Help with my Senegal Parrot.

[Gab&Den]

Hello all,

Gab&Den here and we own a Senegal parrot, Cannon, a green cheek conure, Rita, and a diamond dove, Poco. We have a Goffin Cockatoo on the way soon, but that'll be a while from now. Sorry for this being my first post, but I really need help with my Senegal.

I got him back in Dec. 2014, he's 1 year and a month old now, so he was about 11 months.When I first got him, the second day was the best he has ever been, I was able to hold him and scratch his head with no problems. After that though, it's been a wild roller coaster with him. He screams every time my girlfriend or I come near him, put food in his cage, walk past him, ANYTHING.

This past few months I've been trying to fix this problem myself by just being around him,I would say little to no progress has been made. If I try to pick him up, he flaps his wings and dives around in his cage, banging on everything on the way down. When I say he flaps his wings, I mean he viciously flaps his wings, they are clipped and quite possibly have been his entire life.

He has lost 3, active feathers, I would say his flight feathers because he will bleed after it happens. These feathers haven't been lost simultaneously but over the past few months.

I'm not afraid of getting bit or scratched, etc. I just want him to be happy and stress free. I have even considered just giving him back to the breeders I received him from in the first place. It is really sad to have a bird that is almost terrified of everything. The only thing he does is eat sunflower seeds out of my hand, or millet, or the lafebers nutriberries ball.

I don't think he was properly socialized while being raised, and that's why it's so difficult to do anything with him, I would like to believe that if his breeders were to see him, they could get him to do just about anything.

Any and all suggestions, comments, advice are welcomed.

Thank you,
Gab&Den

[Wolf]

Hi and glad to have you here on the forum;
It doesn't sound as if your Senegal was socialized very well to me either, but I think hat it is only a part of his story. Among other possible issues I am wondering is they even told you his actual age. for that reason I am asking you what color are his eyes? It may shed some more light on this or it may not, but it is worth asking.
His diet is not a good one, if all he eats is nutraberries and millet and sunflower seeds, unless I misunderstood this part of your post. Do you have any information on his background?
Although it appear that you may have rushed things with him and started trying to handle him before he trusted you this also seems to me to be only a part of his problem.
In the interests of trying to best help your bird through this could you provide as detailed as possible account of an average day in his life beginning with when he gets up in the morning what he eats and when he gets it what is a normal day like when does he eat in the evening and what does he eat and when does he go to bed. Does he have any interaction with any of your other birds, or time out of his cage? Where is his cage located in relation to where you spend the most time and in relation to your other birds?
At this time keep sitting near to his cage and talking to him with the offer of the occasional treat while you do this as it won't hurt and even if results are slow they are occurring. Be patient, and I will try my best to get you the answers that you need.

[Gab&Den]

Sorry for the wait, my internet was down for a good while, while working more, so here I am, over a month later.

Okay, I feed him pellets and fresh foods daily, when i mentioned the others, I meant to say as a treat in an attempt to get him to come closer. His eyes are a light yellow? I guess they are still somewhat gray. I put him to sleep around 10 and wake him up around 11/12 the next day. I have also relocated him, instead of him being in the same room as the conure (who is as tame as can be), he's now in the room with me. So he can see everything that's going on. I'll open his cage and he plays on it, but will not let anyone take him off it, he kind of just waddles away from us when we get near. So sometimes taking him out can be difficult because getting him to go back in is so dramatic.

He was getting better, but just freaks out now. I think something is happening and he will connect my gf and/or me with it. It's like he blames everything on us.

I most likely will be more prompt with my responses now, and thank you for the help/advice so far.

[Wolf]

Ok, lets start all over, from the beginning, as you are leaving out a lot of information that I asked for. Now I do not mean to be rude in any way, but it is due to the parrots nature that I asked the questions that I did. Those were just the first and most basic bits of information that I need to be of any real use to you, I have even more questions but I usually base those on the replies from the first set of question, I do it this way so as to not be nosey and just ask for what I need to know.
Where are the other birds located? By your statement that you moved him to the room with you, I assume that you are referring to your bedroom, is that correct? With his eyes being yellow though still possibly with some grey still, he should be over a year of age but under two yrs. I am guessing that you are living at home? What room do most of you hang out in and is this the room where the other birds are? Is that the room with the most activity? I am asking this because he is aware of the other birds and he might be better by being closer to them, but still needing the activity of his human flock to make him feel more secure.
The schedule that you have him on is not good for his health. Birds are photoperiodic and this means that they depend on the sun to control their bodily cycles, breeding times and such. The light, both type of light and quality of light affects their emotions, how they think and process information as well as how well and what they see. Light has a major impact on just about everything that makes a bird a bird. Wing clipping is also a thing that affects almost all of the things about a bird and is also important to the birds mental , emotional and physical health and well being and for this reason I do not clip any of my birds. I also do not recommend that you clip yours.
An all seed or all pelleted diet is not healthy for these birds as they are much too high in fats and in protein, the result of overfeeding them either or both of these items is fatty liver disease, heart disease and kidney disease. These birds require a diet of whole grains, vegetables and fruit and a measured amount of seeds and/ or pellets as well as a few nuts thrown in on occasion. We will be happy to discuss this further and help you to set up a good healthy diet for your birds.
All of your birds need to be on a solar light schedule, which, I can see is not going to be easy for you at least to begin with but it is vital to their well being. They need to be uncovered in the mornings so as to be exposed to the twilight that happens in the morning just before dawn and they also need to be exposed to the twilight period in the evening that we call dusk. The special light that occurs at these time are what sets his internal biological clock which in turn controls hormone production in his body. This solar light schedule is the same as all of the wild birds get. Getting up at 11 or 12 oclock and going to bed at 10 or so at night is not good for your bird, he can not adjust to a human light schedule so we must adjust to theirs.
I really need the information that I asked for in my first reply as well as in this reply before I can go any further in making recommendations for you and him.

[Gab&Den]

Yeah, we live in a house, and we feed him (the Senegal) pellets and fresh foods daily. Fresh foods are about 50%, then pellets at about 40% give or take, the rest I leave for treats. He is in our bedroom. The other parrot (the conure) is located In a bedroom across the hall. I would say we spend a considerable amount of time in these two rooms. OH yeah,now that you've mentioned the whole unclipped wings thing(it reminded me, no sarcasm), I think his wings were clipped incorrectly when I first got him, which is probably what led to him losing feathers in the beginning. I feel like that was a key factor to why he would have some angst. We came up wth that recently due to the fact of him not losing a feather since probably around end of January, however he flaps with the same intensity as he did initially.

[Wolf]

It is alright, but clipping their wings even when done correctly is not good for them and it affects their personality. It makes them more fearful and less confident in themselves, it makes them less trusting of their humans as well and it reduces their ability to solve problems.
We are getting better at giving up the information but apparently for some reason you don't want me to know about your birds routine or his environment. I am not trying to pry but I am trying to get enough information so as to help you and your bird to be able to have a trusting relationship. I don't understand what you are afraid of. If you live at your parents home that is fine with me but I need to know who is interacting with the bird. Most people spend the majority of their time in the living room and while it does not matter to me if this is the case or not it is affecting the birds. If that is where most of the household activity is then he may feel that he is being left out and therefore resentful as he can neither see nor participate in those activities. For whatever reason there is for it your bird is fearful after over a year of living with you and this is highly unusual and I am trying to get a picture of what is happening so that I can tell you what needs to be done to help him to get past this. I really want to help him and you but if you will not give me the information that I need to understand why he is behaving in the manner that he is, then I am sorry but there is nothing that I can do to help. With this in mind I will ask again.
What is the birds daily routine? How much time does he have out of his cage daily? Exactly what do you feed him and when do you feed it to him? How much time do you spend each day with him and what do you do at these times? Is the time spent in one long period or is it in shorter intervals? Where is his cage in relation to the amount of activity going on in the house? Are their any other animals around him? Does anyone other than yourself interact with him at all? What does he have for toys to play with? Does he use these toys? is his cage covered or not? Is his cage near a window? How high is his cage? By this, I want to know if he is close to your eye level when you stand near the cage.
Answer all of these questions and I will try to answer your questions as they will help me to see what may be affecting his behavior and how to fix it.

[Pajarita]

My dear, the reason why Wolf is asking all these questions is because birds react both physically and emotionally to their living conditions. Physically because their endocrine system is governed entirely by quantity and quality of light and, to a lesser degree, food (high protein causing hormonal surges), and emotionally because, as highly social animals, they need the same kind of company that nature evolved them to have (and which we have to reproduce in captivity). All parrot species, with the exception of the English or Show budgie, are undomesticated and have identical needs to their wild counterparts and that's why, in order for them to be healthy and well-adjusted, we, the humans, need to adapt to their needs and not the other way around. Aside from this, there are certain techniques that would seem appropriate to us to make a bird feel better about us that, in reality, do exactly the opposite (this is because we think like mammals and use dog approaches which don't work with birds). Timing is also an important issue both for diet and for easing bonding between human and bird.

Now, the fact that you bought this bird already an older juvenile from the breeder worked against you. Breeders don't really socialize their babies and this poor thing must have been, in effect, neglected for all those months after weaning when it's most important to establish the bond. This, added to the fact that you obviously did not know how to proceed to overcome this problem and waited an year before asking for help, made things worse. This does not mean that we cannot help. We can. But it will require switching the bird to a bird light schedule (you have him on a cat schedule because you couldn't call getting up at noon a human one ), putting him on a good diet (40% pellets is not good and, most likely, it's actually a much higher percentage than this because, given a choice, parrots will go for the high protein and not produce) and working on specific techniques -which will not include flooding ones as you have been doing.

So, please, tell us exactly what a typical day is for your bird, what his diet is (exactly - and not what you put out but what he actually eats) and, if there is no real consistency on his routine, please tell us that, too. We can't help you correct whatever it is your doing wrong if we don't know what it is -and yes, you are definitely doing things wrong because, if you weren't, the bird would have bonded to you a long time ago.

[Gab&Den]

I live in a house with my girlfriend, just us two, so we're the only interaction he has. We don't have any other animals besides the dove and our conure, Rita. The top of his cage is a little under my eye level, I'm 6 feet tall.

I've only had the bird since December, I feel like I'm answering your questions, but you're misinterpreting it. (I.e. He is in our bedroom where we spend a considerable amount of time) Our living room isn't used for entertainment purposes, we changed it into a gym.

I wake him up at around 11am, feed him, change water bowls, etc. he has 3 toys in his cage. One I like a rubber whiffle ball with a bell inside. He has a kabob, and also another wooden toy with blocks attached to it. His cage is covered at night.

Time spent outside the cage, I would say is about 2-3 hours daily. He sits on his cage and won't be touched, however, if he floats down to the floor, he will gladly follow the step up command. I interact (sit near his cage and talk shoftly to him while I hand feed him treats) with him for about 15 minutes and then give him a 10 minutes break. This cycle goes on for about an hour. Then we let him watch tv with us from his cage.

I feed him zupreem natural pellets, and the fresh food depends on what I buy from the farmers market that week, carrots, bananas, mango.

His cage is near a window, not directly in front of it though.

And no harm done, I know you're trying to help and I really appreciate it.

[Gab&Den]

I have had the bird for four months guys, December of 2014, until now, March 2015. He is 13 months old, being born, January of 2014. Typical day includes pellets, which he eats all of and fresh foods, mainly dark greens, collards, kale, with carrots and rice. Out of all of that, carrots are his favorite. He also eats strawberry and banana. His diet is mainly pellets supplemented by fresh food and a small amount of seed as treats.

I hope this clears things up.

[Pajarita]

Ok, so he is in the room where his two humans spend most of their time and that's good BUT this means that he will be exposed to a light schedule that is not a strict solar one so I suggest you put a sleeping cage in the bedroom where the GCC is and a day cage in your bedroom. This way, you can leave the sleeping cage uncovered and he will be exposed to dawn and dusk and his endocrine system will be in tune with the seasons, as it should be.

His diet should consist of cooked whole grains mixed with veggies and raw produce for breakfast and all day picking and a measured quantity of high protein food for his dinner; this can be seeds, avicakes, nutriberries or pellets, it's up to you, but I don't think that pellets are the best dietary option for parrots and use a lower protein mix of seeds (for my sennies, it's the same one I use for the larger species, 50% cockatiel mix with some striped sunflower seeds and 50% small psittacine mix which is safflower-based) and a tree nut -usually, walnut or almond but also pistachio, filbert, brazil nut, cashew, etc

Now, as to getting him to bond with you, if he is already comfortable with you, guys, in the same room (which I assume he is), you should start him on a strict routine and some target training. The strict routine is so he feels more comfortable with his life (knowing in advance what is going to happen and when and then have this come to be exactly as expected gives them a sense of control. Your participation in these routines, doing the same thing and saying the same thing all the time, gives him a sense of 'flock interaction' which goes a long way toward his accepting you and your girlfriend as part of his family (timing of these activities to coincide with the wild parrots biorhythms does it, too). The training helps more you than him because it will give you a good opportunity to not only engage him in something that will provide a reward (high value item) which will endear you to him but also to observe his body language and learn how to 'read' him.

A good day should be as follows: exposure to dawn, lights on when sun is out, breakfast, let him out of his cage for flying (this will have to wait until he molts his clipped feathers) and interaction time with a 10 minute training session and just company (talking, singing, giving a treat, etc), rest at noon, interaction when bird becomes active again after the noon rest (around 2 pm but it depends on the individual), training session, company, flying time and training session right before dinner, turn off artificial lights when sun is halfway down to the horizon, serve dinner in sleeping cage, allow bird to eat dinner and roost and go to sleep when night falls. Now, I realize that this does not quite 'match' your own schedule but, unfortunately, birds are not like dogs and cats that adapt to our lifestyle, we need to adapt to theirs.