Hormones or overbonding? Good people training resources?

[Screech]

Beaker is 5 + years old and I've had almost four full months and things have kind of settled or plateaued where I can't tame him past this point. I can touch his head, I can almost lift his wing with my hand, and I can get him to nicely touch things, like my hand, his beak and tongue it a little(for good the right price of course!). However, when his favorite person is home we loose progress because he gets so wound up that he does territorial displays towards me (and lots of biting threats) - I'm sure that must emotion must have residual feeling the next day. When I'm further away he will take it out by aggressively chewing on his nails or wearing out feathers on his legs.

Does anyone have experience as the non-favored person for a large macaw? Is this just the "teenager" years or is this something that I'm exacerbating by doing something wrong?

Do any training books or videos address this very thing?

 

[LiL_Caity413]

 

[Screech]

Thank you, Lil_caity! I really appreciate all the work you put into your reply. It does give me confidence to hear you say that there are things I am doing correctly.

I'll add target training to our regime again. The last time we tried target training he wasn't used to the clicker idea yes (*click* I offer treat, beaker eats finger tips), it might just work now!

Is there anything wrong with Beaker only being under my control until he learns to keep his weaponry in check?

 

[LiL_Caity413]

 

[LiL_Caity413]

 

[Screech]

Bongo acts the same. She is "so" bonded to me that when I am around, she is consumed by being near me. If I am not around, my wife can pet her through the cage but that's about it. If I'm around, my wife can't get within 5 feet of her without her posturing.

It finally dawned on me that we weren't getting anywhere when Beaker started giving me two 'options' when it came time to go back to the play gym. He would communicate, "either you back away from the perch and I will be super cuddly while you pet me or I will bite the living crap out of your bicep and maybe find your vein in the process"

He actually trusts me more than my wife for most things, while at the same time love makes him blind to all that.

BTW, Lil_Caity, that looks like the best write up I've ever seen on the whole internet. In the past I've seen responses similar to "oh, well. sometimes it just sucks..." or articles that try to balance out the problem by having the favored person doing things the bird doesn't like while the dis-favored person is doing everything else (resulted in a very nippy Beaker).

These last two days have been interesting, for once Beaker is trying to engage me while there is more than one person around! I have had to leave him on his stand (gotta gain control again) more than I would in the past which in turn has left him lunging more often. Unfortunately I had a horrible day yesterday, so I didn't have the energy to do more than some target training. The sessions I did do started with him being avoiding the stick, then attacking the stick, and finally just poking at it a little bit.

 

[LiL_Caity413]

 

[Screech]

Marty looks like an agitated bird at first, bet then gets real focused. Do you apply the turn around trick for other purposes such as distraction? Also is there a point when you change the use of the bridge and treat for a well trained action?


Back to Beaker: Could just be a good day in general, but I think the strategy is continuing to have all around good results. Screaming was near non-existen, I only had one incident of open beak threat -not sure what brought it on, usually he starts to lean and dance in the general direction of the play gym first, and only one incident of displacement aggression (leg biting).

Still left to deal with is Beaker's obsessive nail biting (fortunately he has left his over preened feathers alone). This is usually in frustration of not being held or over anticipation of my wife coming home. Maybe an interactive toy or some kind of task completion training to occupy him from his troubles?