Help with target training

[Brony B]

I have a young Fischer Lovebird, approximately 8 weeks out of the nest. His name is Skittles, I bought him home 2 weeks ago. I target trained him inside the cage as he was not tame. He took to it really well and I can target him anywhere around the cage.

Now he is stepping up onto a handheld perch or my hand and we are using a training perch. My problem is that he refuses to target outside of the cage. I have held the target stick for a while and also held it quite close to him but he isn't interested. I've tried target training 4 days in a row but he's not showing any interest. It's strange because he will still target inside the cage.

I'm a first time parrot owner, I'm not sure what to do to progress with training. Any advice?

Thank you in advance!

[Wolf]

Yes! Slow down and hold off of the training for a while, at least a month or two. Please consider that you have a baby bird that you have just acquired and brought it to a new place that it is totally unfamiliar with and you are also a new person and it is afraid. It is afraid of both you and its new environment and needs time to acclimate to both. You would be far wiser to spend this time gaining the birds trust buy sitting with it and talking to it with the occasional treat offered until the bird come to you of its own volition and giving it some free time out of the cage on a daily basis, even if the free time is just it hanging out on top of its cage. Learn to read your birds body language and do some research into the proper diet for this bird and switching it to that. There will be plenty of time for training later and probably with much greater results.

[Pajarita]

Wolf is correct, you have a baby in your hands and babies do not want to and should not have to work. He targets inside his cage because there is nothing else for him to do, my dear, but, once he is out, freedom has a strong appeal all of its own... Mind you, lovies are not your typical parrot that would be willing to work for food and food is the only thing that makes a parrot work because obedience or eagerness to please is not in their psychological make up so I seriously doubt you will be able to make him do much after he grows up.

[Brony B]

Thank you both for your advice! I have spent the last few days bringing him out of his cage and letting him explore. He is very comfortable sitting on my shoulder! I've read mixed opinions on whether or not to let birds sit on your shoulder but I'm not comfortable to stop him doing it if it's what he wants to do while he's getting to know me. He's much more comfortable and excited to come out of his cage now

By the way - at the moment he is on a seed only diet (came from the breeder on this diet) but we have introduced some fresh fruit and veggies and pellets. I'm hoping to slowly change him to a pellet based diet

[Wolf]

I must admit that I do not have any lovebirds, although I do have a parrotlet and for the purposes of diet they are very similar. Small birds such as these are not he best candidates for a pellet based diet.
The very first issue that I have with feeding pellets is that they tend to be full of artificial additives, sugars and dyes none of which are good for your bird and can lead to many different types of problems later on. This may take a year or more to become evident but I try to avoid these types of issues from the beginning. Another problem for me with using pellets is due to the dryness of them. In order for the bird to digest them they end up going through hydration/ dehydration cycles because the pellets will draw the moisture needed for digestion from the tissues surrounding them, which causes the dehydration part of the cycle. This will cause your bird to require more water than is normal for them. Some of these birds have a genetically based water conservation method or two built in and I feel that the super dry food of pellets runs afoul of this mechanism in these birds. So if you must use pellets for your bird, please limit it to about 20% of their daily diet or less and only use 100% organic pellets with no additives for them and make sure that they get plenty of raw vegetables and greens.
I also don't stop birds from perching on my shoulder unless they start biting too much.

[Pajarita]

I also allow any bird who wants shoulder time to go on my shoulder. But, when it comes to lovies, as long as they are not babies or clipped, they never stop longer than a minute or so there and most of them liked been on my head much better than my shoulder... well, unless they could find a neck or sleeve opening, then they would go in very happily and stay for a few minutes (they love tunnels).

[Brony B]

He isn't eating many pellets, he's a fussy little guy! I'm struggling to introduce vegetables, he isn't showing much interest. At the moment he will nibble on Apple which I offer as an occasional treat. I'm not sure how to improve his diet as he came from a seed-only aviary. Do you have any suggestions? Sorry if this sounds like a silly question, I'm very new to parrot ownership!

I'll continue letting him perch on my shoulder, he seems to like sitting on my head lately too!

Thank you for your help!

[Wolf]

Parrots are suspicious little creatures especially when it comes to new foods. Unlike some types of animals which will eat just about anything or others that seem to be born knowing what to eat, parrots are born without knowing what to eat or even how to eat or drink and must be taught how to eat as well as what to eat and this task belongs to its parents or in the case of hand raised birds to the surrogate parents, meaning us. This can be a very frustrating process as they always end up tossing a new food out of the food dish or out of the cage. You end up needing to get creative with the way the food is prepared and offered to the bird for example your bird may refuse to try raw chopped carrots so you grate the carrot to see if it will eat it that way and then perhaps after trying 4 or 5 different ways you discover that the bird loves to eat carrots when they are cooked and mashed. A week later the bird refused to eat the carrots this way and it is back to the drawing board and this time the bird will only eat them in thin spears and raw but only if you wedge or tie them to the cage bars for them.
Patience and Persistence along with a certain amount of creativity are your tools to a better diet for your bird. Another thing that often helps if for you to prepare several samples of the food that you want them to try and put these on a plate near some of the same food prepared for you and sit down and talk to your bird while munching on the food and letting it know how good the food is and how much you are enjoying it. Then watch for him to start wanting some and then to start begging or demanding a piece and then offering a piece of one of the samples until he begins to eat this food. This often helps because for a parrot eating is a social event as well as a bonding activity.
It really shouldn't be a big deal as to whether your bird sits on your shoulder or on your head, however if your hair is longer then there is a chance that the bird can get tangled in and caught by your hair if they sit on your head. There may also be the issue of little bird presents in your hair of the kind that you may not want there, but then you could always wear a hat of some sort to deal with both of these issues.

[Pajarita]

All my lovies loved to perch on my head so I would not worry much over it.

Try to make the easy gloop recipe (Kashi's 7 whole grain pilaf with a can of small white beans and/or lentils mixed with mixed veggies, chopped broccoli and chunks of baked or boiled sweet potatoes). Lovies are actually very good eaters compared to other small species (like tiels and budgies), they like their fruits, veggies and greens so it's just a matter of timing. Take the seed bowl out when they go to sleep and replace early in the am with warm gloop and fresh produce and leave it there all day until dinnertime (sunset) when you take it out and replace it with a budgie and/or cockatiel seed mix. The first few days, mix a little tiny bit of seeds in the gloop but, as you see they are eating it, eliminate them from breakfast and leave them only for dinner.