Hey everyone.
Not my first post here, but rather my third and possible my last... still about the same thing... my biting, male green cheek. I apologize for the length of this post! (seriously, it's long...)
I got my bird one year ago today.
Some background and disclaimer before the advice comes in:
Charlie (maybe he bites because he's mad that I accidentally gave him such a common bird name) was nippy from day one. In fact, he was biting the other birds in the cage when we went to pick him up. I've worked with him relentlessly over the past year. He is clicker trained and can do a bunch of tricks. He is target trained. He is (partially) potty trained. He says "step up," and "what are you doing?" He also says "gimme a kiss," will press his mouth on yours and make a kiss sound and then say "thank you!" Before his wing clip, he was also recall trained. He's a smart cookie and picks things up really fast! He is on a diet of pellets and chop. He gets covered at around 7:30 every night and uncovered at around 8:00 the next morning, unless its a weekend in which case it might be a little later. He doesn't get pet anywhere but his head. No erogenous zones are stimulated. No head bobbing is returned and nothing resembling a nest box has been provided for him. Any time he has regurgitated for me I have walked away and not encouraged it. He spends hours a day outside of his cage.
I have read the Parrot Wizard's book and watched his videos. I have watched the DVDs from BirdTricks.com. I have read countless articles. I am not posting this part to say that any of these people are right in their methods but rather to show that I have done research and am active is trying to provide the best for Charlie.
I clean his cage every day. A full paper changed and wipe with paper towels. Water changes multiple times a day. Baths are offered a few times a week. I am not currently working so I devote a ton of time to the little guy.
So, my dilemma is that he is a very, VERY bitey bird. He bites when he is getting pet. He bites when he is getting fed. He bites when he takes a treat. He bites when he steps up. One of his new things is to try to bite my hand when I am changing his food dish, to the point where he will almost totally squeeze through the door where I am attempting to insert his bowl. He will go out of his way to bite a hand that is within reach. Sometimes it's a quick snap of the neck and a little nip. Other times it's a running lunge and a clamping bite that leaves blood now and bruises later. He bites on his cage. He bites if he's on the bed. He bites if he is on the floor. He bites in new environments and he bites in his "territory."
There are no instances where I am ever completely confident he won't just decide he is done being nice and sink his beak into me, usually on a spot that he has already torn into and left scabbed and bloodied. I am not NERVOUS around him (before someone tells me he can read my mood... trust me, he doesn't give one lick about my mood), but I am definitely mindful of him. Is he biting 100% of the time? No. Sometimes he will step up just fine. Sometimes he will enjoy a good scratch. However, a good 80% of the time that head scratch session will end with him grabbing my finger with his foot like a dinosaur, screeching, and tearing my cuticle off.
Advice over the past year has come in two forms: A and B. A always contradicts B. For example:
A: "Don't remove yourself after he bites you, you will just give him what he wants."
B: "If he is biting, leave him alone and ignore him to teach him that's wrong."
Or
A: "I used the earthquake method to throw my bird off balance when he would bite. After a week he got the message!"
B: "Don't use the earthquake method. You will ruin your bird's trust. Just calmly say 'no' and set him down."
Now any of these methods may have worked for other people. Maybe someone is lucky and got a bird that speaks english and knows what "no" means. Maybe that bird also doesn't have its beak a quarter inch into their thumb so it can be easily set down. Not my bird!
Charlie, in spite of his intelligence and amazing ability to learn, has either never understood that biting is bad or enjoys doing it so much that punishment is irrelevant. I have tried it all:
Time outs in his cage.
Walking away from him and leaving him alone.
Earthquakes.
Putting him on the floor.
Physically holding him and holding his beak and saying "no" firmly while making eye contact.
Simply ignoring it.
HEAVILY re-enforcing good, non-biting behavior with treats and clicks.
Blowing on him when he bites.
Using a spray bottle on him when he bites (most people say not to do this, but they also don't have hands that look like a mummy, and it didn't work anyway).
Adding Avicalm to his food and water.
His wings are clipped. The day of his first clip at the vet he was an angel and was like a completely different bird. That didn't last long however. His lack of flight just became the new normal for him and he soon went back to being aggressive.
Nothing has had any effect on his behavior. He still likes me and wants attention like crazy. But he's mean about it.
At what point am I faced with the fact that my bird just bites? He's often not fun because of this. Because of this my BIG FEAR is that he eventually becomes a showpiece and not the part of the family he is supposed to be. I can deal with him being aloof or not affectionate. I've made peace with that, but when you have a pet that you dote over like crazy that will deliberately find a way to bite you and cause you pain, it very quickly becomes exhausting. We bought Charlie in what was, in retrospect, kind of a bird mill type of situation. I have a strong feeling that his formative weeks were not all that they should have been for a companion parrot having seen other breeders and bird stores since then.
The fact that he has literally not stopped molting since I got him surely compounds his moodiness. He's also celebrating his first birthday which probably has a hormonal effect on him, but that doesn't really explain every other day of the past year.
Compounding this is the fact that my girlfriend is preparing to bring home another baby green cheek at the end of the month. A little female turquoise baby from a very different environment than Charlie. The breeder has been sending her photos of her on a weekly basis. They are clearly doing a better job raising her than whoever took care of Charlie. My gut tells me that this is a bad time to introduce a whole new bird into the mix, but I really can't stop it. Her mind is made up so now that is adding another element of stress to the mix: will Charlie get WORSE with this new intruder in the home? Will he injure the new bird? Will he bond to her and then REALLY hate me?
That's a separate issue, of course, but can anyone tell me anything about my bird's aggressive biting? I love the little guy, but after a year of this, I am truly at a loss as to whether I can ever mold his behavior into the gentle companion I was hoping for and wondering if I should just save myself the heartache and accept that he is a "mean" pet and stop setting myself up for disappointment every time a "step up" ends in bloodshed.
Has anyone else had a bird like this?
Not my first post here, but rather my third and possible my last... still about the same thing... my biting, male green cheek. I apologize for the length of this post! (seriously, it's long...)
I got my bird one year ago today.
Some background and disclaimer before the advice comes in:
Charlie (maybe he bites because he's mad that I accidentally gave him such a common bird name) was nippy from day one. In fact, he was biting the other birds in the cage when we went to pick him up. I've worked with him relentlessly over the past year. He is clicker trained and can do a bunch of tricks. He is target trained. He is (partially) potty trained. He says "step up," and "what are you doing?" He also says "gimme a kiss," will press his mouth on yours and make a kiss sound and then say "thank you!" Before his wing clip, he was also recall trained. He's a smart cookie and picks things up really fast! He is on a diet of pellets and chop. He gets covered at around 7:30 every night and uncovered at around 8:00 the next morning, unless its a weekend in which case it might be a little later. He doesn't get pet anywhere but his head. No erogenous zones are stimulated. No head bobbing is returned and nothing resembling a nest box has been provided for him. Any time he has regurgitated for me I have walked away and not encouraged it. He spends hours a day outside of his cage.
I have read the Parrot Wizard's book and watched his videos. I have watched the DVDs from BirdTricks.com. I have read countless articles. I am not posting this part to say that any of these people are right in their methods but rather to show that I have done research and am active is trying to provide the best for Charlie.
I clean his cage every day. A full paper changed and wipe with paper towels. Water changes multiple times a day. Baths are offered a few times a week. I am not currently working so I devote a ton of time to the little guy.
So, my dilemma is that he is a very, VERY bitey bird. He bites when he is getting pet. He bites when he is getting fed. He bites when he takes a treat. He bites when he steps up. One of his new things is to try to bite my hand when I am changing his food dish, to the point where he will almost totally squeeze through the door where I am attempting to insert his bowl. He will go out of his way to bite a hand that is within reach. Sometimes it's a quick snap of the neck and a little nip. Other times it's a running lunge and a clamping bite that leaves blood now and bruises later. He bites on his cage. He bites if he's on the bed. He bites if he is on the floor. He bites in new environments and he bites in his "territory."
There are no instances where I am ever completely confident he won't just decide he is done being nice and sink his beak into me, usually on a spot that he has already torn into and left scabbed and bloodied. I am not NERVOUS around him (before someone tells me he can read my mood... trust me, he doesn't give one lick about my mood), but I am definitely mindful of him. Is he biting 100% of the time? No. Sometimes he will step up just fine. Sometimes he will enjoy a good scratch. However, a good 80% of the time that head scratch session will end with him grabbing my finger with his foot like a dinosaur, screeching, and tearing my cuticle off.
Advice over the past year has come in two forms: A and B. A always contradicts B. For example:
A: "Don't remove yourself after he bites you, you will just give him what he wants."
B: "If he is biting, leave him alone and ignore him to teach him that's wrong."
Or
A: "I used the earthquake method to throw my bird off balance when he would bite. After a week he got the message!"
B: "Don't use the earthquake method. You will ruin your bird's trust. Just calmly say 'no' and set him down."
Now any of these methods may have worked for other people. Maybe someone is lucky and got a bird that speaks english and knows what "no" means. Maybe that bird also doesn't have its beak a quarter inch into their thumb so it can be easily set down. Not my bird!
Charlie, in spite of his intelligence and amazing ability to learn, has either never understood that biting is bad or enjoys doing it so much that punishment is irrelevant. I have tried it all:
Time outs in his cage.
Walking away from him and leaving him alone.
Earthquakes.
Putting him on the floor.
Physically holding him and holding his beak and saying "no" firmly while making eye contact.
Simply ignoring it.
HEAVILY re-enforcing good, non-biting behavior with treats and clicks.
Blowing on him when he bites.
Using a spray bottle on him when he bites (most people say not to do this, but they also don't have hands that look like a mummy, and it didn't work anyway).
Adding Avicalm to his food and water.
His wings are clipped. The day of his first clip at the vet he was an angel and was like a completely different bird. That didn't last long however. His lack of flight just became the new normal for him and he soon went back to being aggressive.
Nothing has had any effect on his behavior. He still likes me and wants attention like crazy. But he's mean about it.
At what point am I faced with the fact that my bird just bites? He's often not fun because of this. Because of this my BIG FEAR is that he eventually becomes a showpiece and not the part of the family he is supposed to be. I can deal with him being aloof or not affectionate. I've made peace with that, but when you have a pet that you dote over like crazy that will deliberately find a way to bite you and cause you pain, it very quickly becomes exhausting. We bought Charlie in what was, in retrospect, kind of a bird mill type of situation. I have a strong feeling that his formative weeks were not all that they should have been for a companion parrot having seen other breeders and bird stores since then.
The fact that he has literally not stopped molting since I got him surely compounds his moodiness. He's also celebrating his first birthday which probably has a hormonal effect on him, but that doesn't really explain every other day of the past year.
Compounding this is the fact that my girlfriend is preparing to bring home another baby green cheek at the end of the month. A little female turquoise baby from a very different environment than Charlie. The breeder has been sending her photos of her on a weekly basis. They are clearly doing a better job raising her than whoever took care of Charlie. My gut tells me that this is a bad time to introduce a whole new bird into the mix, but I really can't stop it. Her mind is made up so now that is adding another element of stress to the mix: will Charlie get WORSE with this new intruder in the home? Will he injure the new bird? Will he bond to her and then REALLY hate me?
That's a separate issue, of course, but can anyone tell me anything about my bird's aggressive biting? I love the little guy, but after a year of this, I am truly at a loss as to whether I can ever mold his behavior into the gentle companion I was hoping for and wondering if I should just save myself the heartache and accept that he is a "mean" pet and stop setting myself up for disappointment every time a "step up" ends in bloodshed.
Has anyone else had a bird like this?
Out of the blue,he turned into a screamer AND biter. One minute I was giving him loveys and skritches and the very next SECOND there was BLOOD dripping off of whatever he was perched on...my arm...my hand..and it was just like THAT! A Dr Jeckyl/Mr Hyde.
