at any given chance. When getting some out of cage time, if boyfriend is in the room on the couch, Shortie will spend all his time trying to find his way to the floor in order to literally chase boyfriend around the room or attack the nearest feet. He was spending time on the top of his cage with Angel and I was tending to fresh water and food in his cage and cleaning the destruction of toys from the bottom of his cage, he started to snap and me and climb down his cage and Angel started snapping at my hair when Shortie got going. I feel like Angel was mostly playing but Shortie managed to work his way to the floor before I could get him and ran after my foot. He took a hefty bite and I had to grab a blanket from the couch, cover him and grab him and put him back in his cage. My understanding is that when he went after my feet, it was the second time he had done such a thing and had chased boyfriend up onto the couch earlier that day. Yesterday, I took him out of his cage, he willingly steps up, but he was out of his cage for less than two minutes and went after my hands, causing a bleeder on my pinky, and I had to put him back up. I'm not sure what is triggering his bad behavior but he is massively aggressive. He wasn't when he first got here though. Actually he was as cuddly and friendly as possible at first and we thought we were going to have the most trouble with Angel. Role reversal of a life time, which is unfortunate as Shortie is easily the biggest of the birds. I moved his cage away from the door way, because though it was up against a wall, it was closest to the door, now he is in the middle of the wall. Doesn't seem to have mattered to either him or Angel much. He does play with his toys and shred things, this morning he had broken the chain holding one of his toys to his cage. With all the reading and research I've done I just feel like I may be in over my head with his aggression, because it's not just toward me, it's everyone. If anyone is in the room, he raises his crest, spreads his winds and paces in his cage, and snaps when you get close. He has gone after my hands while I was changing his food and water. Any suggestions are Much appreciated.


I tried to be as detailed about each of them as I could, but if anyone wants any more information, I am more than willing to answer questions. Their diets are currently a mixture of a high quality seed, dried fruits, nuts, millet and a vegetable pellet food. They also get a bit of whatever is cooked that night as long as it is bird safe. Shortie doesn't go for 'people' food, Angel and Milo love it.

[Wolf]

Hi, it has, indeed, been a while since you last posted here and I was really worried about Emmy and actually still am very concerned about her, but like you there is nothing that can be done presently, but I will still worry about her.
If you will recall the taming method that I gave you to help Emmy, then you should know that it works on all parrots regardless of species and I would most definitely put it to use with the Conures. All of these birds have been through a lot that they were never intended to have to go through, but the taming method that I gave you will help them to readjust and help you to socialize them.
I wish that I knew more because I only have a limited knowledge about Cockatoos. I really don't know much more than that they can be one of the most loving of birds that you could ever meet, but they are also the most territorial and aggressive of birds as well and this has caused there to be a super abundance of them in avian rescues needing homes.

[hannah50942]

well sorry i can't help you but maybe a bird trainer will they know alot about birds and why the mite be doing this stuff. maybe it had been torched and terrorized in his past life when he was a baby or something happened to him and he is still really scared like my cat she got sucked up the vacum cleaner before we got her now she runs away from the vacuum cleaner. you bird mite be scared of noises cause something happened with noises that scared him.

[Wolf]

well sorry i can't help you but maybe a bird trainer will they know alot about birds and why the mite be doing this stuff. maybe it had been torched and terrorized in his past life when he was a baby or something happened to him and he is still really scared like my cat she got sucked up the vacum cleaner before we got her now she runs away from the vacuum cleaner. you bird mite be scared of noises cause something happened with noises that scared him.

You would have to go back to another post to know this, but yes, these birds were extremely traumatized before she got them. She has already made a huge difference in their lives and sometimes it is just going to take a lot of time, for the bird to begin to heal emotionally and mentally, as in this instance.

[Pajarita]

They did not change, they are only now beginning to show their true colors. Parrots are almost always nicest when they first come to us (especially when they have been neglected as these were) and, when they start to feel comfortable, the honeymoon is over and the problems start. Nothing to worry about, this is normal.

Now, I might have misunderstood but it seems to me that they are getting too much protein in their diet. You listed "seed, dried fruits, nuts, millet and a vegetable pellet food" so, correct me if I am wrong, but, to me, this list tells reads: free-feeding protein (so it's way too high), high sugar (dry fruits and, if they are the 'normal' kind, full of sulfites), low moisture (everything in it is dry) and low fiber (no greens, no veggies, no 'real' fruit) when it should be lower protein, low sugar, high moisture and high fiber. My toos are HUGE eaters of greens -they love them so much, it's usually the first thing they go for even though they love their gloop and eat a wide range of fresh fruits and veggies- and they really do not like anything dry, so much so that they actually dunk the birdie bread in their water before they eat it (my birdie bread is very moist and dense and no other bird dunks it but them). Both of them come as adults to me (21 and 17( and used to a diet pretty much like the one you are offering but I have found that toos are easy to switch (I had two umbrellas also) even when they are seed junkies (not like grays, for example).

Cardboard and paper mean nothing to a too, they need wood to chew (pieces of an untreated, pine 2x4 keep them entertained for hours and are cheap and easy to get). Try putting pieces of wood in a hard cardboard box mixed with scrunched up paper (so they have to riffle through the paper wads to find them).

Shortie: Putting a bird in a cage right after he came out because he bit you seems like a good strategy to us but it will make things worse because he will resent it and blame you for it, feeling thus, justified in his aggression (kind of like a fulfilled prophecy -they are very smart animals and reach deductions on their own, whether the deductions are accurate or not is not relevant because even when they are not to us, they are to them). The trick is to prevent the bites by using an actual physical deterrent (like a long skirt or a bath towel tucked around your waist that hangs all the way down to the floor or carrying something that they don't like) so he would not go after your feet, and to learn their body language and quirks so as to stop the behavior before it happens. For example, Freddy (LSC) would also go after everybody's feet (this is something all toos do, btw) but, with me, he just touches my shoes with his beak or grabs my shoelaces because he has learned that I will bend down and 'reward' him with a 'step up' and 'shoulder time' (positive reinforcement) but he will bite people's feet if they move suddenly, run away, jump or scream in fear. My daughter had to take care of my birds when I went away for a week and I explained this to her but she got nervous the first day and did not manage it until the second after we talked on the phone and I told her to pretend to ignore him when he climbed down but keep her eye on him and, as soon as she saw him making a beeline for her feet, quickly bent down and in a cheery voice say Hello to him and ask him to step up - end of problem.

Screams: for a cockatoo, company is everything. To the point that having somebody in his/her sight and not been ON the person it's akin to torture. It's a bit of an exaggeration but it comes down to the fact that unless they are able to touch you or VERY close to you, you are not keeping them company so you might want to allow a deeper bonding between Shortie and Angel so he doesn't feel so lonely when people leave the room. Aside from this, a strict routine schedule, hours of out-of-cage time and keeping them with normal hormone levels (solar schedule, low protein diet) take care of the screaming. But it doesn't happen overnight or in a couple of months. Freddy was a screamer and it took me 10 months to get him to quiet down during the day (he does the normal morning and evening calls and, every now and then, still screams whenever he gets excited but this is perfectly normal).