Biting Ringneck - why

[mllesra]

Hello all!
My boyfriend and I rescued a male indian ringneck 3 years ago, his name is Tikkie. He was around 3 years old when we adopted him, he will be 6 this year. He is fully flighted. Before we adopted him, he was at a rescue for ~2 years, and with a family for his first year or so. He lived with another ringneck who was adopted out before him.

I have a question regarding biting.

Tikkie, for the most part, is very well behaved with me. If I am home alone and let him out, he is for the most part a well behaved gentleman. I am only one he allows "inside" his cage, to refill his foraging ball with treats, etc without attempting to bite. He enjoys sitting on my shoulder, and does not bite, but will mimic my whistles, etc and be a good bird.

The problem is when my boyfriend is home. Tikkie will land on Shawn more than me if we are both present. However, he almost always will bite/gnaw his hoodie/shoulder consistently without letting up, to the point where he will contact with skin and hurt Shawn. If Shawn has treats, Tikkie will not do this when there are treats present.

Shawn has tried not responding to his bites, but it doesn't seem to have an effect.
Has anyone else had a similar experience? Could Tikkie be jealous of Shawn? I'm not quite sure what to do to get him to stop his biting.

Thanks much!
Sarah

[Wolf]

Parrots are very smart as you have no doubt noticed and they rarely do anything, especially of this nature without a reason. Do you think that treats may be the cause of this behavior? Such as in the bird is acting out as a way of insuring that he gets the treats that he wants. Perhaps the way to approach this would be to give him one treat and then make him wait and try to reward him with praise and head and/ or beaks scratches/ rubs. Perhaps another approach to this would be to incorporate some training into his schedule. Perhaps work with teaching him flight recall so that instead of just getting the treats that he is demanding that he has to work for the treats a little bit. Flight recall is great exercise and is also a useful ability for both the bird and his humans. What do you think?

[liz]

Wolf is right. Birds have a lot of energy and need a lot of exercise. Since birds do not have finger tips they check things out with their mouths. All of us have "parrot clothes" with holes in them. I have forfeited the top button on all my shirts. They love to chew and really must to keep their beaks in good condition. All you can do is protect the things you do not want bit.

When my son comes over he has to protect his legs and feet. Rambo has a passion for feet. He preens his own more than he should. He preens Myrtle's feet when she holds still long enough and will preen my toes if he gets into my bed before I wake up. That is a strange feeling to wake up too.

[Wolf]

Coming back to this, it occurs to me that, perhaps I should have also mentioned that a lot of the chewing on the clothes is a normal thing and you are unlikely to change it very much, except where treats might be the cause of it. I am not a follower of the stiff upper lip, give no response to a biting bird. First of all no self respecting bird is going to tolerate another bird biting and chewing excessively on them, they are going to squawk and move away from the bird that is doing this and if that fails they will attempt to intimidate the offending bird or bite back as a last resort.

I find no value in allowing a bird to bite me. I do understand that sometimes they get carried away when playing or checking things out with their beaks, but when they start using too much pressure I will try to distract them from biting on me and failing in this, I do tell them, " Be Gentle" or " No Bite" or some other term or phrase, just be consistent and use the same word or phrase each time and then I also put the bird down when it bites. The best and most effective way to teach a bird to not bite is for you to avoid the bite altogether.

Hope that this helps you.

[Pajarita]

Welcome to the forum!

It seems to me that you have two things going on here:
1) when Shawn gives Tikkie a treat to 'distract' him from biting his clothing so hard that he actually bites his flesh, too, he is, in reality, rewarding a bad behavior.
2) jealousy - because, if this was a completely normal behavior for Tikkie, he would do it to you, too - and he doesn't.

Now, chewing clothes IS, indeed, a normal behavior in parrots (and that's why we all have what we call 'parrot clothes' that are full of holes ) BUT they know very well when they are just grabbing clothes and when they go 'deeper' and grab flesh. Chewing clothes are, mostly, a show of affection (they are preening us) but, when they do it hard and bite the flesh, it's not normal behavior but a subtle (or not so subtle) sign of aggression. I have a male Senegal that attacked me relentlessly for over 3 years (he did it every chance he got and the entire time I was in the birdroom -I still have the scars from his attacks) but, slowly and surely, he became my friend and he does not bite me now (as a matter of fact, he has become almost a Velcro bird because he insists on been on me almost all the time he is outside his cage). Normally, he just talks my ear off and simply rides my shoulder or hangs upside down from my chest closely looking at what I am doing but, in the last couple of weeks, he has taken to 'pecking' my hair and clothes (he grabs a pinch of them in his beak and he quickly pulls hard on them and releases them). But he has been doing it a bit too hard and would, sometimes, end up causing some mild pain because, although one would think that this is just due to the fact that, as I wear just a TShirt or a top made of some other 'light' material, it's an easy thing to end up pinching me or pulling too hard on my hair without meaning to but I know he knows he is doing it too hard.

I also never believed the 'be stoic and don't show pain' when the parrot bites you position. I think it's ridiculous! Parrots are highly intelligent as well as empathetic so, when they cause pain, they know very well what they are doing. In his case, I just go "OWWW! Stop it!" when it happens or "BE CAREFUL!" when he starts gently (because he tends to escalate it). I don't make a big deal of it because I know he is doing it from a bit of sexual frustration (the female Senegal is not 'putting out' and we are in breeding season - he has been chewing up 'nests' and dancing for her but he has, apparently, not 'impressed' her enough ) and that, once he stops producing sexual hormones in a couple of months, he will go back to been gentle. But, if this is something that has been happening for a while or has been escalating, I suggest you:
a) re-evaluate your husbandry because he could be overly-hormonal from an incorrect light schedule and/or diet
b) stop rewarding the bad behavior
c) avoid confrontations
d) redirect the aggression through training and distraction

Let me know if you want me to elaborate on these suggestions.

[seagoatdeb]

Hello all!
My boyfriend and I rescued a male indian ringneck 3 years ago, his name is Tikkie. He was around 3 years old when we adopted him, he will be 6 this year. He is fully flighted. Before we adopted him, he was at a rescue for ~2 years, and with a family for his first year or so. He lived with another ringneck who was adopted out before him.

I have a question regarding biting.

Tikkie, for the most part, is very well behaved with me. If I am home alone and let him out, he is for the most part a well behaved gentleman. I am only one he allows "inside" his cage, to refill his foraging ball with treats, etc without attempting to bite. He enjoys sitting on my shoulder, and does not bite, but will mimic my whistles, etc and be a good bird.

The problem is when my boyfriend is home. Tikkie will land on Shawn more than me if we are both present. However, he almost always will bite/gnaw his hoodie/shoulder consistently without letting up, to the point where he will contact with skin and hurt Shawn. If Shawn has treats, Tikkie will not do this when there are treats present.

Shawn has tried not responding to his bites, but it doesn't seem to have an effect.
Has anyone else had a similar experience? Could Tikkie be jealous of Shawn? I'm not quite sure what to do to get him to stop his biting.

Thanks much!
Sarah

My take on what is going on here, is that the parrot has made a mate bond/favorite human bond to you and your husband is a flock member, so he relates to him different. Some parrots only allow the other human to give treats or help them with what they "want" Your husband may have to work a lot harder to be able to gain enough trust that he can do more without getting bittten. Learning to "read" the signs the parrot is likely to bite and avoid it can help.

There are many ways to help with biting and many posts on this forum, if you search. One way, I found to help my Red Belly who is very inclinned to be a one person parrot is to let other people do a clicker training where the only thing she has to do is touch a stick to get a treat. She loves this game and will allow almost anyone to do this one with her and it speeds up her learning to accept people more and be nicer to them.