Green cheeck conure

[twilamarie2003]

I just brought home an 8 week old hand fed green cheek conure. We were able to visit him on several occasions before we brought him home. He was housed in a cage with three other babies while he was weaning. He is doing well with us. He is a bit nippy with some of the family members, but he is great at being handled for the most part. He is eating and drinking well. I have started target training him, and working on step up/step down and being touched and handled. He loves to cuddle. Here is my problem: He dislikes being in his cage. He hasn't touched any of his toys and only wants to be out of the cage to be held. All he does is squawk and pace at the cage door until you let him out. If you leave him long enough in the cage, he does go perch somewhere, but as soon as he sees you again, he is right back to the squawking and pacing. He is having plenty of time outside of the cage. I know gcc love cuddling and being held, but how can I encourage him to play in his cage and play with his toys as well?

Thanks!

[hooligan]

It's funny because this is what first led me to this forum, and I just made a post about it right before seeing this I've had my bird for about three months now, so one of the more experience owners might have some more useful advice.

I have a GCC, and when I first brought her home, she didn't really play with toys, and when she was out of her cage she was only interested in cuddling and wasn't really into exploring or playing games. She's still cuddly, but she is much more brave and spunky now. Trick training was extremely helpful. Just by following Michael's guides and doing a couple ten minute sessions a day, she would be distracted from cuddling for stretches of time, and learned do be a little more independent.

After teaching her to step up, I did target training with her on my shoulder. I taught her to target the stick a little farther down my arm each time, until I could reliably get her to step down. Then I started other tricks.

As for the toys, you might need to show her what they're for. At first, Luna was mostly interested in toys with ropes (because she likes to swing off of the drawstrings on my hoodies), but would only play with something if I was holding it. I showed her how to tear up paper toys, and got her interested in toys with textures by scraping a fingernail against them to show her how weird/rough they are. Getting her to play with them alone just took some time. I think it helped to have a good variety in her cage, and then if I saw that she really liked one, I would buy/make more that were similar but also different. Her favorites now are plastic bottlecaps. We wash and save them, and she likes to play tug-a-war with us and uses them as foot toys.

As for always wanting to be out of the cage and with you... someone else will need to weigh in on that one. My bird is the same way. There are times when she wants to be in her cage: she naps occasionally and sometimes wants alone time after a bath, but for the most part she wants to go wherever I am. Since I don't work at home, she's alone for part of the day, and I have a small apartment anyway, so I handle her as much as possible.

[marie83]

Thats green cheeks all over for you. They are so needy but you mustn't give your bird more attention than you can realistically give in the long run because they WILL expect it all the time. This doesn't mean they won't still want the attention (Ollies currently clinging to the side of his cage making very soft cute little noises, peeking out of the only bit of the cage which isn't covered with a towell) but it means they won't be nearly as upset if they don't get it. Ollie has a good example I can use, I once had a very bad bout of illness and I couldn't handle him for two weeks. I spent loads of time nearby, talking to him softly because I couldn't convince my parents or sister to do anything with him. In those two weeks he started pulling his chest feathers out, luckily I got better and he stopped pulling them out as soon as he was getting a normal level of attention. Birds are sensitive creatures, if you can only spare 3 hours a day usually then don't spend 6 hours a day with him/her in the first few weeks.
They will eventually learn to amuse themselves. Bells always tend to go down well as toys, they quickly learn that they are good for beating up. You can hide food in other toys to start with to attract your birds attention more to them. Some toys you may need to show your bird how to play with them. Your baby has only just come home so to start with I would just leave him to it, put a variety in his/her cage and he will explore them, probably when your not looking to start with or only when your out of the room. Eventually he may start playing when your in the room when he is used to the routine and knows it isn't 'his time' to interact with you yet. At the moment with a green cheek its more a case of 'why play when I can look all cute and try to get your attention instead'.

[Andromeda]

He dislikes being in his cage. He hasn't touched any of his toys and only wants to be out of the cage to be held. All he does is squawk and pace at the cage door until you let him out. If you leave him long enough in the cage, he does go perch somewhere, but as soon as he sees you again, he is right back to the squawking and pacing.

You just described my GCC, word for word. As Marie said, "That's green cheeks all over for you."

Word of caution: never, ever let him out of the cage if he's actively screaming. He's screaming because he wants out, and if you let him out in response to his screaming he'll learn to scream endlessly until you let him out.

Mine is only caged for 1 - 3 hours per day but even still he'll start his "conure scream" when I enter the room. I have never reinforced his screaming so he gives up very quickly if I completely ignore it and wait him out (and by ignore I mean just that: don't even look at him, and if you're in the room, turn your back to him). Once he's been quiet for, say, 15 - 30 seconds, I tell him he's a good bird and then I let him out.

Other than that Marie has some great advice and I agree 100% with what she posted!