Training?

[Observer]

Hello All;
I have an rougly 3 month old quaker parrot. I was wondering if this is an adequate age to train the bird to do tricks. If so, what tricks should I start ou with? How should I reward the bird (praising, treats (seeds), or both)? Any videos or books one should read before training a bird? Thank you for your time and help.

Another question, not ragarding training, is my bird sick or still young? I've noticed that he has some baby feathers still (white/light grey [not talking about the grey grey that they are supposed to have]). Thanks in advance

 

[cnyguy]

As long as you've established a trusting relationship with your parrot, you can begin trying to teach him some tricks. You might find the book Parrot Training by Bonnie Munro Doane helpful.

Have you ever taken your parrot to an avian veterinarian for a well-bird checkup? If not, it would be a good idea. The vet could tell you if your parrot's feathers are normal or not.

 

[CaitlinBird]

Cnyguy has a point! How strong is your relationship with your bird? I wrote a post about this on my blog a while back about building strong relationships with our birds, let me dig it up.....

Here it is!

Any feedback on the article is appreciated!

 

[MonicaMc]

Melinda Johnson, Barbara Heidenreich, Susan Friedman, Lara Joseph, Karen Pryor... all have great information! Some have books, some have DVD's, others have some free articles that you can read on the internet.

All are based on positive reinforcement/Applied Behavior Analysis, often under the guise of clicker training.