New bird owner with re-homed GCC and would like advice please.

[Fyx]

Hello everyone! Thanks for taking the time out of your day to read this (it's reaaaally long). Let's jump right in!

A little background on our green cheek conure (she doesn't know the sex). My wife worked with a lady who had him and she also had 3 parakeets. She also has a couple kids (unsure of their ages, but I believe younger). She said she didn't have the time needed to take care of the conure (her husband also worked nights and had trouble with the squawking during the day) so she was looking to re-home them but only as a group. My wife has always wanted a conure so naturally she said yes! We ended up with 3 parakeets, a cage with toys and food for them, a conure along with food and cage, and an outside cage on wheels.

We bring them home in April and of course the cage was too small for the conure so she gets a bigger one and gets him setup. Added a couple items (mineral rock, cuddle-board, two bells in balls, different size perches) and he seemed ok in the new cage and had no trouble eating or drinking. He was very quit during this time except at night when the sun was going down or bright orange objects. He squawked at a hot Cheeto bag, Little Caesar's pizza box and a roll up extension cord (also if we watch a scary movie or one where a lady screams when being attacked/killed he likes to squawk too!). We setup him in our living room where the most action would be. Us and the dog. Our german shepard never bothered the conure from the get go and I think the conure doesn't mind him either. The conure was quiet for about a couple weeks just watching us and he would walk away from us when we tried to approach the cage. I didn't think anything of it other than he needed time to adjust.

Unfortunately I work from home so got to spend more time with him talking as I went by and playing with his bells. I also sat closer to him in the living room. After 3 weeks one night he rang his bell so I went and rang the other one. He rang his again and I congratulated him and made a "ding ding ding" sound. I asked him to ring his, made the sound, then ring mine and made the sound and he did it! The next morning he was friendly to me! I walked by the cage and he came up to it. I would talk to him and ring his bell and he would too. He would start to crawl towards my fingers and try and bite at them and naturally I would pull them away.
One morning I was cutting up an apple for another pet (bearded dragon <3) and decided to see if the conure wanted some. I held a little piece up to the gate and he came up and ate it. He started making this little purr/chirp sounds while eating it so I gave him a couple more pieces in his bowl we tried to put veggies in. He doesn't like to eat carrots or kale or bananas or cuties (baby tangerines). HE LOVES MILLET and we even tried to sprinkle them on the banana but no dice. He had some food that looked like tricks or fruit loops and the wife said that wasn't the best for them so she got some seed mix as well.

A week later I try and open the cage and feed him some apples like that. He came up slowly and ate the apple just fine and I would shut the gate. We would continue to play with the bells and he would continue to follow me around the cage. If I left the room and came back and walked nearby he would fly or crawl fast and basically follow me around the cage. I started a new game with him (which now I think was a HUGE mistake) where when he would come up the cage I would let him beak my fingers or hand and then I would turn around and poke his body/feet or lightly pull his tail feathers and say "get you get you!". The conure of course would do flips and turn around and follow me and my finger all around the cage so we made a game out of it.
A couple days later I opened the cage and tried to feed him apples and he lunged and latched onto my finger which caught me off guard completely and caused me to panic yell (I'm a 6'3" 330 lb man but with sensitive skin lol) and make a big scene. The conure of course afterword started making this cackling laughing sound as I yelled for the dog to get back. That bite drew blood and the wife said she would need to train him to step up and not bite if I was going to make a scene because "any attention when bad things occur is good attention to them". I agreed and said I was fine with that, it was her bird anyway. For some reason the conure would get super excited when seeing me if I left the room for a hour or so and would I came back and he saw he me would poop. I told her "great he's like those dogs that pee when they are happy to see you lol".

A week go by and she tries to approach the cage and bond with him be he is scared and keeps running from her. But as soon as I show up in the room he comes to me. I can't fault my wife but she gets tired of things easily and I told her even if he shows you no love just give him time and talk and hang out anyway. Eventually he would come up to the cage for apples but that was the extent. She starts liking the conure less and less because when I would leave the room he would squawk really loud and it would hurt her ears and give her a headache/migraine (she is genetically disposed to these, her whole family gets them easily). Paired with the fact the conure doesn't seem to be bonding with her, she says I'll need to move him into my office where I work most of the day since he won't be calm. At this point she starts calling him my bird and I agree I've grown fond of him and agree to it. We are in the process of moving my office around so he sits on the floor next to the room while we get it setup properly.

I continue to play "get you get you" with him and talk to him and feed him as normal. Sometimes I'll leave him in the living room when I'm super busy so the dog can entertain him and I noticed if I leave for a couple hours and come back and walk by the cage without acknowledging him he would do a single loud squawk and I would turn around and seem him do this "strut/slow walk" where he bobs his head, flares his tail and puffs up and eyeballs me. Of course I think it's hilarious,cute,etc and try to get him to do it so I can record it and show the wife. I finally got him doing it!

I started looking for information for the conure (diet, playtime, sleep schedule, etc) and have now read tons of stuff. We've had him now for almost 2 months and he has never left his cage (we know this is bad now!). The more I've the told the wife things the more she thinks she made a mistake bringing him home as he tends to be a very high maintenance and social bird. She knew they were social but didn't realize how much so!
So I felt bad for the conure and decided to start small and sit with him in the bathroom and open the top of the cage so he can start exploring. It took him a bit for he came up and explored the top of his cage. I tried to hold my arm up to him to "step up" on and he would beak at it at first (guessing to make sure it's safe and sturdy" and then he would bite and launch on hard and not let go. I pulled my arm far enough away that he lost his balance on the cage and let go. I tried my other arm and the same thing. He would do little beaks which is fine but then he would latch on hard to the extra skin and not let go. I don't understand why he likes to hold my flesh but the cage, toys, etc he just bites or beaks and lets them go. I finally get him off that arm and try and use two fingers to push towards his chest and he bites down hard on them again. It took my 3 mins to shake a ball in his cage enough to get him to crawl back down into it and shut it and walk away.

I started reading more on how to get him to stop biting but it may take some time. I realized (I think) I should of just left him alone after the bite and walked away. I'm a big baby and it's hard to not react when he bites for blood. I'm still unsure on alot of the training's so I have a clicker and some treats and some chopsticks (target stick) to try and get him to follow it first.
How much time a day should I leave him out of the cage to explore?
How should I get him to stop following me around like he wants to eat my face off in the cage?
How do I get him to eat good veggies and not just want millet and apples? How should I try and touch or pet him (I think I red the tail feather is bad)? The conure doesn't have clipped wings and flies around in the cage when spooked so I guess he is "flighted?". Any other good bonding or things I should be doing? I want him to be able to fly around the office and eventually the house and sit on my shoulder and all that fun stuff. I want to make sure I do him justice and he can live a long happy life with us!

 

[Charliesmom]

I am no expert by far. I have bought almost every book there is..... no joke. I've watched every you tube video lol. But what I've found is everyone kind of has the same few ideas on how to stop biting. The first thing everyone agrees on for the most part is having no reaction. I havea verynippy at times green cheek and wheni first got himi was full of scabs. But i have to say it took awhile but it did for the most part work. Now if I do get bitten it's not hard and may only leave a dent for a minute. I've found that birds take a lot of patience and research but they are so fun and worth it. My bird makes me laugh every day even though he still can get nippy sometimes. But then show him he's not getting a reaction and try putting something else in his beak like a toy or piece of paper to RIP up.

 

[Jen5200]

I totally missed this thread - sorry, I would have responded sooner! What’s your little guy’s name?

I have 4 conures who came to me as adults over the past 3 years - two had biting issues, two did not. All came with crappy diets . I’ll share a few things that I did with mine and you can see if any of it helps.

Diet is an important contributor to behavior - think about a two year old that eats junk food and the wonderful behavior that comes with it lol. I would recommend starting to make a slow progression toward a better diet. Not sure if yours is on a pellet diet? If not, I’d try to get him onto a good pellet (Harrison’s, TOPs, natural Zupreem, Roudybush, Tropican, or something similar). You may have to try a few different kinds and it may take him a little while to decide that they are food - I’ve tried all of the pellets that I feed in an effort to get them to also try them (monkey see-monkey do). None of mine like the same pellets, so I get to keep a “selection” on hand. Veggies are important. Mine all love apples, so I started cutting apples smaller and smaller....then I added finely cut veggies (one at a time) into the apples to disguise them, slowly adding more variety as they accepted each one. The goal being to eventually scale back the fruit (high sugar) and have a much higher veggie portion. I keep a small amount of seed in their diet, and use it as treats. Sunflower seeds are pretty high fat and should be given sparingly.

Mine all get an hour or two per day out of cage minimum. Because mine don’t all get along, I do have to rotate time out in groups that don’t try to scrap with each other. Mine have to be supervised, as they are all flighted.

Biting - that’s a tough one, and I had two that shredded my fingers, face and anything else that they could get their little beaks on (and I bled a lot)! There was no single tactic that fixed it in my experience. I tried a few different things that seemed to work over time. The first one was not making a huge deal out of the bites... they hurt like crazy so it can be tough - I just set my bird down somewhere that isn’t “fun” (and isn’t their cage), like a chair back, a perch, etc. I turned my back on them and pointedly ignore for a minute or so. Then I would pick up again and start fresh and try for a more positive experience. I don’t like to make their cage a bad place to go, so I try hard not to use it as a punishment. Stanley was a vicious biter, many times I needed to just use a perch to have him step up on rather than my fingers (when he was feeling particularly carnivorous and I needed to remove him from my body). Neither of my biters were allowed on my shoulder until we got to a point that I could trust them not to bite - I had my lip punctured a few times and decided that wasn’t a wise place to have them. It took a few months of being very consistent with setting boundaries of what behavior I would accept. I was very enthusiastic every time they did something good and set them down and ignored briefly when they did unacceptable behavior. I discovered with Stanley that I need to present my finger for him and keep it out of reach of his beak, I pause and wait for him to lift his little foot - then I know that he intends to step up and not bite the dickens out of my finger. We are down to almost zero bites now.

Petting zones - stick to the head and neck. Below the shoulders on a bird are their sexy zones and can lead to other unwanted behaviours, including frustration biting.

Target training is a really good way to build a bond with your bird, and there’s lots of good videos out there about it. Mine love learning new things, so be prepared to teach a few basic tricks if he enjoys it.

Good luck with your guy - ask lots of questions, there’s lots of us conure people here!

 

[noodles123]

He likes you better-- you are the chosen one. You are his "mate". Your wife is the intruder/threat.

You can try backing off a bit and giving her time to have positive experiences with the bird with your outside of the room.

I will write more later---I am late for work!!!