Parrot training gone terribly, terribly wrong

[Ursibear]

Hey guys
I'm really sorry for being so insistent with questions regarding my newly rescued but i really need your help here....
So here's the story:
For the past 10 or so days, everything has been going great. He was eating treats from my and my boyfriend's hand. about 5 days ago, we introduced the clicker. it took a bit at first, but after a while he started getting excited when hearing the sound, expecting his treat.
So two days ago I introduced the training stick. He's been wary of it all the way though.
Yesterday night i fully cleaned his cage while he was playing on his playstand, and took the opportunity to change some of his toys around since he wasn't playing with them anymore. I also tossed 4 pieces of Harrison's pellets onto his usual mix in the food bowl. He didn't look too enthusiastic at first but he did nibble one at the end.
This morning when i went over for his morning training and food and water, he looked kind of pouty. I guess there's no way to tell, but he wasn't chirping or singing or anything of what he usually does. He was just sitting there and chatted with me now and then. It's probably a good moment to say i got really excited about him touching the target stick for the first time. He seemed normal when he was eating and drinking.
I have Wednesdays off, so instead of going to work as usual, i took him out of the cage for a bit. He was fine i think, OK cuddly but not all that chatty.
At some point i got up with him on my forearm and went to pet his head with my finger. I've done this lots of times but this one time he got scared for some reason.
So he "glided" over to my boyfriend and sat there for a bit. About 10 minutes later he got up to bring him over to his playstand and that's the moment Sisu, without previous warning, bit him in the back of the neck. Hard. he took off about a half an inch square inch of skin, dermis and all.
My boyfriend tried to get him off, and he got bit in the hand, the ear and the jaw. All of this before i was there in seconds. I grabbed him to get him off and he bit me, too. I now lack a decent piece of my right index finger. And he wouldnt get off, so i had to towel him.
And he hated it. He was screeching bloody murder and i was upset, so i thought, what the hell, he is going to hate me for months anyway, might as well check his beak and talons.
Clipped about a mm off each claw and smoothed the beak a little (he's been having flaky beak lately) then i put him at the cage to tend to our wounds.
My boyfriend went to the emergency room. And now i am left alone here with my bunnies and a parrot that very clearly hates me, wondering what did i do wrong.
So to sum it up... Sisu hasn't bit either of us for two weeks, has been moderately happy, playing with his toys and foraging out of pinecones, and suddenly out of nowhere he becomes a dino and tears us to shreds.
My questions are... what did i do wrong? how do i prevent this? how do i regain Sisu's trust?
Please help me >.< I wanted to save this little guy i love from "being put down humanely" and i refuse to give him away. I love him and i want him to be happy together with us. My boyfriend is angry, and I don't want him to leave and take his kids with him. He's the only one who puts up with my problems, and sometimes not even i can put up with myself >.<

[JacobBird]

I don't think you did anything wrong. I think he displays all these emotions because he just got used to his new environment and now he is back to being himself. What I would do is to leave him alone for a few days and take small steps forward. After a few days, try to get close to him and see how he reacts. Just take everything slowly from the very basics. I think he will be fine after a while (:

[marie83]

Agree with JacobBird, just go back to the very beginning again. I've had to many many times with some of my rescues because I've had no choice, they needed claws trimming, vet trips or I've made the stupid mistake of trying to move things along too quickly and ended up destroying the trust instead. Theres a load more information out there now thanks to the internet than there was when I first started keeping bird so make use of the info.

Unfortunately bites are part of the parcel when you keep birds, the best thing to do is to learn to read body language to prevent them and that takes time and observation. Keep your bird off shoulders if you don't want to risk your ear/face/neck, if the birds on your shoulder and get a bit there then its not the birds fault really as you cant see him to listen to what he is telling you. Unexpected attacks are always a possibility however gentle they usually are so shouldering a bird at your own risk really.

Not sure how you can pacify your boyfriend at the moment cuz he probably wont want to hear it, let him cool down for a while and then tell him in order to prevent anything like that happening again then you both need to work on x, y and z because you care about him enough so that you don't want a repeat incidence and you both commited to the bird.

[Eurycerus]

This story scares me to pieces because I could see that happening to my boyfriend! I can't stand the thought of endangering someone else because my parrot is a one person parrot. I'm so sorry to hear that that happened. My boyfriend still isn't fond of my parrot because of the bite to the face, I could only imagine if it was emergency room worthy.

I would definitely say that the above is correct. Start all over again with basic training. Whenever your boyfriend starts to feel a little more friendly have him give all the food in the cage (as long as the food can be given without reaching inside the cage, thankfully my cage is like that) and have him do the target training, or trick training inside the cage so that he gets treats from him. Make sure he associates treats and fun things with your boyfriend. Probably your boyfriend won't be interested in trying to deal with your parrot for a bit so give him time. For me when Nika bit the bejesus out of me I had to work up the courage and get back on the saddle so to speak and prove to her that it wasn't going to push me away to have her hurt me. So if your boyfriend is willing you could have him try to take him out after a few days of treat giving. He may get his hand bit a few times but maybe she'll get over herself.

I hope you can figure something out and make it work.

[Ursibear]

Thank you for comforting me guys and gals, it means a lot to me
I would go back to the beginning with Sisu but... like an hour after i put him on his cage he started asking for cuddles -.- I went over thinking it could be a trick to get revenge but... no. he let me scratch him all over and then i actually had to get my hand out of the cage really fast because he wanted to step up on it. I don't know what to do!
My bird is weird and puzzling
Marie, when it comes to the shoulder thing, i've tried to get him to stay on my forearm ever since he started coming out of the cage, but he won't budge. I guess he's used to climb on a shoulder from before he got to me, because if you block his climb up the arm with your other hand, he just waits patiently until you remove it to continue climbing.
If you don't remove it, as i did when i was watching TV one day, he just climbs on the other hand, goes down on the opther side, and continues until he reaches the shoulder >.< Haven't figured out how ti get rid of this habit. Shoulders are definitely not safe for him to be as he can't fly and i wear mostly tank tops when indoors, and my skin is not good enough for him to get a proper hold.
And Eury, I don't think i can get my boyfriend to interact with my anymore. When he came home from the emergency room he was still pissed and informed me he's going to ignore the bird from now on. SO i guess i'll have to live with a 1-person parrot
BTW do any of you know a good parrot page where i could look up the body language thing? There are many movements of his I still don't have down >.< He shifts his mood very, very quickly but i owe myself (and him) to try and understand as much as i can.

[Eurycerus]

Does Sisu have a play stand? Nika would like to hang out on my shoulder but it doesn't feel good and it makes me feel on edge because she can get moody and has randomly bit me in the face. So she hangs out on her playstand that I made her which is close to me but not too close. I come and sit right by her and do trick training. Also just recently she discovered the floor and gets antsy and wants to crawl around so I go get her and let her crawl on the ground while I follow closely behind to make sure she doesn't get in trouble.

I've read the signs leading up to a bite and honestly it's not very helpful for those sudden mood swings, at least for me. She pins her eyes when I go to pat her head or even get nearby or if she thinks there's a treat, or she has a treat, etc, etc. She does it so often that it's a terrible indicator. I can only tell when she's in a bad mood all day, not the random angry bursts. She got a little pissy yesterday and I just had to deal. She rarely fans her tail even when angry. I read all the websites I could find about parrot body language and it hasn't helped. But you could still google around and read everything you can find. She's pretty obvious about her jealousy by biting me when she's angry about someone else around, but that's because I don't let her near the person she's actually angry with.

I now just never allow her to interact with people outside of her cage so that only I will get bit. I'm hoping to work up to interactions with people at some point but we aren't there yet. When I get her harness trained I might be more willing because at least then I can control whether she's going to fly into someone's face.

[Polarn]

I was about to mention the pinning eyes and the tailflaring(both exited and angry though) but if your bird is like Eurycerus then thats no use for you. But if it is flaring its tail or putting its wings away from the body, then youre lucky couse then he is quite obviouse in the bodylanguage.

I read somewhere that most birds do have these "tells" to begin with but their trained to remove them by mistake and poor handling, couse they figure that humans do not read their signs and therefore it is worth skipping them all together and just go by the only thing that has any kind of affect, biting. I also read that some handreared chicks never develope these social skills to show someone that they want nothing todo with you, couse they had noone aorund teaching them how to give these signs. But with adopted birds it may just as well be lack of knowledge from previouse owner not paying attention to the signs teaching the bird not to show them couse its a waste of energy or thy might never have learned em.

Polarn is superobviouse and he has some moodswings but they never get as far as biting (unless when I have to handle him when hes not in the mood...)
First sign of him wanting nothing todo with me: he turns his back, I know when I approach him and he turns his back, he wants to be left alone.
Second sign (sometimes first if he doesnt turn his back): he will lift his wings slightly and flare his tail (this he however does when excited too) so I usually take a pause and wait for him to settle down, either he will turn the back or he will lift his foot up indicating he wants to step up, but i never approach him to ask for a step up when he is overly excited or angry, and I cant really tell except sometimes he sings while doing this when he is exited, but an overly exited bird will sometimes bite as well.
Now this I dont know if the putting too much pressure on sign is just amazons or what couse I've only heard amazons doing this, and that is he crouches down a bit opens his beak (Iknow more birds do this) but he growls, and it sounds as a dog growling at you. And when I havnt been properly supervising others trying to interact with him this is where everyone has backed off, couse as soon as you get closer while he growls he will start biting in the air.

Now neither of these happens often since he is flighted and is always allowed to fly off so thats usually his first resort (besides turning his back) when he doesnt want to interact with me. Hope this might help you somewhat but as mentioned he might not show any signs at all before biting because he has learnt biting is the only way to go.

[Ursibear]

Yes, i made him a playstand out of one of those cat clawposts that has a hidey hole on the bottom, then a thick wooden post covered in sisal rope, and a square platform on top. I screwed 4 lilac branches to the top platform (i checked it to make sure it's safe) and i put toys and a foraging pine cone in different places everyday, with a ladder and one of those spiral ropes connecting a couple of branches. He likes it there, particularly because the bunnies come to hide in the hole and he loves watching them from above, but anytime i come to talk to him or pet him (he loves his cuddles!) He ends up tricking me and climbing up my arm.
He also climbs to my shoulder when i watch TV and sometimes when i am on the computer, and he won't come down. I try to get him to step up on my hand, but all he does then is to move to the back of my neck where i can't reach him
About the eye pinning, he does it all the time. Literally all the time. When he sees a treat, when he plays with his toys, watches the bunnies, sees me and gets cuddled. It's really not a good indicator >.<
He also puffs up his feathers quite often in different contexts. He does it after being cuddled, when he hears my voice, after stretching and while drinking water.
He wags his tails and half unfold his wings during play sometimes, after stretching or when he's on my shoulder, after almost falling.
So i don't know I'm really confused here.
The only thing i have noticed is that before the two big biting episodes, he wasn't whistling. He likes to do bird calls all the time. But then again he chatters and mimics running water and my laugh, and the bunny digging sound, and drinks and eats and plays as normal. So i don't even know if that's a sign >.<

[Eurycerus]

I read somewhere that most birds do have these "tells" to begin with but their trained to remove them by mistake and poor handling, couse they figure that humans do not read their signs and therefore it is worth skipping them all together and just go by the only thing that has any kind of affect, biting. I also read that some handreared chicks never develope these social skills to show someone that they want nothing todo with you, couse they had noone aorund teaching them how to give these signs. But with adopted birds it may just as well be lack of knowledge from previouse owner not paying attention to the signs teaching the bird not to show them couse its a waste of energy or thy might never have learned em.

Oh interesting thanks for telling me! That could very well be.

Nika only lifts her wings from her body when she's hormonal or showing off and wants attention. Maybe the wing lifting for amazons is a bit different. I've wondered about the turning the back toward me thing. I always thought she was being pouty because she's never gotten upset if I gently pat her, so it makes sense that maybe she's indicating that she doesn't want to step up but doesn't mind a gentle pat. She gets excited over everything but I can usually tell based on the circumstances if she's upset or not. It would be helpful if she did the full on angry stance, tail fanned, eyes pinned, etc.

For instance Dave was over and I assumed she would be jealous and cranky, but Dave said I should take her out so I came over and she was being all cute and came right over and easily stepped up. She obviously wanted out but I decided to be patient and take my time hanging out near her cage with her on my finger. After some time went by she remembered that Dave was there and got all flustered and angry and started leaning towards me and biting me (a very poi thing to angrily bite the nearest target when upset), so I put her back. Little jealous poop. She's adorable thankfully.

Here's where I worry that if she was flighted she would've swooped off my finger and attacked him, similar to what happened to your boyfriend.

It sounds like pois might be a little harder to read. Sisu does exactly what Nika does, eye pinning frequently. She only poofs up when content, resting, preening, or napping, so no anger. She does the tail wag and the wing stretch too when happy, adjusting, etc. Nika can have very quiet moments that thus far relate to nothing other than being content. She was very quiet and calculating when she attacked Dave the one time but I feel that that wasn't a good indicator.

Nika wants to come over to my desk and chew everything up which is why I don't let her on me because she's flap over to the desk. I think she could fly over right now but she doesn't know she can. Thankfully she seems moderately content to hang out on the play stand and doesn't feel the need to climb on me when I come over. Sometimes she does but I extract her pretty quickly.

[Ursibear]

I read somewhere that most birds do have these "tells" to begin with but their trained to remove them by mistake and poor handling, couse they figure that humans do not read their signs and therefore it is worth skipping them all together and just go by the only thing that has any kind of affect, biting. I also read that some handreared chicks never develope these social skills to show someone that they want nothing todo with you, couse they had noone aorund teaching them how to give these signs. But with adopted birds it may just as well be lack of knowledge from previouse owner not paying attention to the signs teaching the bird not to show them couse its a waste of energy or thy might never have learned em.

Oh interesting thanks for telling me! That could very well be.

Here's where I worry that if she was flighted she would've swooped off my finger and attacked him, similar to what happened to your boyfriend.

It sounds like pois might be a little harder to read.

Indeed, thanks Polarn I'll watch him carefully to see if he turns his back to me. Never seen him doing it so far, but maybe he did and i mistook it for something else.
Also yes Eury, I am afraid that he'll fly and bite other people, specially my boyfriend. Its just so disconcerting in his case because they get along just fine. he feeds Sisu treats with the clicker, help him from the cage to the playstand, changes his water and cage, and so on.
I was going to teach him to fly somehow but I've just decided to leave it be for now until he's fully tame. He has all his flight feathers so he will at least be able to glide if he falls
Is that your plan with Nika too?