Teaching mango to step up without using his beak

[Nir]

Mango knows step up but he usually uses his beak just a little bit while stepping up. this is fine but i have been trying to teach him to wave and its kind of hard to do since he uses his beak to step up. he never pulls with his beak but just keeps his head low while stepping up. But teaching wave requires you to put your finger as you would stepping him up and as soon as he lifts 1 leg you stop, praise him and treat him. However since his head is always low, he never really gets to that part so i decided i will teach him to step up without him having to put his head down.

So any help on how to do this? so far i am using another stick to keep his focus on the stick and then he steps up fine so perhaps i should keep doing that? any help is greatly appreciated.

[Pajarita]

My dear, this is what parrots do. They use their beak as a hand and almost always put it down before they step up anywhere. It's not good to try to deviate their habits so much from what nature meant for them to be.

[Eric&Rebecca]

They use their beak to climb and stepping up is a form of climbing. He's testing the strength of your finger. I don't think it's something you can get him or stop or is advisable to discourage. If he starts doing it of his own accord then great but I wouldn't push it too much.

[Nir]

dang so any other ways i can teach him to wave or should i just abort that trick?

[janetafloat]

My Sennie always used to use his beak to step up but he's mostly stopped doing that now (I've had him 3 months) and he learnt 'wave' with no trouble. I'd suggest that when you have him step up hold a small treat up at beak height to keep his head up and he'll learn that he doesn't need to use his beak every time.

[Nir]

My Sennie always used to use his beak to step up but he's mostly stopped doing that now (I've had him 3 months) and he learnt 'wave' with no trouble. I'd suggest that when you have him step up hold a small treat up at beak height to keep his head up and he'll learn that he doesn't need to use his beak every time.

ya i use my target stick to distract him. but a treat would work to. i guess i will just keep doing it and see what happens. no rush. on a side note , i just made him a pvc table perch for training.

[marie83]

I dont see any need to abort the trick but you might want to withold a while as yours is still pretty young. As he heads to maturity his balence should improve and he will naturally grab with his beak less if your holding your finger steady and and the right height.

[KimberlyAnn]

I dont see any need to abort the trick but you might want to withold a while as yours is still pretty young. As he heads to maturity his balence should improve and he will naturally grab with his beak less if your holding your finger steady and and the right height.

That makes a lot of sense! I have this issue with this trick too and now that you brought up balance, I will wait.

[Nir]

I dont see any need to abort the trick but you might want to withold a while as yours is still pretty young. As he heads to maturity his balence should improve and he will naturally grab with his beak less if your holding your finger steady and and the right height.

good advice. Any other beginner tricks i can work on? I was thinking fetch?

[janetafloat]

Alfie got 'round' (turn?) down really quick and now twirls on his training perch hoping for a treat every time!