New to forum

[BigBarney49]

Hello guys,
We have adopted our 23 year old TAG about 7 months ago and have made A LOT of progress with him!

Before we came a long, he was attached to his previous owner...and her ONLY! After a lot of work, we finally got him where we want him....kind of.
We recently moved his cage from one part of the living room to another and he is NOT happy about it. He has been banging his dish bowl(actually doing it right now as I type this) throws his food around a lot more until we react to it, and is always up for a fight.
He is now EXTREMELY territorial about his cage. If you put your hand on top of the cage, he will climb up as fast as he can to get at you. If I come around the cage, he will puff out his feathers, pin his eyes, and start bobbing his head up and down and ready to fight.

He will come out of his cage and occasionally gets on the floor to explore a little more. That is about the only time he will let me pick him up.
My wife on the other hand can go to his cage and he will 'step up' onto her hand every once in a while. If he doesn't want to, he just nips at her without hesitation.

He use to not be this stubborn until we moved his cage. Anyone got any suggestions?
And I am happy to be apart of this forum and the proud owner of this little butt-hole.

 

[BigBarney49]

Anyone at all? 40 views and not one response.

 

[Anansi]

Hello, and welcome to Parrot Forum!

Please don't take the lack of responses personally. Sometimes, if new threads are coming in fast and furious, a thread can quickly find itself knocked out of the new posts section relatively quickly, allowing it to kind of "fall through the cracks" in a sense.

Also, weekends are just typically slower than weekdays. Just be a little patient. There are a lot of AG parronts who frequent this sub-forum and they'll chime in soon enough.

First off, congratulations on your TAG, and great job on getting the amount of progress with him that you have thus far.

As for his change in attitude, greys can be particularly sensitive about changes to their environment. And they are also a little more prone to holding grudges. Double whammy for you, there, but nothing hat can't be overcome with a little time.

When it comes to his cage territorial behavior, I suggest that you start off by working with him in an entirely different room. He needs to be out of sight of his cage for you to most effectively work at socializing and training him. Much of his aggression will simply evaporate once he can no longer see his cage and therefore has nothing to defend.

Also, you might want to do this training and socializing between meal times. That way, he'll be particularly treat motivated. This can work wonders in terms of their receptivity to what you want them to do.

Stepping up is very important. You want him to be able to step up reliably. Use treats between mealtimes to your advantage in this regard. Hold the treat just beyond the hand you want him to step up to. Just enough so that he needs to step onto that hand to get it. Done regularly and consistently enough, he will begin to associate stepping up with the tasty goodness of treats. Once that association is made, his stepping up will become far more reliable.

Hope this helps, and keep the updates coming!

 

[Flboy]

Welcome! Move the cage back for a test?
FYI I am on the forum 24x7 and have no idea how I missed your post! Must have been a busy time and you fell off the page. Also, Kiwi/henpecked/birdman666 were center stage all day! Dang, I knew I should have made the hour drive to see that baby!

 

[Allee]

Hello and Welcome to the forums! I can't add a thing to the excellent advice given to you by Anansi/Stephen so I'll just say, I wish you the very best with your newly adopted grey. Great photos, he's a very handsome bird. Looking forward to progress reports.

 

[Terry57]

Hello and welcome to the forum! My CAG was extremely upset when we moved his cage (We moved to a different house)and regressed quite a bit. He was quite nippy and stopped coming out completely.
He did get used to it after a month or so and went back to his usual self.
Hopefully your beautiful boy will settle back down soon. It sounds like you have made a lot of progress with him

 

[BigBarney49]

These are all great suggestions that we haven't tried. Putting the cage back, is not an option at this point. I will have to start trying to train him in another part of my house to see if that helps.
Is there anyway that I can show him that, "No, this is my cage?" He is very defensive about it.

 

[RavensGryf]

Beautiful bird! I love the Timneh Greys, so pretty. Welcome!

Keep in mind too, most of the views on threads are from the "public" non-members looking at the internet, and can't respond unless they sign up .

 

[BigBarney49]

Yeah, that makes sense.

Is there a way of "punishment" that I can do when he does bite? I know putting him in the cage is no good and ignoring it is not an option either.

 

[BigBarney49]

Bump to the last question.
What can I do as a "punishment" for hit biting?

 

[Sterling1113]

"Punishment" doesn't work for animals like birds. They're prey animals. If you try to scold or punish, they think they're being hunted, and it hurts the bond. (I mean in terms of raising your voice or being harsh)

However, if he sits on your hand and tries to bite, try the "wobble". When he goes to bite, just move your arm a bit so he loses balance. Don't throw him off your arm completely, just enough so he has to move his focus to staying still. Eventually he'll realize biting = off balance and he doesn't like that.

Or, find his absolute favorite treat. Only offer it when he's behaving. Good behaviour = treat. Grey's are smart... I'm sure he'll catch on

Hope things get better! He's beautiful.

 

[AmyMyBlueFront]

Welcome to the forum! Sorry can't help you with the cage thing,My TAG Smokey,<r.i.p.> for 27 years,her house was always in the same spot.

She was a wild caught when I got her,at about 6 months old,and to the day of her passing,was NOT a hands-on girl! She would run,and hide,and avoid me like the plague,untill she was cornered,then would grudgenly "step up" all the while telling me what a "good girl,or good bird" she is

I would take her into the bathroom <smallish room> and place her on the floor..and she had little problem about stepping up..but I came to the conclusion that it was only because she was unfamiliar with that room.
As soon as she was back to where she could see her house,she wanted no part of my hand and would fly right off <even when she was clipped> and go SPLAT on the floor and run for her homestead lol.

After years and years of this I just realized that it was how she felt and no amount of treats,or bribery,or scolding was gonna change that.
She was VERY stubborn,extremely intelligent,and otherwise a beautiful creature. I think maybe three times in 27 years I was able to scratch her head..she just hated hands. She had no problems hanging onto my shoulder,or pulling my hair,or banging her beak on my forehead or giving me oodles of kisses..it was just her hangup

Jim

 

[Anansi]

Don't let Jim's (AmyMyBlueFront) story about Smokey discourage you. Hahaha! Working with a wild caught parrot (especially a grey, since AG's tend not to be the most cuddly parrots to begin with) is orders of magnitude away from what you are attempting with your grey.

Ashley (Sterling1113) has given you some very good advice on discouraging your bird's biting.

Since the cage isn't a very good time out option in your particular case, given that most of his bad behaviors are tied to said cage, you can accomplish much the same with an unadorned training perch. (Provided you are doing the training in a room out of sight of the cage.) Just tell him "no", and then take him to the stand. Once he's on the stand, turn your back on him for 5-15 minutes. This will convey your displeasure better than a "punishment" would.

 

[BigBarney49]

Thank you all for the responses. I don't know what the heck is going on with him, but a switch flipped and he is happy now. Every time he starts coming after my hand or something when's its on the cage (trying to feed or water him) I just talk quietly and softly too him letting him know, "That's not ok. Slow your roll dude," and he stops. Now he wants to be my best friend.

 

[Anansi]

Great update! Pretty much a best case scenario for how things could've turned out.

Maybe he's finally dropped his grudge about the new location of the cage? Hahaha!

 

[Chrissygee]

I've been following along - I'm so glad that things have improved. I have had birds for a long time, but never a CAG and I'm finding out how different they can be. I have used that wobble technique with success for other birds, so it's great to have it in your bag of tricks - it really does work in most cases.