hi,help please.

[mark kenneth]

I am hoping that someone who has read my previous message can advise me.When do you know that your bird is ready to come out of their cage.i have had her a while and left myself thinking yea she can come out but if i cant get her back in.

[Pajarita]

I thought we had but I will try again.

Once you see that the bird is not terrified of you, you can let the bird out (lock the dog in a bedroom) by simply opening the door and taking a couple of steps back (but don't just stand there staring at it, predators do that and they don't like it). Have you even tried it? Because, if you haven't, I suggest you do, observe it and, if you have any problems, come back and let us know exactly what the bird does and we will help you.

A seven year old gray should be used to coming out of its cage and, if you do it about an hour before dinner, it will go back inside when you put the dinner in the cage. Of course, for this to work you need to NOT free-feed the protein food and serve it only for dinner (is this what you are doing? If not, what is its diet and the schedule, exactly?). You also need to keep it at a solar schedule because it's the dusk light that will tell it to go get its dinner (if you have the artificial lights on, its body cannot know what time of the day it is). Also, is the bird clipped? If so, has it always been clipped or recently only?

[mark kenneth]

hi, the grey was clipped when she was picked up from the breeder but has never been clipped since. her cage is in the livingroom and she is close by the window.are you saying to feed her after coming out of the cage.we just want her to try and be happy and last thing we want is her getting stressed.we will try tomorro and take her out. i think we are frightened of upsetting her more than her off us.
Thanks for advise and will let u know about her progress.
many thanks
Mark

[Wolf]

Parrots generally do better with schedules and routines. The first schedule that you should set up for your Grey is that the cage is uncovered with no artificial lights turned on before dawn so that they can receive the twilight at dawn and then have the artificial lights turned off for the same period in the early evening called dusk and then the bird will be able to sleep by full dark. The light from these two twilight periods is crucial to their biological clock to function properly. It is the same light schedule that wild birds experience. It helps to control their mating seasons and the production of sexual hormones telling the birds body when to produce these hormones as well as when to quit producing them. These hormones very often also translate into increased aggression.

The next schedule or routine that you should consider is the feeding schedule and it does not actually follow the clock but the light. Shortly after the bird wakes up in the morning it should be provides with fresh fruits and vegetables as well as a low protein, low fat food such as gloop, or chop. Ideally the bird should then have sufficient amounts of these foods to last all day until dinner time. I usually feed my birds their dinner just as the light begins to change in the late afternoon towards dusk, so that they have time to eat and relax and then they go to sleep by full dark. Dinner is when I feed them the high protein, high fat foods such as seeds or pellets if you feed them, I don't feed my birds pellets.

Now the next schedules that you should consider are time out of the cage for the bird. One good time is about an hour after they eat breakfast and another good time is about an hour or two before they receive their dinner. Overall the bird needs to be out of its cage for a minimum of 4 to 5 hours daily and it can be split into shorter time periods but still needs to equal or exceed the 4 to 5 hour minimum. This provides the bird time to explore its environment, to fly about for exercise and personal interaction and training time. This type of schedule will also make it easier to get your bird to return to its cage, especially in the evening, and it is similar to their natural way of life. Most parrots wake up in the morning, leave to forage for food, return to their roosting areas to take a nap during the middle of their day, wake up go find more food, return to their roosting area and go to sleep at dark.

If your bird will not step up for you to return it to its cage, you can always wait for it to start getting dark, turn off your lights if they are not already off and wait for it to get dark, if the bird has still not returned to its cage, it is easy to go to it and pick it up and return it to the cage, most of them will go ahead and step up at this time so you may not have to pick it up to do this.

[seagoatdeb]

What i find is that just putting a piece of nut in the cage will get most parrots back in tame or not.

[Georges mom]

An almond always works for me whenever I want George to return to his cage.

[Pajarita]

Yes, a high value item will do it but, when they get used to the schedule, they go in all by themselves when they know it's 'that' time. At least, mine do - even the ones in the birdroom which only go in cages for sleeping at night or eating breakfast. I say their names followed by a "Go home!" and they immediately start walking toward the cage and climb inside But that's because 99.99% of the time I only tell them to go home when food is been served.

[galeriagila]

I do *SOOOOO* admire people with disciplined birds!

After all these years, I'm lucky if a high-value treat gets the Rickeybird back in the cage. He only comes out when I have no particular place to go, so... it just takes as long as it takes to get him back in. Now that I'm retired, its easy!

Don't be like me. Listen to these folks: they know what they're doing! Good luck!

[Pajarita]

Actually, Gail, birds are naturally disciplined when it comes to routines because they follow them in the wild all their lives (only the ornithologists and biologists call them 'biorrhythms'). The key is to make the environmental clue (light, food, time of the day) perfectly consistent every time. So, if they learn that when they hear a certain phrase and this phrase has always been said at the same time (not time by the clock, mind you, but time of the day) and has always followed by a high value item, they will do what they are asked to do because it has become part of their daily biorrhythms. The problem arises when we ask them to do something 'out of schedule' - like, today, my daughter is picking me up for shopping but she is doing it earlier (11 am) than the time the birds go back into their cages for their mid-day rest (a bit after noon) so, although I never give them a nut in the morning, they will get one to kind of make-up for the 'disarrangement'. BUT I can do this and get a good result only because it happens only two or three times a year as I ALWAYS make sure their schedules are kept.

[galeriagila]

Pajarita, I will give you this: since I retired, our routine is pretty well set, and he's gotten better. When I was working, I grabbed any time I could, of course. Nowadays, When it starts to get dark, he expects to go to bed (sometimes when I was still working, I'd stretch it later just to have time with him). He still refuses to go into the cage... simply WILL NOT STEP on a perch, butts it with his head... but if I toss a green chile in, he will grudgingly go in. In the old days, NOPE! Also, I purposefully don't give him water for a half hour before bedtime... usually, I give him periodic drinks from my water glass. But I stop at some point and... he's thirsty and wants a drink! Added incentive!

Seeeeeeeeeeee?

I'm smarter than that Patagonian!

Sometimes.