Newton's screaming problems

[Wolf]

Just carry on as if nothing out of the ordinary has occurred, he may be a little mad at being grabbed, but you did not hurt him and did the best you knew to do so his anger will be very short lived and is probably already forgiven.

[liz]

If you have to grab him to save him, use the word help so he learns it. You should not have put him back in his cage. You should have opened your hand as soon as you cleared the danger. I always ask "do you need help?" When possible scoop instead of grab.

Rambo actually calls for help when he needs it. Myrtle does not say the word but knows the meaning when I say it.

[Pajarita]

Don't worry about it, he will forgive you and he will learn to maneuver better and avoid crashes. But the best thing to avoid this type of problem is to bird-proof the room where he is going to be allowed to fly in or the whole house if he is going to have access to it.

[Harpmaker]

When my baby Meyer's crashed in a cramped area, I grabbed her target stick and held it where I could offer a step-up, then said "target" and she climbed right over and then got on my finger. We were all surprised it worked because she had never practiced targeting outside the cage. They are smart, even as babies.

On the other hand, she WAS handraised, so looked to people for help.

[Spyke]

I need some help here.

He is screaming, and screaming and screaming. But i cannot get him to stop. His screaming has stopped being cute and charming, and is now starting to become a real problem. It's not a few minutes at the time either. It's continuously from i wake up at 9am, to around 2/3pm.

I am trying not to reward him for screaming by ignoring him when he does, and giving him attention when he is quiet. Does not seem to help. I've also tried calling out to him if he starts screaming when i am not in the room.

Thing is, he starts screaming when i am in the living room with him. I am literary sitting just a few meters from him all day.

This is getting serious.
I live in a apartment, so i am so scared of my neighbors getting enough at some point and demanding it to stop. My own brain is also getting tired, although that is not nearly as important.

He is eating right. His poop is solid and consistent. He get's fruits and veggies every morning. I spend hours by his cage, or take him out. He has started playing with his toys a little. He is slowly starting to take an interest in me as another individual, not just a food dispenser. So what in gods name is causing him this obvious horrible agony?

I've been thinking about moving him into my bedroom, where i have light cancelling curtains, so i can turn off the light if he starts screaming for apparently no reason, like it seems he is now.

I do really need some help here, i am afraid i will lose him if i don't figure out what he is missing or what i am doing wrong.

[Wolf]

Tell me what his schedule is, including what time he gets up and goes to bed, what he is eating and when, how much out of cage time he gets and how much of that time is on you. Most parrots scream because they are hungry, in pain or are lonely and need reassurance. With this in mind do not ignore him when he screams, at the very least answer him and choose a word, a phrase or a whistle to answer him with. I use a whistle as most people are not overly annoyed by a whistle. If he will quiet down a little when you answer go see what he is screaming about. If he is out of food give him more as there should always be some food for him to eat, How are you making your gloop? if it does not have the right ingredients in it then he may be hungry no matter how much he eats as he would not be getting proper nutrition. If he is lonely hold him and let him hang out on you. If you have not had him in for a check up since you got him, please consider getting this done. Do you cover his cage at night or is there light keeping him awake after dark? What about noise level while he is sleeping?
As you can tell by this reply there are many possible reasons for his screaming and several possible answers so the more that you can tell us about his daily routine the better we can help you.

[Pajarita]

Wolf is right, there could be many reasons why he is screaming constantly so, please, give us more details so we can help you fix it because he could be tired and cranky from not enough quality sleep (like a baby would get when overly tired), he could be hungry from lack of soft foods, he could have a medical problem like sour or slow crop, he could be lonely, etc. Personally, I think it might be a combination of things with the main one been loneliness. The thing with baby parrots is that we tend to think of them as little mammals like a puppy or a kitten which are fine as long as they are in the same room with us and we play with them for a couple of hours but baby parrots are never, ever, ever alone, and by that I don't mean been able to see or hear somebody, I mean been next to another body 24/7/365 (touching, feeling the warmth of the other body). Having a baby parrot is like having a baby, you need to spend every single moment the baby is awake with him/her or they cry - and this what your baby is doing, he is crying for attention and ignoring him or covering him during the day will only make things worse because it will deepen the sense of abandonment.

[Spyke]

I turn off his lights 8:30PM, and put a blanket over his cage at 9PM. There is activity in the apartment to around 11/midnight. But after that it is completely quiet. I take off his blanket again around 9AM.

He still won't eat his gloop unless i feed it to him. (The gloop i make is Pajarita's recipe i found in another thread). He always has fresh water in his cage. I also make sure he has a supply of either pellets or fresh fruit in his bowl.

When he screams, i have tried calling out "hello" or whistle to him. Walking over to him and sitting down next to him sometimes helps, sometimes don't. He may take a second to look at me, but then continues screaming. Other times he doesn't pay attention to me at all and just sit there screaming.

His poop still looks good, and he eats well. To be honest, i've been a little reluctant to have him out of the cage after the episodes where he crashes. I've usually opened the top of his cage and let him explore a little or made him fly over to me to get a treat.

Yesterday i thought i'd take it a little further (thinking flying might make him tired) and had him fly longer distances to get over to me. He also took flight and had a few rounds in the living room before landing back on his cage. That was very reassuring to see, so i will definitely have him out more now.

I have not had him checked, no. I am waiting for a dna test from a clinic, but not a health check. I have not seen any indications of decease or injury, as he's usually always active.

When he is out, i try sitting down next to the cage so he can come over to me if he wants to. He won't unless i have a treat for him.

[Wolf]

I am normally a real pain about keeping a bird to a natural solar light schedule, but in your case, living as far north as you do, I am unsure that you can do that. It depends on the length of your days and nights as to whether this will help or whether you need to go with special lighting options to keep him healthy.
As long as you free feed him pellets, he will not eat the gloop in the manner that he should. This is due to the pellets being a high protein type of food, so he will choose to eat that before eating the healthier gloop. Try to consider that foods high in protein or fat are like candy for a child. Just as you would not feed a child candy all day long, you need to restrict the pellets to just his evening meal and remove it when he goes to bed for the night. Leaving him fruit for all day eating is good, but I would also include fresh vegetables with it and let him have as much of the gloop as he cares to eat all day as well. He will need to eat a little more of these foods to satisfy his nutritional needs, but that will also help him as he will feel fuller than he will on pellets and this may help to reduce some of his screaming.
Your bird really needs to spend at least 4 to 5 hours out of his cage every day with at least one hour of it perching and/or climbing around on you. If bribery is a useful tool to encourage this behavior then by all means use it as it will also reduce the screaming.
When a new bird, especially a young bird who doesn't yet fly well is given the opportunity to fly about in your house, it is normal that there will be a few crashes until he learns the layout of the room or house. As he is allowed to continue to be out where he can fly the crashes become less frequent and softer. This activity also tends to help reduce the amount of screaming.
When working with a bird that uses their flock call to locate me, I always answer with a whistle that I want them to use instead of screaming for me. The way that I do this is to listen to the bird and try to pick a suitable whistle from the ones that the bird already uses as it is easier to get them to use such a whistle than one that I pick out of the blue, so to speak. Birds are also more likely to respond to you when you use one that they use. It does take a little time to convert them from a screamer to a whistler, but it is so worth it that you don't want to get discouraged and give up on it.

[Pajarita]

Wolf, calling back to an adult bird that is vocalizing is the right thing to do but this is a baby that has not had enough touching interaction and that's why he is screaming even when people are sitting next to him - this company is not enough for a baby, it's like expecting a human baby to stop crying just because we sit next to him. It doesn't work because the baby wants to be picked up. And it's the same with a baby bird. Puppies need to be next to a warm body, so do kittens, human babies and baby birds.

Please spend much more time with him on you or he will grow up disaffected.