Hello first time parrot owner

[gorudygo]

Hello everyone,

We are first time parrot owners. We just got a 9 month yellow sided green cheek conure last week. She is super cute and the breeder did a great job with her. She is very loveable and friendly to my wife and 7 year old daughter. We have only had her a week but have already started click/target training with her. She is super smart. Picks things up quickly and she seems very easy to train. She is almost potty trained and we have had very few mishaps. She has no problem eating mostly Roudybush pellets. We feed her some additional fruit or veggie twice a day. She likes to take mini baths under the sink faucet while perched on my hand. She sleeps a full 12 hours from 7 to 7 which works with our schedule since my daughter is in first grade and I work from home. She has been getting about 1-3 hours of handling/play time with us and a total of at least 3-5 hours out of her cage daily. She is so perfect when she is getting attention, training, or playing with you but sometimes she screams/squawks for an hour in her cage or on her playpen if we are not handling her. She has plenty of toys, food, clean water, and clean cage/playpen. Have we spoiled her already? Trying to figure her out so that she gets the attention she needs in her new environment/home to feel safe but also not allowing her to train us.

I feel like this is a very important time for her to learn our schedules and for us to learn her needs. Any thoughts or suggestions would be most helpful. Thank you!

[Gabriel]

Welcome to the forum and congrats on your new feathered-friend

You have made great progress with your bird, but since parrots are highly sociable creatures, I would suggest you purchase a new bird if you cannot commit more time to socialize with your bird. if your GCC continues to scream when you leave the room, I suggest that you wait patiently until the screaming has stopped. Once it has, go back to the cage and reward. This should teach your bird that it gets attention when it stays calm, not when it screams and panics. Hope this helps, good luck

[Wolf]

Before I say too much, I would like to make certain about the age of the bird. Are we talking about 9 months as posted or is that an error and the bird is perhaps 9 weeks old. Coming from a breeder 9 wks. sounds to me to be the more likely.
Since this is your first bird, I understand how much information is out both on line and off as well as how conflicting much of it is, unfortunately it is something that we all must go through for a while.
I would suggest that you spend the first month with your new bird to get to know each other and to learn the birds body language as well as to start building on the birds trust and hold off on most of the training during this period. As far as potty training goes, I do not recommend it at all as I find that the chances of causing the bird medical issues is too great and it is much cheaper to just keep some tissue handy and to clean up after the bird. There is a lot of controversity concerning the benefits and the risks to the bird on this particular issue.

[Pajarita]

Welcome to the forum! I have a yellow sided myself and find them the most beautiful of all mutations! If she is 9 months, she is at a great age because she hasn't yet reached sexual maturity but you don't have to worry about her regressing on her weaning. My GCC is always out of cage and spends two hours on me every day even though she has a husband to cuddle with I don't feed pellets because after 20 years of research on parrots diets, I have reached the conclusion pellet are not the best dietary option for them but, even if I did believe that, I would still never free-feed them. GCCs are mainly fruit eaters in the wild and require very little protein as well as high humidity and fiber and pellets do not fulfill such needs. Mine eats gloop and raw produce (one veggie, one fruit, one leafy green - different ones for each day of the week so as to round up a good nutrition) for breakfast (and that means a piece of fruit much larger than one would think should be enough for a such a little bird, mind you!).

I have to agree with Wolf that training after only one week is way too soon unless all you are doing is asking her to step up and step down for which you don't even need a clicker or training because she will do it on her own. I would suggest you just enjoy her, learn her body language, get her used to a good diet and give her time to bond with you before you do anything else.

[gorudygo]

Welcome to the forum and congrats on your new feathered-friend

You have made great progress with your bird, but since parrots are highly sociable creatures, I would suggest you purchase a new bird if you cannot commit more time to socialize with your bird. if your GCC continues to scream when you leave the room, I suggest that you wait patiently until the screaming has stopped. Once it has, go back to the cage and reward. This should teach your bird that it gets attention when it stays calm, not when it screams and panics. Hope this helps, good luck

Will do. I will increase the time with her as you suggested. I work from home so I am flexible. I just thought it would be good to start a schedule with her so that she could get familiar with her cage and play stand. Slowly increase time with her. If it was up to me I would make her my velcro buddy from the beginning.

I will also wait till she is calm before entering back into the room. When she gets like that her squawk is like random machine gun fire. It is hard to find a good time to walk back into the room without reinforcing her cry.

Thanks for the advice. It is much appreciated.

[gorudygo]

I would suggest that you spend the first month with your new bird to get to know each other and to learn the birds body language as well as to start building on the birds trust and hold off on most of the training during this period. As far as potty training goes, I do not recommend it at all as I find that the chances of causing the bird medical issues is too great and it is much cheaper to just keep some tissue handy and to clean up after the bird. There is a lot of controversity concerning the benefits and the risks to the bird on this particular issue.

Hi Wolf,

I will take your advice and take it slower. I am a newbie and also excited for our new addition. I am already starting to understand some of her different body language and different calls. I am sure it will take much more time for both her and my family to build that relationship.

As far as potty training, I didn't even know birds could do that until the breeder mentioned to us. When we got home, I looked it up online and just tried it and she followed along easily. When she is with me around the house, I just look at the clock. Every 15-20 minutes I walk to her cage or playpen and put her there. She does her business almost instantly and then I pick her back up. I will research more about this thank you Wolf. Clean up is not an issue and much easier than I had anticipated. Thanks again.

[gorudygo]

Welcome to the forum! I have a yellow sided myself and find them the most beautiful of all mutations! If she is 9 months, she is at a great age because she hasn't yet reached sexual maturity but you don't have to worry about her regressing on her weaning. My GCC is always out of cage and spends two hours on me every day even though she has a husband to cuddle with I don't feed pellets because after 20 years of research on parrots diets, I have reached the conclusion pellet are not the best dietary option for them but, even if I did believe that, I would still never free-feed them. GCCs are mainly fruit eaters in the wild and require very little protein as well as high humidity and fiber and pellets do not fulfill such needs. Mine eats gloop and raw produce (one veggie, one fruit, one leafy green - different ones for each day of the week so as to round up a good nutrition) for breakfast (and that means a piece of fruit much larger than one would think should be enough for a such a little bird, mind you!).

I have to agree with Wolf that training after only one week is way too soon unless all you are doing is asking her to step up and step down for which you don't even need a clicker or training because she will do it on her own. I would suggest you just enjoy her, learn her body language, get her used to a good diet and give her time to bond with you before you do anything else.

Hello Pajarita,

Thanks for the great advice. I will take it slower. We are all just very excited and she picks up the training super easily. I think she is having fun with it but I will take it slower.

I started the pellet/Roudybush diet as recommended by our breeder and watching some info videos from this forum's owner, Michael. There is so many types of parrot food out there. I figured if my breeder and the parrot wizard both agree on the same brand of food for their birds, it should be good for mine. She has been getting veggies and fruit daily. Lucky for her that my wife and I are both vegan. Thanks again Pajarita!

[Wolf]

I often will place my Grey on her cage when it is close to time for her to go potty, but I don't reinforce this by saying anything. The reason that I do it this way is that although I do like her to potty on the cage instead of elsewhere is that I don't want her to start thinking that she is only allowed to go in that place, because if she starts to think that then she will hold he poop until she can get to that place and that is where the problems with potty training begin.
As for the screaming for you when you leave the room, you have received one train of thought on it, now I would like you to consider another point of view. This bird is very new to you and among other things is very scared because of being in a totally new environment and with new humans. It can see that there is no escape from this new place and it just wants to be reassured that it is safe. These are very social creatures who are never alone at any point in their life from their hatching until they die. They are always in the company of their parents and flock or their mate and the flock. Calling to each other is how the locate each other in the flock should they get separated while eating or for whatever reason and so when you leave the bird calls trying to locate you and to know that you as well as himself are safe. With this train of thought I never ignore my birds when they call to me. I instead make sure that I answer them with a sound such as a whistle that I would like them to use to call me instead of the screaming that they naturally do. After a while they pick up and start using this whistle when they want to know that I am there and all is ok and safe in the world. This response to them is in a way also a reward as it is what they are expecting to happen in the first place and you can still go in when the quit screaming to reward them with a treat, but you will also be teaching them a more pleasant way of calling for you.

[gorudygo]

I often will place my Grey on her cage when it is close to time for her to go potty, but I don't reinforce this by saying anything. The reason that I do it this way is that although I do like her to potty on the cage instead of elsewhere is that I don't want her to start thinking that she is only allowed to go in that place, because if she starts to think that then she will hold he poop until she can get to that place and that is where the problems with potty training begin.
As for the screaming for you when you leave the room, you have received one train of thought on it, now I would like you to consider another point of view. This bird is very new to you and among other things is very scared because of being in a totally new environment and with new humans. It can see that there is no escape from this new place and it just wants to be reassured that it is safe. These are very social creatures who are never alone at any point in their life from their hatching until they die. They are always in the company of their parents and flock or their mate and the flock. Calling to each other is how the locate each other in the flock should they get separated while eating or for whatever reason and so when you leave the bird calls trying to locate you and to know that you as well as himself are safe. With this train of thought I never ignore my birds when they call to me. I instead make sure that I answer them with a sound such as a whistle that I would like them to use to call me instead of the screaming that they naturally do. After a while they pick up and start using this whistle when they want to know that I am there and all is ok and safe in the world. This response to them is in a way also a reward as it is what they are expecting to happen in the first place and you can still go in when the quit screaming to reward them with a treat, but you will also be teaching them a more pleasant way of calling for you.

Thanks Wolf. Your da man. I like the idea of whistling to reassure her and locate me. The whole family knows it is going to take some adjustment time. It is nice to know these things to make sure we are not reinforcing an unwanted behavior. Everyday we can see her getting more comfortable and less anxious. We are heading over to Everybody's Bird Mart Fair in Pomona, CA tomorrow. Hope to meet and learn more from folks like yourself. Thanks again.

Rudy

[Wolf]

I am sure that you will have an unforgettable experience at the bird fair, but If I may be so bold as to suggest that you do not touch your bird or give it anything that you get or it at the fair until you have showered and changed clothing and washed thoroughly anything that you got for your bird. The reason is quite simple, it is to prevent the spread of disease to your bird. There are several bird diseases that tend to be prevalent at such fairs and theses disease causing organisms can survive for several days or weeks on the surfaces of toys and clothing and even in the dirt that you walk on. These can be very aggressive and life threatening to your bird and very expensive to treat. The fair could be completely disease free though that would be unusual, but in any case it is far better to take precautions rather than to have to pay for not taking them. This is something that many bird owners are aware of ,but you are new to this so I thought that a heads up was in order.