Thanks for taking your time to reply, Wolf.
Made my day.
I guess I have been trying to bond with my birds through training. Somewhere along the way, I unintentionally made it clear in my head that my parrots have earned to "love" me through their training. On several websites I have read that a bird will never actually
love their owners. They will just want to use them to "survive", or get treats and food. I have wanted this to be proven wrong so much, so if this is ,in any way, incorrect then do let me know.
But how do I earn their trust? I am around their cage for the majority of the day after I get home from school, as are my other family members.
As for the schedule, it is not very strict, but follows the same general pattern every day. On weekdays, I always wake up to their musical chirps. On days that I wake up early enough, I'll have them step up onto my hand a couple times until it is time for me to leave for school. My dad is a software engineer and works from home, so he sees the birds all day. He always tells me that they chirp and whistle a whole lot during the day, and quiet a bit down towards the afternoon. After I get home from school, I stop by their cage, talk to them, and have them step up for about 2 minutes. Although I would enjoy continuing this for a longer period of time, I can't because I usually have basketball practice or a massive amount of homework left to do. After I finish with everything for the day, it is generally around five o'clock. Because it is not too late, the birds are still awake and alert, though not as jumpy. However, after I play with them for about one minute, they seem very vibrant once again. This is when I let them out of their cage. Because they are scared to go anywhere else, they stay on top of their cage and play with toys and move around on perches that I have set up on top. They absolutely
love watching everything outside the window. They often climb up on to the windowsill(the only other place they'll go beside their cage) and stare outside for elongated periods of time. I've tried bringing other tables and chairs close to them with their toys, treats, and anything that they like on it, but they are still not motivated or confident enough to go there on their own. When I try bringing them there myself, they panic, stiffen up, and fly back to their cage. After about a time period of one to two hours, I put them back. I don't put a towel around their cage because whenever I do, they end up not getting any sleep and flying around their cage. Their cage is about 34"L x 24"W x 40"H.
They are not clipped, and can fly. I've started training one of them to fly to my hand, and we can do this up to 2 feet apart. Not very far, I know, but we made really good progress in the beginning, but now he does not seem confident enough to go any farther. However, I make sure not to push him at all. My other bird is too afraid to fly or even hop. She wants to, but she ends up just stretching to my hand instead. I try to go veryyy slowly with her, but she is still not ready to fly.
I feed them both Roudybush and Lafeber's pellets. I have tried to feed them veggies, but have not made any progress. I am consistently making an effort to do this. The closest I have gotten is them touching it and retreating, not liking the taste. They have done this for every veggie I have given them. I leave their food out for them all day, although I am not sure if I should only give them pellets for a certain amount of time to section off as meals.
I would like to train them separately, but it is very hard to keep one inside the cage with the other out without the bird inside making a lot of noise, distracting the other bird. I have purchased a carrier for this reason, to train one in a separate room, but they are afraid of it(see in my other post). They have five toys that I transition inside and outside of their cage. They have seven perches that I transition as well.
I presume one of the reasons I have to many issues with them is that I have not gotten them from a breeder, but from a shoddy pet shop. They were not hand-fed, and when I saw them at the store, they were screaming when one of the employees tried to put them into the "box", and were very afraid of the hands. However, they are not afraid of my hands now at all. Their names are Coco and Charlie(my six year old sister picked their names), and they are a girl and boy respectively.
Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.