New Rainbow Lorikeet

[Gabriel]

Wolf, I think I may have worded that incorrectly. I was mostly referring to cage dominance/territoriality, and setting the 'rules' with living with a human flock.

[Pajarita]

Ahhh, yes, that's completely different. Cage aggression is related to breeding behaviors and, in birds that are well cared for, content with their life and trust their keepers completely, it only happens during breeding season (and, if the bird regards the human as its mate, it doesn't exist) - except in species which use nests all year round (again, even then it might not exist) but the principle is, basically, the same: defense of the nesting site, dominance has nothing to do with it. As to rules for living with a human flock... well, I'll be honest with you, I think that the 'human flock' is a very sweet and romantic concept but not quite realistic because I SERIOUSLY doubt any parrot would really regard a human family as its flock because the dynamics are simply not there except in very rare cases. But, when it comes to cohabiting rules, it depends entirely on whether you expect the bird to adapt to human living conditions or the human to bird living conditions. Personally, I think that ALL failed parrot/human relationships are always caused by the human expecting the bird to adapt, like a dog would, instead of the other way around.

[Wolf]

I think that for my understanding so that I can answer you correctly I will still need more information about setting rules for living with a human flock.
Cage dominance/ territoriality is another matter. Sometimes this is influenced by such factors as too small of a cage, particularly when the bird spend a large part of the day confined to it. Sometimes it may be a matter of hormones and strongest during breeding season and while they would be raising their young. But mostly it is a matter of their nature in that in the wild good nesting places can be difficult to find and just as hard to keep so it is their nature to defend such a place. For this reason I tend to respect the birds right to protect and defend this space, which means that I open the door to the cage and I wait for the bird to come out on its own before I clean the cage or even ask the bird to step up for me. I often change their food and water with them in the cage, but I try to keep my intrusion into their personal space to the absolute minimum. It is much the same as my protecting and defending my home and everyone and everything in it, so I don't perceive it to be a dominance thing so much as an equality issue. In their social structure birds are not dominate they are equals and they act and expect you to act in this same manner, as equals.

[Gabriel]

I've read that behaviors in baby birds like beaking can lead to biting once the bird grows older, if not dealt with correctly. How do you discourage similar behaviors in young birds?

[Pajarita]

You don't, actually. Beaking is the same as when babies put everything in their mouth so it's not a behavior that you want to inhibit as it's part of their development -beaking allows them to taste, identify textures, shapes, etc , it's a learning process for parrots. It's nipping that has to be discouraged but even that depends on the situation, meaning you need to determine what happened that made the bird nip you. Was it that the bird was actually warning you of danger? Was it that you insisted on something the bird had 'told' you he did not want to do? Was it that he was asleep and suddenly startled awake?

[Gabriel]

I've read of many situations where a young bird bonds very closely with a person, then suddenly bonds with another member of the household, and becomes aggressive towards their previous owners. Is there a way to prevent this from happening?

[Wolf]

Yes and no ! Again you are dealing with a natural process of growing up. For lack of better words it is called puberty. It is the process in which the young bird becomes an adult, you know raging hormones and all of that. But it also involves a change in personality to some degree in the parrot and it releases the bond with its parents or in the case of a captive bird its current caregiver, so that it can choose a mate to bond with. In a captive bird this sometimes means that it will choose another human rather than the one that raised it. This is a normal process that can't be stopped.
If it happens that your bird chooses another person, the only way to change this is to keep that person away from the bird until it choose you again and then hope that it holds. Pajarita may have a different take on this as she knows more than I do, but I don't think that it will be much different.

[Pajarita]

No, I agree with what you posted, Wolf, but that only applies to companion species, not aviary ones. The aviary ones become aloof to all human beings once they reach sexual maturity -that's why they are called 'aviary'.

[Gabriel]

I have read that you can also prevent this behavior in a young bird by having lots of different people handle him and having the whole household give him equal attention.

[Wolf]

I disagree. All of the evidence that I am aware of says that you can sometimes help the bird to accept other people as flock mates, for lack of a better way to say it. This does help with the bird that would otherwise be biting everyone except for its chosen human, in many cases but it has no impact on who the choose as that human as a baby( the parent/ child bond) nor on who the bird chooses to bond with after puberty ( the mate bond). As long as it is not done too soon or too frequently socialization is a wonderful tool, but like most things you have to be very aware of the bird as it can backfire if done at the wrong time or in the wrong manner and cause an anxious bird to become a fearful bird. This is because it can also be very stressful to them, it depends on the individual bird.