Biting eclectus ??

[Libbi24]

Hi all,

I posted recently about a cage size for an Ecelectus parrot I was adopting. But now I have another problem lol!

For some context: pickles is (around )a five year old Ecelectus parrot. He was found outside of a hospital in London. He was malnourished, and he had lost nearly all of his feathers. a rescue to tried to find his owners as eclectus parrots are expensive and hard to come by in the UK. He is pretty tame as well. However no one had come for him. Fast forward a couple of years a lovely lady took him in for that time. However unfortunately she had to move back to her home country and that is then how I ended up adopting him.

He’s a great little guy. He can speak two languages, and say all sorts of cool things. He steps up, and enjoys human company. However, I’m having a problem where he’ll step up without a problem and then out of nowhere growl and lunge, he’s actually bit me pretty hard on my neck. I’ve had biting parrots before so I understand why they do it. My reaction when he does this is basically make no reaction, I go ow so he knows he’s hurt me and put him down on his stand and ignore him. However, it keeps happening. He flew onto my head today and I do not allow parrots on my head I don’t believe it is a good thing and I was in the process of actually doing my hair, so I asked him to step up, he stepped up for me and then took a chunk of out my hand.

He has been with me now for two days, but I have been to the rescue a handful of times to get him aquatinted with me. It seems as if he’s frustrated but how do I get past this with him. Do I use positive reinforcement? I have never owned an Ecelectus before so any help would be greatly appreciated!

(Ignore the wall, we’re going to be decorating soon lol!)

 

[Talaya]

It took my boy about a week, to eat from my hand but he still lunged and occasionally bit me for about 6 months… I just had to accept that I hadn’t respected his space or signals.i feel he didn’t fully relax into being himself for nearly a year.
Theyre a little tricky to read I think, or at least mine doesn’t give much warning. I have read they don’t bluff, they just do.. Look for a lengthening/stiffening of the neck, then very lightly flared feathers around the neck, if the wings lift a little it’s too late..thats when the strike is coming so stay away. This all happens in seconds.. Fortunately they don’t tend to have a bite as strong as some others, but it still cuts and bruises.
3 years on and he still growls when disgruntled but only nips every few months. He is very quick to rise in temper.

When not wanted in our head..we just gently flick our head forward and say off firmly and being dislodged he flies back to a stand, then yes he gets a treat like half a pine nut, or almond slice.. Now we only have to say off gently and he knows what it means.
He once bit my ear and cut through the outer skin, so he wasn’t allowed on my shoulder for a month. Same process as above. I found by saying ow did teach him a little that I was hurt and gradually over about. 6 months he got less and less pressure.. but he also learnt the word lol.
He has never reacted well to me being annoyed at him back and putting him away.. he just growls and gets disgruntled , so you just have to say no biting very firmly, and move him away, then ignore him for a while.. if it was my hand I would throw him in the air and tell him to go away, then talk to him and tell him that it wasn’t a nice thing to do. Next time that you’re not happy with him on your head and he has to move. So tell him your thoughts or what you are going to do..They really do understand much more than you realise.

A frustrated eclectus sounds just the right description, I expected he is very frustrated, lost, annoyed, frightened, he only has you to tell that he is frustrated. has lost all he knows all over again and it could take months, even a year to settle.

I am in the UK too, I don’t know what the rescue said to feed him, also make sure your feeding is right, mainly vegetables, evening meal maximum of 50% fruit with the vegetables maybe a teaspoon of millet seed (one with no additives, canary biscuit or oils). Too much sugar, additives, or oils will affect his mood too.
A few almonds a week, sunflower seeds are ok if used wisely.. only as rewards/training. Say 20 a week. When we can get them Palm Nuts, but they’ve been out of stock everywhere for over a year, so I use Nutriva organic red Palm Nut oil. And he gets 3 drops in his Sunday meal.
They only live mainly on wild figs, buds and flowers in the wild, so they are ‘mentally’ not too good at dealing with seed or a huge variety
or our high sugar fruits.
There is a lady on Facebook, she is the world leading person re Eclectus: Laurella Desborough and she just got a world award for research/knowledge/breeding etc last year.
Please don’t give up on this little chap, he looks in good health but will just take time to come around and feel safe again.

 

[Libbi24]

It took my boy about a week, to eat from my hand but he still lunged and occasionally bit me for about 6 months… I just had to accept that I hadn’t respected his space or signals.i feel he didn’t fully relax into being himself for nearly a year.
Theyre a little tricky to read I think, or at least mine doesn’t give much warning. I have read they don’t bluff, they just do.. Look for a lengthening/stiffening of the neck, then very lightly flared feathers around the neck, if the wings lift a little it’s too late..thats when the strike is coming so stay away. This all happens in seconds.. Fortunately they don’t tend to have a bite as strong as some others, but it still cuts and bruises.
3 years on and he still growls when disgruntled but only nips every few months. He is very quick to rise in temper.

When not wanted in our head..we just gently flick our head forward and say off firmly and being dislodged he flies back to a stand, then yes he gets a treat like half a pine nut, or almond slice.. Now we only have to say off gently and he knows what it means.
He once bit my ear and cut through the outer skin, so he wasn’t allowed on my shoulder for a month. Same process as above. I found by saying ow did teach him a little that I was hurt and gradually over about. 6 months he got less and less pressure.. but he also learnt the word lol.
He has never reacted well to me being annoyed at him back and putting him away.. he just growls and gets disgruntled , so you just have to say no biting very firmly, and move him away, then ignore him for a while.. if it was my hand I would throw him in the air and tell him to go away, then talk to him and tell him that it wasn’t a nice thing to do. Next time that you’re not happy with him on your head and he has to move. So tell him your thoughts or what you are going to do..They really do understand much more than you realise.

A frustrated eclectus sounds just the right description, I expected he is very frustrated, lost, annoyed, frightened, he only has you to tell that he is frustrated. has lost all he knows all over again and it could take months, even a year to settle.

I am in the UK too, I don’t know what the rescue said to feed him, also make sure your feeding is right, mainly vegetables, evening meal maximum of 50% fruit with the vegetables maybe a teaspoon of millet seed (one with no additives, canary biscuit or oils). Too much sugar, additives, or oils will affect his mood too.
A few almonds a week, sunflower seeds are ok if used wisely.. only as rewards/training. Say 20 a week. When we can get them Palm Nuts, but they’ve been out of stock everywhere for over a year, so I use Nutriva organic red Palm Nut oil. And he gets 3 drops in his Sunday meal.
They only live mainly on wild figs, buds and flowers in the wild, so they are ‘mentally’ not too good at dealing with seed or a huge variety
or our high sugar fruits.
There is a lady on Facebook, she is the world leading person re Eclectus: Laurella Desborough and she just got a world award for research/knowledge/breeding etc last year.
Please don’t give up on this little chap, he looks in good health but will just take time to come around and feel safe again.

Hi,

Thank you for your detailed reply! I’ll give everything you said a try.

As for his diet. I mainly feed my birds a veggie based diet anyway and I did a bunch of research on it before I adopted him. He loves pine nuts and I’ve been using them to get him acquainted to me. (If you can’t find any you should try Morrisons that’s where I got mine from!) tonight I’m making a fresh batch of chop with broccoli, carrots, kale, radish, green beans, a little bit of spinach, peppers, chilli’s, curly parsley and then I add red lentils, quinoa and either a tiny bit of flax seed, chia seed or sesame seed. My birds have their pellets at night. I use tops pellets. Does that sound reasonable for pickles? Many thanks x

 

[Thechoplady]

I would slow way way down on your interactions with your boy. Every time he successfully bites you’re inadvertently teaching him to bite so avoid the bites at all costs. I would start target training him ASAP. You can go to birdtricks.com for instructions on how to target train. I would also address his diet and make sure that’s on point but if you’re gonna be changing his diet, I would weigh the bird on a gram scale to make sure he’s not losing too much weight during the conversion. You never want your bird to lose more than 10% of its body weight during a diet conversion.

 

[Macawdamia Nut]

I have owned my macaw for 50 years. He has never tried to bite me. My bird grew up with an eclectus who was a nipper! One day, when I was a teenager, my uncle stayed over. He asked my mother, “Does your bird bite?” My mother responded, “No. Never!” My uncle then asked, “So, why does your bird distinctly say, ‘Don’t! Bite!’?” Maybe it’s an eclectus thing.

 

[kme3388]

I have owned my macaw for 50 years. He has never tried to bite me. My bird grew up with an eclectus who was a nipper! One day, when I was a teenager, my uncle stayed over. He asked my mother, “Does your bird bite?” My mother responded, “No. Never!” My uncle then asked, “So, why does your bird distinctly say, ‘Don’t! Bite!’?” Maybe it’s an eclectus thing.

We just adopted a macaw, and my husband shares the same opinion as you stated above. My Ekkie thinks I’m his mate so he is “easy” for me. He just try’s to mate with me all of the time, while he seeks out my husband for a biting session. He’s hormonal to put it nicely.

 

[kme3388]

Hi all,

I posted recently about a cage size for an Ecelectus parrot I was adopting. But now I have another problem lol!

For some context: pickles is (around )a five year old Ecelectus parrot. He was found outside of a hospital in London. He was malnourished, and he had lost nearly all of his feathers. a rescue to tried to find his owners as eclectus parrots are expensive and hard to come by in the UK. He is pretty tame as well. However no one had come for him. Fast forward a couple of years a lovely lady took him in for that time. However unfortunately she had to move back to her home country and that is then how I ended up adopting him.

He’s a great little guy. He can speak two languages, and say all sorts of cool things. He steps up, and enjoys human company. However, I’m having a problem where he’ll step up without a problem and then out of nowhere growl and lunge, he’s actually bit me pretty hard on my neck. I’ve had biting parrots before so I understand why they do it. My reaction when he does this is basically make no reaction, I go ow so he knows he’s hurt me and put him down on his stand and ignore him. However, it keeps happening. He flew onto my head today and I do not allow parrots on my head I don’t believe it is a good thing and I was in the process of actually doing my hair, so I asked him to step up, he stepped up for me and then took a chunk of out my hand.

He has been with me now for two days, but I have been to the rescue a handful of times to get him aquatinted with me. It seems as if he’s frustrated but how do I get past this with him. Do I use positive reinforcement? I have never owned an Ecelectus before so any help would be greatly appreciated!

(Ignore the wall, we’re going to be decorating soon lol!)
View attachment 62120

Please do research on Ekkie hormones. I haven’t seen @chris-md in quite sometime on here but read some of his stuff he’s posted on the forum. @Terry57 & @saxguy64 both have quite a bit of experience with male Ekkie’s as well if you can read through some of their suggestions. I’ve had my Ekkie for over 3 years now. I’m his mate which I didn’t choose. He treats me very well. I get regurgitated on, and he try’s to “care” for me. He attacks my husband, and I honestly haven’t found a resolution for it other than to handle Nico when my husband isn’t present.

 

[kme3388]

I also wanted to mention this encase you didn’t know. It really can depend on the parrot as well. Ekkie’s don’t exactly like to be touched. Nico doesn’t like head scratches. He likes to be held, and train but would prefer his feathers to be left untouched. He will snuggle into me, but he will push away my hand if I try to touch the feathers.

 

[Thechoplady]

I agree with kme3388. Ekkies in general do not like to be pet. Sophie will step up and i can carry her around and she like to be where I am but she does not like any kind of petting or scritching at all.

 

[chris-md]

Please do research on Ekkie hormones. I haven’t seen @chris-md in quite sometime on here but read some of his stuff he’s posted on the forum. @Terry57 & @saxguy64 both have quite a bit of experience with male Ekkie’s as well if you can read through some of their suggestions. I’ve had my Ekkie for over 3 years now. I’m his mate which I didn’t choose. He treats me very well. I get regurgitated on, and he try’s to “care” for me. He attacks my husband, and I honestly haven’t found a resolution for it other than to handle Nico when my husband isn’t present.

I’m around lurking, just about everyday. Just not actively posting I’ll reply tomorrow. But mostly seems what has been said is my interpretation. Slow down.

 

[Talaya]

Hi,

Thank you for your detailed reply! I’ll give everything you said a try.

As for his diet. I mainly feed my birds a veggie based diet anyway and I did a bunch of research on it before I adopted him. He loves pine nuts and I’ve been using them to get him acquainted to me. (If you can’t find any you should try Morrisons that’s where I got mine from!) tonight I’m making a fresh batch of chop with broccoli, carrots, kale, radish, green beans, a little bit of spinach, peppers, chilli’s, curly parsley and then I add red lentils, quinoa and either a tiny bit of flax seed, chia seed or sesame seed. My birds have their pellets at night. I use tops pellets. Does that sound reasonable for pickles? Many thanks x

Hi, that sounds like a healthy chop to me.

I tend to only add one type of seed in my chop, just so I can give another as a topper or lunch, but that personal preference. If the chop is a bit wet I’ll add ground flax seed (Linwood’s) to absorb the juices. Red veg and dark leafy ones are the best for Eclectus, dandelions are good.
I buy organic - dandelions, milk thistle seeds, amaranth seeds, flax seeds, camomile flowers, rose hips, coconut chips, chilies, from buywholefoodsonline.co.uk

I used to feed him some tops organic pellets, but they make my boy toe tap, so I don’t anymore. He seems to get enough vitamins from his food with the occasional drop of Nutriva palm nut oil.
So keep an eye out for him toe tapping x

Oh yes, it’s very common dislikes to be touched.. mine will just about let me do certain things I have had to train.. but he won’t let anyone else stroke/tickle him. So often they grab/nip/bite because they think you’re too close to touching their feathers. They also use their beaks a lot to balance and get around. Almost like a walking stick.

They can be quite possessive over objects/toys, so be aware when moving his stuff you could get bitten then too. Always set them up for a win. If cage cleaning, movings toys..make sure he is not in the cage or that he is in another room, or maybe give him a millet spray to keep his beak busy. I would recommend this https://www.northernparrots.com/nutcase-bird-safe-rubber-foraging-toy-for-parrots/
I’m on my third one !

It’s take it slow, at his pace you have a head start as he knows you from the rescue centre but Ekkies are thinkers and take a long time to think something over. He is just like a baby and needs to learn in baby steps over time. X