Bird breeder sold me the wrong macaw hybrid?

[Birdman666]

NOPE. Just the opposite. The first few times they do it, they are prone to biting the arm they get set on...

Once they get used to it, not a problem. Oh, that again, Hi. Foot Goes up. Okay I did it. Take me back now.

The big thing though is when they are in cuddle mode with you, there are times when they are NOT going to want that interrupted by a stranger. And by then, you will know your bird well enough to know when to say, not a good idea right now, these are pair bond birds, and this is our 1 on 1 time, she's likely to pinch you...

 

[Birdman666]

There is a socialization game we used to play down at the rescue with rehabs once we got them to stop biting...

A group of people sit around in a circle, and we play a game of "pass the birdie."

Each person takes a turn with feeding, touching, and playing with foot toys. Then passes the bird on to the next person.

After awhile we set the bird down in the center of the circle, and instead of passing the birdie, we CALLED the birdie...

THIS WORKS WONDERS!!!

 

[JewelsinMo]

I don't have any Mac experience, but my 0.02 is that she's just being beaky because she's still very very young- bite pressure training and beak play will help you work through these issues.

Could be just going through the "opinionated" and "testing" phase. That stuff usually starts pretty early on.

Firm hand, emphasis on boundary setting, control the beak when stepping up or setting down, and maintain eye contact. Work on bite pressure training. It could be this bird is just now discovering their bite pressure. (Which is actually about right on schedule. Babies are docile. Opinionated, Tantrum-prone Juveniles are the anti-docile.) Opinionated macaws use their beaks to communicate, you need to teach them to tone it down, or it gets worse!

Mr. Towel generally helps opinionated macaws with their attitude problems. Juvenille macaws quickly discover that bad behaviors (1) earn them a time out, or (2) get them what ever they want.

I'd choose option number 1 if I were you!!!

(Oh, wait, I've been you, several times! This is probably just a phase... )

Your posts are excellent and help me so very much! Could you expound a bit on bite pressure training?

Thank You!

 

[Mattroma]

Here is a thread I reference on bite pressure training. birdman explains a few things in it.

http://www.parrotforums.com/macaws/37547-soon-b-g-parent-few-questions.html

 

[JewelsinMo]

Thank you Mattroma!

 

[fasn8ya]

by any chance was this breeder in south carolina near the coast? i bought a "harlequin" from one that i am wondering about.

 

[Greenclaws]

Yes, she is based in South Carolina. After buying from her, everyone in the bird world who I spoke to only had bad things to say about her. I thought I did my research but apparently they delete all the negative feedback on their pages or something. Who knows? Would you mind posting a pic of your bird so I can see? I'm 90% I've figured out what my macaw is. She is a flame macaw. Catalina x greenwing macaw. The breeder probably thought her Catalina was a harlequin since they look very similar. My macaw has mostly greenwing traits with beautiful yellow developing in her wings, just a small patch of green right on top of her head and a faint black band under the beak from her B&G genes.

Anyways, Raja is doing great! At least she is healthy. I love her to death and she is just beautiful so I love her just the way she is!! She is free flight trained and goes outside with me daily, flies everywhere she wants and never flies away. I hope your baby is doing well

 

[Greenclaws]

This was her from a couple days ago. Not sure if you can see but 75% of her feathers are new but there's lots of old raggedy baby feathers left. The amount of breakage and stress bars on her old baby feathers is crazy! Poor thing must have gone through lots of stress and had poor nutrition.

 

[Greenclaws]

By the way the last pic is a baby vs now picture.

 

[JerseyWendy]

WOW, Raja looks amazing!!! GORGEOUS gorgeous girl!!!