Adopted my first conure

[Keinanna]

Hello my name is candace and i just adopted my first conure on sunday. I have experience with a lot of otherbirds but this one is my first conure and i am having some problems with him.

When i first got him he was pretty friendly and would step up very easily and would come to me all the time. he gave kisses liked to cuddle with me he has shared food off my plate and really been the perfect bird. Today however i woke up and went to bring him out of his cage and he refuses to come anywhere near me he will fly around the house perching for a rest on anything high and then take off again eventually going back into his cage on his own. If i put my hand in his cage he acts like he is afraid of me and hides in the farthest corner of his cage as he can be from my hand.

He screams or a conure version of screaming (loud beeps) any time i am not in the room with him so he must want me around but does not want to be touched at all is this normal? Will it pass?

The people i adopted him from say he is around 3 years old and said they were getting rid of them cause their dog ate his mate and they are afraid he will be eaten too. They are registered breeders so the dogs come before the bird. They pretty much gave him away including cage and lots of accessories. i am sure they loved him but he was not getting much attention there.

I cant think of anything that could have happened to him in the past couple days in my home that would make him act like this. Could it just be the stress from moving to a new home? Any ideas for how to help him not be so afraid?

I was really hoping to have a nice companion bird that would do all the thing he did when i got him on sunday and monday. I let him out of his cage when i was having supper hoping he would want some apparently pasta is his favorite food and since i was eating pasta i thought he might like some but he did not want anything to do with me just sat there watching me.

any help you canprovide would be great thanks

 

[Rio Mom]

You need to just give him more time to settle and adjust to you and the new surroundings. Two days isn't much time yet. By the way, what kind of conure?

 

[Keinanna]

i thought that might be the case but was not sure thanks

in the mean time i am making sure to give him all his favorite treats

sorry i forgot he is a green cheek conure. I had written a really long post last night introducing myself and chewy (my new conure) but something went wrong it did not post and i lost it.

I will do up another one later though.

Another thing i forgot to mention is that we have another bird in the house a little budgie and chewy keeps flying over to the budgie cage and trying to check out the budgie do you think they might get along? they both seem pretty interested in each other. Could the weird behaviour maybe be that having another bird reminds him of his mate he lost?

 

[Spiritbird]

The keet jumping on new birds cage will most likely scare the new bird. I would suggest to keep things on the calm side for a while.

 

[cindylou_38]

(cage) For a single, small Conure, the minimum cage size would be about 28” x 22” x 30”. A larger Conure would need something bigger, minimum of 36” x 28” x 34”. Giving your bird double her wingspan as the width of the cage is ideal. Putting two conures in this size cage would be a bit cramped so you would definitely want a larger cage no smaller than 36” x 28” x 34” for small conures; a cage 40” x 30” x 45” would be much better for 2 birds.

Are your intentions to breed?

Harness well there are a few different ones, so just do your research first.

 

[roxynoodle]

I think he/she means the conure is going over to the budgie. Just be watchful there as a conure can hurt a budgie pretty badly if it bites it.

Yes, just give it more time. Talk to the bird, sing to it, keep offering treats. I would not stick my hand in the cage, but rather open the door, sit on the floor and see if it comes down to you. Just be patient.

 

[Keinanna]

yes it is the new conure that is flying to the budgies cage and the conure is the new bird.


i will keep offering treats and talking to him and see how it goes

 

[cockatielfan17]

welcome to the forum and hope u and ur bird get along again but give him time to settle in
and do exactly what roxy says she is pretty good when it comes to birds

 

[roxynoodle]

welcome to the forum and hope u and ur bird get along again but give him time to settle in
and do exactly what roxy says she is pretty good when it comes to birds

Why, thank you Hard to do with conures, but I was able to help win over the 2 bigger birds by imitating them. It is hard for me to imitate conure sounds though other than actual speech. And of course I don't want to encourage the screeching, lol!

The Grey and I have been doing her imitations for the past hour though. I can't do some of hers either like the microwave beep, fire alarm beep or video game sounds, but I try to do my best.

Pete and I have our own actual amazon language though. If anyone else heard us, they might think it was time for me to go visit the nut house for a spell!

Some things I do with my conure, and all the birds is say, "I"m glad to see you, too!" when they stretch. I say, "Oooo, pretty, waggy!" when they wag their tails. When they do cute poses I tell them, "Thank you! I really like that, you are so pretty!" I just pretty much talk to them all day. They learn the meanings of many things even if they don't actually say them. They know what "I'll be right back" means. They know what "I need coffee cup" means. Also other things I do often like "make lunch", "make dinner", "get veggies", "take birdie bath" (shower). Try to establish a routine and tell them the things you are going to do. Over time they learn what you're telling them. Even the cat understands several of them.

Eventually you can ask them questions and they will be able to chirp a response. I can ask Rowdy "Do you want your birdie light on (or off)?" "Do you want to go to bed?" "Do you want your veggies?"

Honestly, just talk to them all the time, and let them learn the meanings of things you do, and things they do.

Just be careful what words you use. I once had the great embarrassment of having plumbers working on my well. When one went into the bathroom to turn on the water, Bri yelled out, "Are you going pee?" I almost crawled under the coffee table!

 

[Helitorian]

Just be careful what words you use. I once had the great embarrassment of having plumbers working on my well. When one went into the bathroom to turn on the water, Bri yelled out, "Are you going pee?" I almost crawled under the coffee table!

I laughed so hard at that, Roxy! I'm kind of glad Con is hard for other people to understand otherwise I might have some embarrassing moments of my own once she learns to mimic what I say.

 

[roxynoodle]

Yes, and it's really interesting to me that they learned to turn things into questions! I always say, "I'll be right back" when I need to leave for a short time. Rowdy says to me, "Be right back?" in the form of a question when she sees me getting up or putting on my shoes.

And Bri managed to turn "I have to go pee" into "Are you going pee?" She was also the loudest, clearest talker I've ever had. Yes, they definitely heard her, and probably thought right at first it was me! It doesn't get more embarrassing than that!

Back in the 90s I first became familiar with Alex, Irene Pepperberg's Grey that she experimented with for 30 years to learn the cognitive abilities of Grey and other parrots. That was a complete enlightenment to me. I knew they were very smart and could even create their own sentences from words they learned, but after seeing that, I figured I needed to explain everything to my birds and they would learn much of it.

 

[Keinanna]

wow thats very impressive i will definitely keep up with what i am doing then

I wanted a bird to keep me company i am on doctor ordered bed rest awaiting surgery at the end of the month and will have a long recovery time time at home afterwards as well so i decided to get a conure as i have adored them ever since i discovered what they were about ten years ago.

my little chewy has his cage on the dresser beside my bed and i talk to him all day. I tell him how pretty he is when he poses for me. i comment on the food he is eating. when he fusses that i am not sharing my meals fast enough i tell him he needs to wait till it cools a bit cause its too hot and has learned that when i start blowing on his piece he is going to get some and comes down to the door ofhis cage to wait. His favorite i have seen so far is hashbrown patties. As soon as i bring them in the room he gets so excited and it is the only thing i have seen him eat ever so carefully as not to drop any and eats every last bite!

He gets to have free reign over my bedroom during most of my awake times. he is pretty good about going back into his cage on his own which is good since he still does not really want me touching him. this morning it was quite funny i have a wraught iron canopy bed so the top railings are perfect bird perches. I asked him if he could please point his tail the opposite direction so his poops would go on the floor and not on the bed. he stayed in his positionbut anytime he had to poop he turned and pointed his tail to the floor side and went back to how he was before. he definitely seems to understand which is good. now i just have to get him to trust meso we can be friends i want birdie cuddles.

 

[Keinanna]

i have made some progress today for most of the morning i talked to him chirped back to him and copied his head bobs. I opened the door to his cage and let him come out on his own and while he did not come to me he stayed on the top of his cage preened himself for a bit. I went to talk to him and he did hop onto my shoulder. i did not try to touch him i let him sit there for a couple mins then lowered my shoulder to his cage door to hop inside which he did. I dont want to push him too much too fast but i am happy he did not fly away to hide from me today.

 

[roxynoodle]

Rowdy likes when I copy her head bobs. And when she sticks her tongue out and I do it back.

 

[Keinanna]

i tried to play the blink game but i dont know if i was doing it right. I tried wagging my tounge at him too but he ignored me so i stuck with what he was doing and it seems to be working cause he seems like a bit calmer of a bird today

 

[roxynoodle]

Ok, try waiting til he does it first, and then do it back. Both my Nanday and amazon play tongue wiggle with me. He got on your shoulder so that's a huge thing! He is a little bird and you are a big predator. So that's a huge thing, trust me!

 

[Keinanna]

i will wait for him to do it. We spend about 23 hours a day in the same room together so i doubt it will take too long for him to trust me and any of that time that we are both awake i talk to him and mimick him and he does the same to me if i am eating he wants to eat too. If i talk to someone else he has to join in and talk too thats how i figured out he quacks like a duck i was talking to my boyfriend when he came into the bedroom and chewy started quacking.

 

[roxynoodle]

And by eating when you do, he is demonstrating flock behavior. So he considers you his flock.

 

[Keinanna]

thats good cause he does that all on his own or at least i think he does. I started him out right from the first day i got him eating with me i used to sit him on my lap with my plate also on my lap and allow him to take what he wanted but since he decided not to come to me i have just given him bits off my plate. but now anytime i so much as bring a plate of food into the room he goes to his bowl anticipating me eating and watches to see if i eat too. So if he is associating me as part of his flock i guess that is a very good thing.

 

[Keinanna]

I have noticed something strange with my conure. I spend all day in the same room as him i am the one who feeds him talks to him etc... he is starting to tolerate me but by no means seems to be comfortable around me yet if my boyfriend comes into the room chewy begs for attention he practically throws himself at my boyfriend and does all that he can to get my boyfriend to pay attention to him. Apparently this morning while i was at the doctor the two of them cuddled in bed for over an hour and when my boyfriend put him back into the cage he jumped back out and refused to leave my boyfriend alone. my room mate came into my room this evening and it was the same thing the bird was just begging for attention from him.

I dont understand chewy seemed to love me for the first two days and now he barely tolerates me but just about anyone else can pick him up play with him cuddle him and he does tricks for them talks for them but wont do any of that when it is just me in the room.

could it be that the bird does not like women? would that change or am i doomed to have to give up and make him my boyfriends bird and find another bird of my own?