New Senegal in family. Starting to bite when stepping up on

[Julie c]

Hi, my husband and I adopted a 10 yr old female Senagal named Sophie a few weeks ago. Her first home was with an elderly person who no longer could care for her. She moved into a good home with many dogs and other birds and children. She lived with this family for a year. The family seemed very caring and knowledgeable but Sophie did not thrive in this busy environment. We took her in as we were looking to adopt a bird, since our last feathered friend died last year.
In her previous home she did step ups on a stick as she tended to bite.
When she moved in with us, the second day she easily stepped up on our hands and sat on our shoulder. She seemed to settle in well to our quieter home. We worked on getting her used to our home and routine. She shared some of our veggie and fruit snacks eagerly, and hung out with us in the mornings and evenings.
She started greeting us with a side to side step dance, beak clicking and regurgitation. We responded with positive greetings. She started asking for head scratches within a week.
It has been two weeks now and yesterday she was taken out of her night cage as per usual and bit quite hard. I did not react to it well and got her off as quickly as I could. Throughout the day, I tried doing step ups with my hand and got bit each time. She would Step up and then lash out.
I am wondering why this change in her attitude. Did we encourage sexual behavior and she is frustrated? Is she trying to assert dominance? Is she frustrated or scared?
I have since the bitting returned to using the stick for step ups. I am near her and talk to her calmly but am not greeting her with too much enthusiasm. Her diet consists of pellets, veggies, some fruit, beans. She is getting about 11 hours of sleep, and some naps during the day. She does not seem to play with any toys we've provided, but is curious about her surroundings and exploring some.
Please help, I would love for her to be trusting of us and have some physical contact.

[liz]

Welcome to the forum.

By stepping up for you and sitting on your shoulder she is trying to claim your home as hers. It is surprising that it is happening within two weeks. She is a fast learner and is trying to trust you. The bites mean that she is still scared.

She is old enough and smart enough to accept when you say something when bit. I say owe but most say ouch. She is ready to know that she hurts you with her bites and will ease up on them. If I am busy and Myrtle wants my attention she has resorted to pinching me. I was very busy one day and did not respond when she pinched me so she said the owe.

There is so much going on in their little bird brains. They learn so fast and remember a lot more than most people know.

Choose a word to use when she bites too hard so she can learn what is too much and say it in a normal voice. If you scream or yell you will be teaching her that she can make noise by biting you and they love noise.

[Pajarita]

Welcome to the forum! I am afraid that what you are describing is typical. A bird will always 'behave' in a new home (we call this the honeymoon period) but, once it feels more comfortable in its surroundings, it starts showing its true colors so don't think that it's nothing you have done, it's the way parrots behave when they are rehomed.

Now, as to how to eliminate this behavior... There are two things that cause this behavior, one is physical (sexual hormones - and your bird seems to be overly hormonal -the regurgitation is a clear indication of this because, this time of the year, senegals should not be producing any sexual hormones) and the other is the way the bird is used to dealing with humans so you need to 'attack' both fronts. The sexual hormone issue is taken care of by keeping the bird at a strict solar schedule with full exposure to dawn and dusk so as to make her endocrine system produces sexual hormones ONLY during breeding season and not all year round (no bird produces sexual hormones all the time in the wild). It's not so much the number of hours the bird sleeps but the number of hours the bird is exposed to light and, in order for the bird's body to 'register' this, it needs to be exposed to dawn and dusk without interference of artificial lights (and, of course, it needs to go to sleep after dusk and not be exposed to any lights until the following morning). This is because birds are photoperiodic, a long word that means that they control their 'seasons' by the number of daylight hours and this number is recorded by their photoreceptors (cells that 'perceive' light) as they are 'turned on or off' by the different kind of light that happens at twilight -think of it as a stop watch that gets turned on by dawn and off by dusk.

The other cause of production of sexual hormones is too much protein in their diet. Nature made it so birds breed when the conditions are favorable and, for that to happen, there needs to be lots of rich food (which is needed not only to produce the eggs but also to feed the growing babies). Now, in the wild, there are seasons when there is lots of food and there are seasons when there isn't but, in captivity, there is always rich and plentiful food so we, as bird keepers, need to be very vigilant as to the amount of protein and fat we provide on a daily basis and free-feeding (filling up a bowl and leaving it there all day long) the high protein source (pellets, seeds, nuts, nutriberries, avicakes, beans, etc) is what does it. That's why I feed my birds (I have two senegals, one male and one female) gloop and raw produce for breakfast and a good quality seed/nut mix for dinner only.

Then we have the behavioral part of the problem... Parrots are not naturally aggressive. They are, actually, VERY patient and tolerant but, eventually, if one doesn't 'listen' to them, they end up biting us because we have given them no other choice to get their point across. I suspect that this is what happened to this bird and, the problem with this is that they get used to dealing with people by biting. Again, it's not their fault, it's the fault of the people who had this bird in the past. Now, there is no magic bullet for this problem. It's a matter of being loving, patient and treating the parrot with respect and keep on doing it until the parrot realizes there is no longer a need for bites. I don't believe in the very common advice of not reacting to a parrot's bite. I think the 'logic' behind it is stupid, parrots are way too smart to confuse a scream of pain with one of joy and they don't enjoy causing pain so why would not reacting work in any way? There is no animal in nature that would not react to pain so why would us not reacting have any other significance for a smart parrot other than to make it think we don't feel any pain? And why would we want them to think they are not hurting us? A parrot that loves you will not want you to feel pain so, in my personal opinion and experience, showing them they hurt us is the way to go. I have dealt with many aggressive parrots (wild-caught, breeders, male amazons defending a nest or a mate, etc) and it has always worked. I scream in pain, tell them "BAD BIRD!" and turn my back on them or walk away. BUT the real trick is never to give them a chance to bite you! But this is easier said than done because, in order for one to avoid all bites, one needs to not only learn the bird's body language inside out but also learn what the bird likes and dislikes -you need to learn the triggers that make it bite you and always avoid them.

Now, what I would do is re-evaluate its diet and light schedule and change it so as to ensure the bird will stop producing sexual hormones (a bird that is overly hormonal is a bird in physical discomfort and, most likely, pain as well as sexually frustrated and this equals aggression); establish strict daily routines (4 hours minimum of out of cage time and 2 hours minimum of one-on-one with its chosen one -senegals are NOT family pets, they are a one person bird- my birds are out from 6:30 am to 1 pm every day) like breakfast at dawn, noon rest, dinner at dusk, etc and continue using the stick instead of your hand for perching. Another thing that is important is never to stick your hand in their cage to get them out, just open the door and let the bird come out by itself (put a couple of perches outside the cage and a couple of stands around the house for it to fly from one to the other, if it wishes -the bird is flighted, right?) and just keep at the patience and love until the bird learns to love you (it takes them a long time to actually love you, it never happens immediately, even when we think it does because the bird wants to be with us) and learn its body language so you know when to ask for something and when not to ask BUT, even though you can ask, you can NEVER insist on anything -they don't like it when we don't listen to them.

[seagoatdeb]

Hi, my husband and I adopted a 10 yr old female Senagal named Sophie a few weeks ago. Her first home was with an elderly person who no longer could care for her. She moved into a good home with many dogs and other birds and children. She lived with this family for a year. The family seemed very caring and knowledgeable but Sophie did not thrive in this busy environment. We took her in as we were looking to adopt a bird, since our last feathered friend died last year.
In her previous home she did step ups on a stick as she tended to bite.
When she moved in with us, the second day she easily stepped up on our hands and sat on our shoulder. She seemed to settle in well to our quieter home. We worked on getting her used to our home and routine. She shared some of our veggie and fruit snacks eagerly, and hung out with us in the mornings and evenings.
She started greeting us with a side to side step dance, beak clicking and regurgitation. We responded with positive greetings. She started asking for head scratches within a week.
It has been two weeks now and yesterday she was taken out of her night cage as per usual and bit quite hard. I did not react to it well and got her off as quickly as I could. Throughout the day, I tried doing step ups with my hand and got bit each time. She would Step up and then lash out.
I am wondering why this change in her attitude. Did we encourage sexual behavior and she is frustrated? Is she trying to assert dominance? Is she frustrated or scared?
I have since the bitting returned to using the stick for step ups. I am near her and talk to her calmly but am not greeting her with too much enthusiasm. Her diet consists of pellets, veggies, some fruit, beans. She is getting about 11 hours of sleep, and some naps during the day. She does not seem to play with any toys we've provided, but is curious about her surroundings and exploring some.
Please help, I would love for her to be trusting of us and have some physical contact.

She has had two home changes with new people, which is very traumatic for any parrot. A lot of pois including Senegals have a tendency to to be very consiliatory, if they are very scared. The biting is actually a step forward, the Senegal is now secure enough to be testing you. As much as you need to learn about her, she is learning how to operate in your house. Check out the training, posts that Michael has been so kind to provide, there is a lot of good training info there, so you can work toward trust and having a good close realationship with her. It takes time, usually from 6 months to 2 years to develop the realtionship needed for a really close bond. My daughter got an older Senegal parrot from a very similar situation. The woman had to go to a nursing home and the Grandson took the Senegal into a noisy house with two conures who ganged up to attack the Senegal. My daughter has had her for almost a year now, and she has been steadily improving. She loves head scratches and even dances if someone sings. It may take some time for your Senegal to have a desire to play with toys, but she will one day.