The importance of training handling and lifting.

[cml]

I have not posted in a little while, but I want to share with you all my view on training your bird to accept to be grabbed and lifted.

First off, I would like to take a small moment to specify that I do not train my birds to be handled or lifted because I think it's cute, a nice trick or anything similar. They get this training because I believe that when there is an accident or emergency, its paramount that you are able to quickly grab your bird and either tend to an injury or get the hell out in case of fire or the like.

For you that do not know me (I've noticed quite a big influx of new members); I have two parrots, Stitch - a white fronted amazon, and Leroy - a bronze winged pionus.

Here's how they are when it comes to basic handling:

Stitch is very tame and I can lift him up, hold him upside down, walk about with him, check his wings etc. Head scratches is about the best thing in the world. To get him this way has taken a lot of time and effort of course, but its been done through preseverance and positive reinforcement. Stitch has been with us since he was roughly 3 months, and was hand raised.

Leroy on the other hand is not as tame. He came to us when he was roughly 9 months old, and he had lived in an aviary before that and was not treated well. He's our precious little "rescue bird". I've worked so damn hard to get him tame, but even after more than two years, he's just about started to actually accept me starting to lift him (he now walks into my hand). Actually grabbing him, or doing a proper lifting up from the perch freaks him out though and he flies off. He'll tolerate/sometimes enjoy head scratches. Even though he doesnt like being touched, he ALWAYS comes on flight recalls and ALWAYS (no matter what) steps up.

Now, in the last few months, we've had two accidents here, and one with each bird.

Stitch broke a claw resulting in lots of blood starting to pump out, and Leroy broke a primary feather today which didnt break off, causing him lots of stress and discomfort. Stitch, being so used to being handled and being very tame I could just grab and put his foot into potato flour, stopping the bleeding. There was no stress, and he just looked a little suprised I grabbed and lifted him without saying so first.

Leroy on the other hand totally stressed out when the half broken feather started poking at him, and started panicking and flying around our house. I tried to grab him, but he just wouldnt let me. You could see he was in pain and discomfort from the feather and everytime he landed it hit the perch, causing him to think something was poking/attacking him. He got more and more stressed until I was finally able to catch him with a towel and clip the broken feather. He then immediatly calmed down and is now fine.

So whats my point here? Had Leroy been more tame we could have avoided him being stressed out more than necessary. In this case, it's not because we havnt worked on it, but because we havnt yet succeeded, but if you DONT even work on handling your parrot, I feel thats irresponsible and you could save your bird a lot of stress by doing so. EVERY bird owner should do this, and if you dont know how to, take a look at Michael's blog: http://trainedparrot.com/taming

For the people who say that they dont believe in training: I sincerely believe you are wrong and have the wrong mindset about parrot keeping. You shouldnt train birds just to perform nifty tricks, you train them so that when its necessary, they do as you say and so that they trust you. Training is a fun and rewarding way to reinforce the bond between you and your parrot, and it motivates it to see you as a fun and nice individual to be with.

And because this has turned into a wall of text, here's two random photos of Stitch and Leroy :

[Michael]

Thanks for posting. This is what I've always been saying. But not just for accidents but also for building a reflationship based on complete trust. You trust the bird not to bite and the bird trusts you to hold it.

Weren't you one of the skeptics thatpreviously believed it was unnecessary to grab and hold a parrot in this manner? What changed your mind to begin the training?

[cml]

Thanks for posting. This is what I've always been saying. But not just for accidents but also for building a reflationship based on complete trust. You trust the bird not to bite and the bird trusts you to hold it.

Exactly !

Weren't you one of the skeptics thatpreviously believed it was unnecessary to grab and hold a parrot in this manner? What changed your mind to begin the training?

No, I've always believed in training and have been doing that right from the start.

I think you are possibly mixing it up with how to respond to bites, where I was sceptic to the "dont do anything" approach (and instead reward nice behaviour) when I started keeping parrots, and instead I back then said "no" and put the parrot down. This was a few years ago and lead to a biting issue with Stitch, which we had to work really hard to overcome. Blood and hard work let us untrain biting though and Stitch has been very sweet for the past 2 years, even through his hormonal phase, reaching sexual maturity . He's now 3.5 years old!

[Tman007]

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Andy in his lazyboy

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I have my two that I can hold, Andy the GCC I can just pick right up with no problems. I have big hands and he just lays back on my hand hangs on to my thumb and looks like he is in a lazboy LOL. and I can walk around with him like that. Now Amos will let me lay him down on his back, I Can put my hand around him but not hold him like Andy because he is to big. But when I lay him on his back on the table. ( I have a rug on the table for them) he will let me trim his talons. And so will Andy. I haven't started to work with them on the around the neck hold. But Andy will lay in my hand for 15 minutes to 1/2 hr. He just like to do it. The command I tell them when I want them to lay on their back is down. and they both will let me lay them on their back.

[Lizz]

You all know that I do not train. What I do is teach. Rambo has been teaching me and he has given Myrtle a new word: HELP She knows how to use it and knows that Mom comes running when it is yelled.

[cml]

He's tiny Tman!!!

[Pajarita]

You all know that I do not train. What I do is teach. Rambo has been teaching me and he has given Myrtle a new word: HELP She knows how to use it and knows that Mom comes running when it is yelled.

EXACTLY! I don't believe in training, I believe in teaching the same way that one would teach a child how to behave - a bit every day, ignoring bad behavior and rewarding good and always loving them and respecting their wishes.

But even highly trained animals (birds, dogs, horses, etc) would not respond to commands when they are badly hurt or scared. Following a command is a learned behavior while their reaction to fear or intense pain is reflexive or instinctual and both trump learned in extreme situations.