GCC Preening.

[kaylayuh]

My new little guy is smitten with me. He wants to be held and cuddled all the time, and he really loves to preen me and give kisses. This would normally be okay, but he doesn't realize that his beak can pinch and the preening turns into pinching. How can I stop this without punishing him?

I don't give him a reaction, no "ows" or "that hurts". I try to pull back, but he tends to have a tiny piece of flesh in his beak which makes it hard to do without bleeding. It doesn't hurt so much as creates a big mark when he preens a particular area for too long. And I'd prefer not to have to explain what appears to be a hicky... and how I got it from my bird.

Right now, I tell him to be gentle and that helps for a couple of seconds. Until he moves to a new piece of flesh.

[ldallas04]

My new little guy is smitten with me. He wants to be held and cuddled all the time, and he really loves to preen me and give kisses. This would normally be okay, but he doesn't realize that his beak can pinch and the preening turns into pinching. How can I stop this without punishing him?

I would love to hear back on this as well if anyone has good hints.. Max has left marks ALL over my skin because he preens too hard. *sigh* I say.. "Max I don't have feathers, baby."

Our sun doesn't have as much of a problem. His beak is bigger and he seems to have good control. He's the gentle one.

[entrancedbymyGCC]

My personal opinion is that in this situation you can use a mild aversive like the wobble correction or relocating the bird in combination with heavily reinforcing gentle preening. Scooter initially did this, and we used a combination of the wobble, blowing at him enough to distract him, and using the verbal "Be gentle!" to interrupt over-zealous preening with effusive praise and scritching him back when he used his beak gently. He still occasionally gets over-enthused, but never to the point of drawing blood and "Be gentle" generally gets the idea across.

I disagree somewhat with the idea of not reacting at all. This is really quite hard to do if you aren't wearing gloves or something. I tend to go for removing the beak from the flesh as gently as possible and removing the bird from my person until I've recovered my composure. In the case of an inadvertent nip, I may not even need to disengage entirely, but I will pause whatever I was doing at the time. In the case of a real intentional bite, I'll put the bird down on a surface or in the cage and allow some time before resuming interaction.

I think with the kind of situation you are describing, the first line of defense is to identify "good" preening and reinforce that. If possible, end that specific encounter on a positive note. If you are quite sure that he's enjoying the interaction and just trying to fix your pinfeathers, a little shake, wobble or blow paired with a verbal indication may interrupt him long enough to allow a chance for a more positive approach, and can train him so that the verbal warning becomes sufficient. If it's more of a bite than that, put him down for a few minutes. However, do make sure he's not getting a little intimidated or over-stimulated -- if that's what is going on IMO you need to remove the trigger rather than trying to shape the behavior, if that makes sense.

[captwest]

He just needs you to show him the bounderies , his mate would nip and fuss when he goes too far. She would let him know what to do ,when and how hard. He;s just looking for his place and needs you to show him,an action ,a word, he;ll know what you mean if your consitient .

[kaylayuh]

I disagree somewhat with the idea of not reacting at all. This is really quite hard to do if you aren't wearing gloves or something. I tend to go for removing the beak from the flesh as gently as possible and removing the bird from my person until I've recovered my composure. In the case of an inadvertent nip, I may not even need to disengage entirely, but I will pause whatever I was doing at the time. In the case of a real intentional bite, I'll put the bird down on a surface or in the cage and allow some time before resuming interaction.

He seems to understand that "be gentle" means to calm down with the beak. Whoever had him initially must have cuddled with him and let him pinch and preen them. I think he's just excited that someone is cuddling him and loving him after almost a year in a rescue with more birds than can be paid attention to.

When I try to remove his beak from my skin, he bites down a lot harder in another area. The wobble and/or blow helps a bit to get him disengaged, but when I try to pick him up and remove him back to his cage, he chomps down twice as hard somewhere else.

He's really very sweet, but my bleeding fingers are in pain! He catches on quickly, though, and is only biting once where he was chomping down repeatedly for the first two or three days.

[Roger P]

I find that when I am helping Merlin with the pinfeathers on the back of his neck, if I catch one the wrong way or work too hard, he will let me know with a squawk and then I back off. So I decided to that "turn about could be fair play". I have been trying, only when the preening gets too hard and hurts, to give him a "squawk" back, with a sharp tone, like his. Then I ask him to be gentle.

So far I am finding that for the most part this works to stop him from becoming overly aggressive. It does not always work, sometimes he is just in the mood to do some damage (then he gets a time out), but overall this seems to be working for me.

Try to listen for what noise he does to get you to back off, and try to copy that somehow. If he has learned that you will stop when he makes a certain noise, he is likely to figure it out when you make similar noise. Just a suggestion, it seems to be working here.

Does this idea make sense, or am I way off base here? I know the general rule is supposed to be "don't react", but sometimes I think if you don't do anything, they don't know they have crossed the line.

[entrancedbymyGCC]

Does this idea make sense, or am I way off base here? I know the general rule is supposed to be "don't react", but sometimes I think if you don't do anything, they don't know they have crossed the line.

I think it makes sense and I sort of tried the squawk thing... I'm not very good at it.

Don't react (If you can pull it off) makes sense if the bird is trying to make you go away or stop doing something or if they are doing it to get your attention. Reaction of any kind can be reinforcing under those circumstances. If they are engaging in what they perceive as being a positive activity, though, somehow you have to get the idea across that what they are doing isn't working. The problem is figuring out exactly why they are doing what they are doing. But I guess some people make a big distinction between over-enthusiastic preening and "biting" and would not even consider it biting.

When Kayayluh describes her bird biting again and harder when picking him up after discouraging a nip, it makes me wonder if there aren't multiple things going on with him, like resistance to being put away in conjunction with the over-preening thing. That makes it a bit more complex to handle. I think one problem with advice on dealing with an issue like biting is that the response needs to be determined by the root cause of the behavior, not by the behavior itself. The beak use is the symptom, as it were, and the disease is what needs to be treated.

[Roger P]

I agree fully. The "squawk" idea is only if the issue is over-enthusiastic preening, and the only place I use it. If there are other issues (as you have pointed out the other biting), that needs to be handled differently, of course once it has been properly "diagnosed".

[entrancedbymyGCC]

Roger P, definitely we agree. The only problem I had with the squawking is that I can't do it very effectively! I think it creates the equivalent for a bird of ROTFLMAO when I try.

[kaylayuh]

I would have to say that the harder bite is a reaction toward being put down when he isn't ready to be and is having fun doing whatever it is that got him put down, not a reaction toward being put in the cage. He will respond positively to "be gentle" most of the time, so we're gaining progress there.

As for what RogerP said, that makes a lot of sense. He seems to growl if he doesn't like the way I'm scritching him, but has more of a purr if he really loves something. Perhaps I should try a pull-like sound when he's being nice, and a growl when he's being hurtful. If only I could puff myself up like he does when he really really enjoys something, we might make progress sooner. Especially since it's way too adorable when his head turns into a little pinecone and he purrs!