Change in personality

[Munchy]

The past few days Disney has been acting strange. He is about 15 to 16 months old now and I have heard about their personalities changing as they mature. Disney is having a strange fascinating with the top of my head. He is constantly flying to it. I always remove him as I don't want his feet getting tangled in my long hair. He'll be on my hand then fly to the top, I remove him and the cycle repeats very fast. I am pretty good now at getting my hand there first so he lands on it and I bring him back down, but he gets frustrated with this then starts attacking me. Plus he flies around in a very fast and uncontrollable manner. He is getting to be difficult and I am not wanting to deal with him when he is like this. Have I spoiled him? or is this some kind of bird hormone change? When he settles down he is great. It's like he has had a shot of espresso. You can just see his little birdy eyes looking at the top of my head and know what's coming next.

[felix11]

My birds used to try to do this all the time - when they land on my head I shake it until they fly off. They now know it is not a safe perch. It didn't affect their trust in me at all.

[Michael]

You've been rewarding him for going there. I don't see this as a personality change at all. He probably thinks your head is a fun place to play but being picked up and given attention is good too. If he is fully flighted, I would shake my head right before he's about to land so he can't even get a grip and has to fly elsewhere. Then he'll learn that heads are unstable and not try to land on them because he can't.

[Munchy]

I am stuck at home for a month or so, Doctors orders, so maybe I'll work on his tameness. He is pretty tame but he does not like me to touch him on my own, he likes to choose when I can touch him. I touch him more and more during play and it has been working, but I'd like him not to be afraid of me.

There have been other sources that have mentioned reading a birds body language and not touching them or reaching over there heads when they obviously don't want it, so it can be a bit confusing.

Whether I should try to tame him out of that, or respect his desire not to be touched when he doesn't want to be.

[Michael]

I don't see it as a matter of respecting their natural boundaries vs subjecting them to my desires. First off, they are living as a pet in the human environment so certain things may be unnatural but are a necessity. Cage, step up, eating bird food, etc are not natural by any means anyway. Instead, I take a behavioral approach. I believe that by A) Not clipping their wings and B) using positive reinforcement to get them to do or allow us to do what we want is fair. If the parrot is getting something in return for the behavior that makes it more likely to occur in the future (ex touching where it hates being touched but allows it more willingly with time/treats), then the reward outweighs the discomfort and we aren't overstepping boundaries. Flight is also necessary because if the only reason they are doing it is because they can't get away, we may be causing undo psychological distress. This is why I recommend the target training and taming approaches that I do.