Changing Cages

[Saber]

Scooty, my CAG, will be getting his new cage soon. I should be arriving via freight next week. It is about 3 times his current cage (and his current cage is decent sized the way it is) and will be bigger then my entertainment center lol. My livingroom is going to look pretty disproportional with the new monstrosity lol....I mean who wants to pay bills with thier tax return right? lol

Down to my concern. Scooty has a pretty standard anxiety to new stuff. I start toys across the room and move them closer and go through a whole routine to get him comfortable with it. And I know I'll need to do the same with the new cage. What do you think would be better for him: To leave his current cage where it is and just have the new one setup in the living room with him where he can see it or should I move his current cage out of its normal spot and put the new one there and then put his current cage next to it during the transition period?

Maybe I'm answering my own question as I type this. I bet it would be less stressful for him to stay where he is for a while and then eventually swap positions of the cages for a while and then do the final step and move him into the new cage. During all this of course we'd be doing the standard "new stuff" process. Letting him walk over to it, stand on it, play with toys hanging off it and whatever he seems to tolerate as we go along. I usually let him set the pace of all that. Some toys and changes he's cool with after a few days, others its a few weeks. Ugh...I hope I don't have to have 2 cages in my livingroom for weeks on end. It wouldn't be bad if I had birds in both but with one empty it will suck lol.

Thoughts?

[Wolf]

Leave his current cage where it is during the transition period. As soon as he will accept the new cage enough to perch or play on it start putting a few healthy treats in it where he can see them to entice him to go in on his own. Hang a couple of favored toys in it next, once he will play with them in the cage you should be able to eliminate the old one right away.

[Saber]

Awesome! I'll go that route

[Pajarita]

Put the old and new cages side by side (actually touching) and place a couple of perches in the new one, leaving the door always open. Once you see him walking on the new cage top, move one of his perches from the old cage and put it inside the new one in EXACTLY the same position and height as it was in the old one and start putting a high value treat in a cup next to this perch. Once he goes into the new cage to eat his treat regularly, start putting his food in there in the morning but continue putting his dinner in the old one. Once he starts going in every day for his breakfast, you can change his roosting perch to the new one. Slowly but surely does it with birds.

[Saber]

Thanks guys

[flappybird]

Guess this thread is a bit old, but maybe y'all will see it anyway.

I also have a 'changing cages' situation, but it's a bit different. Luna's new cage arrived yesterday; it's twice the size of the one she was in, mostly changing in height (which I know is kind of useless, but I'd need to spend several hundred dollars more to get what I want and I'm not prepared to do that at the moment), and a couple more inches W x L. She also gets a playtop, which I thought she would like because she liked to spend a lot of time on top of her old cage.

She watched me the whole time I was building it, and eventually started asking to get off her cage and sit on my shoulder, at which point she immediately got onto the new cage and started exploring it. This was AWESOME, because I got to skip the whole getting used to it part.

I ended up moving the new cage into it's place where the old one was, and she was okay with that. I also moved all her stuff over, and even left her old cage next to the new one and placed her on it to see what would happen: she chose the new cage and proceeded to stay in it. All great, but now I'm worrying about whether I did everything too fast. She has been all over the cage, but stays on the top right corner on a rope perch I put there 90% of the time. The top is solid, as it's a tray for the playtop, and I'm wondering if the extra cover and lack of light is making her sleepy and stagnant. She doesn't seem to want to come out as much at all, usually she hangs out on my shoulder or on the couch or somewhere near me off her cage during her active hours (late morning / evening) but now she doesn't really care. She is eating, but not with the same enthusiasm that she did before, nor has she finished either of her meals that I've served there so far.

Last night I moved her to her old cage to sleep (for familiarity) in the spare bedroom where I can close the door. Tonight she wouldn't come out of the new cage, even for food, so I was unable to move her over to her "sleeping" cage (which I eventually want to change to what will be her sleep/travel cage which she is already somewhat familiar with, but didn't want to change too many things). The cage cover I have is inadequate for the new, tall cage, but I was able to cover most of the top on the sides not next to a wall. However, now I can't put her in the other room, and am wondering if she's going to suffer and not get enough darkness or quiet, and that I will see consequences later.

I know it's only day 2. My only consolation is remembering how much she changed in the first week I had her, and hoping that the same will happen once she is accustomed to actually living in her new cage. Mostly worried because she is 10 years old and I think she's had the same small, shitty cage her whole life.... and maybe that cage wasn't so bad after all. Maybe she feels safer in it because it's smaller, maybe the dome top gave her a feeling of spaciousness that she doesn't have with this new one.. i don't know.

Any observations?

[Wolf]

I don't know if you did this or not, but the very first thing to do with a new cage is to wash it thoroughly as you don't know what residues may be on it.
It can be difficult to see things from a birds perspective but even though you put her things in the new cage, you may not have put them in the same place which could cause the reaction that you are seeing. Even if you got things as close as possible to the same way it was in the old cage, it is still new to her. I don't see any major issues that she won't resolve in a few days. The new cage, being larger may feel more comfortable to her and she may just want to get the feel of it. I would just let her have the time to get used to it and do what you normally do, she will come out when she is ready to and be fine.

[Pajarita]

Well, actually, you are not supposed to keep the tray on top all the time. You are supposed to put it there when the bird is out of the cage and on the top play area (so as to prevent the bird pooping on the 'ceiling' of the cage) but not when the bird is inside the cage (because, as you noted, it makes a solid 'roof' that prevent light from shining in). But I don't think the problem is the cage because birds either accept a new cage or they don't and, if she went in of her own from the first, she has accepted it without a problem (as an added note, I've read about people having problems getting their birds to accept new cages but I've never had a single one that had an issue).

Is she still regurgitating all the time? Because, if she is, that's a medical issue that needs to be resolved and this lack of appetite and lethargy might be related to it...

[flappybird]

It turns out I was right and just being paranoid on day 1/2. She seems totally fine now. Slept in her new cage last night because I can't really get her out once she is sleepy, and it didn't seem worthwhile to force it. Don't know if we're ever going to be able to successfully move her every night to a small sleep cage in the other room though I'd really like to.

This morning she was all happy and ready to hang out and eat food; she went back to eating normally. I didn't see any excessive regurgitation, in fact, that has settled down in the last couple of days. It seems that sometimes she's doing it a lot and other times she isn't. I have noticed that there are a few specific foods she seemed to do it more with - blueberries, bananas, corn, and mango. But otherwise haven't noticed it much. The last time I posted about her regurgitation, it was a particularly excessive episode that hasn't repeated itself since.

I'm happy to report she was climbing all over the cage this morning and evening, it's great she is getting exercise. I'm motivating her by placing treats in different places and she seems happy with chasing my hand down. She's chosen that one top corner with the rope perch as her main hang out/sleeping spot. I need to get more perches and toys so I can connect more of the perch-able areas. This cage has potential!

@Wolf - I gave it a good wipe down but otherwise didn't worry about it much.
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What's the easiest way to post pictures on this forum?

[Pajarita]

If you don't free-feed high protein food and use it only for her dinner, she will be more than happy to go into her sleeping cage to get it. The birds I keep in human living areas are so used to eating in their cages only that they go back in by themselves when it's time (they have a clock in their heads that never, ever misses )

I post pictures from Photobucket with the 'image' link.