A huge set back

[macbrush]

While Spencer was sitting on his perch in the living room today, he flew to the ground for no reasons. So I waited until he came to me just in case something freighten him, then I picked him up with a handheld perch. He flew off as soon as I stood up, so I tried again, this time, he was screaming like I was going to kill him, but when I withdrew the perch, he stepped up but just to flew off again after I took a couple of steps. he ran and hid under a non-movable cupboard, so I let him cool off for about an hour in there, but i ended up forcing him to come out with a stick, since I know he will stay in there for a long time if I let him, also he's quite deep inside, and space is very limited (I sealed it afterwards, so he couldn't get in there again). Then the next few more times that i tried, he either screams or growls at me. So I tried approaching him from a distance, moving closer, then when he show sign of relaxing, I praise and move away a little, tried that for over an hour, still when the perch is near him, he screams or growls. Then I left him along for another 30 mins, approached him with a perch, he still growls, but jumped on the perch and stay there until i put him back to his resting perch.

Just now, it was time to put him back to the cage. The whole drama started all over again, almost identical to what happened before, and he finally jumped on the perch (while screaming) and let me put him back to the cage.

I don't know why, but i feel that he suddenly hates being picked up, and definitely doesn't like the handheld perch since today's incident. I may have to start from stepping up inside the cage all over again. Now he's not even interacting with me that much, will only do targeting, and ignores all other commands, now to mention drop anything that I gave him.

Oh well... guess there is much work to be done (again!). The sad thing is the same thing happened before, he's doing stepping up, coming out, going back... etc just fine, and all out of sudden, i had to train him for those things all over again. I don't know if I have done something seriously wrong, or I just have a weird bird...

[Michael]

Go back through the training steps again. It won't take as long as the first time and he should eventually come around.

[macbrush]

Thanks, that seems the best thing to do, to start over. I guess this time i would try to re-enforce everything a bit more, and let him sit on my hand instead of a perch, since I think he might not like the instability of a handheld perch that much.

Did I mention that he lost 4 primary feathers in the whole ordeal? One was with 1cm of blood still inside, but the bleeding stopped almost immediately. It will take a long time for them to grow back, I just hope that it won't do much damage to Spencer's confident, since he did realize he couldn't really fly well at the end.

What's done is done. I will just have to take it, and continue, hopefully on the right path.