No-touch 'tiel

Hello all,
I recently "inherited" my mother's cockatiel. She got him (I say "him" as a generalization, I don't know the sex) for free from an ad posted in a pet store, so we don't know much about him. He says a few phrases, and despite my mother never having his wings clipped, he can't fly. I think either something happened to his wings, or his previous owner did something to them -- they seem stubby to me. She never had him out of the cage since she had 4 cats, plus the fact that he would hiss, squawk and lunge at her hand when she would change his water/food, so she didn't know if she'd be able to get him back in.

He seems to want attention, as he chirps and whistles when you go out of sight, and when you get near his cage, he comes to right where you are and just sits there. The problem is, he does not like to be touched at all. I've been trying for the last month to gain his trust, following any advice I can find on the subject, and it seems I've made some progress. He doesn't mind my hand being in his cage as long as I don't get too close to him.

I've tried using his feathers to touch him, tried getting him to step onto perches to get him out of his cage and even tried using millet sprays, which he loves, to coax him but anything that you hold near him, he runs away from... even when he's inside and I'm out. I've been trying to get him out of the cage for his sake, and I've let him come out on his own, but all he does is flop to the floor -- like he doesn't climb the outside of the cage, like the inside, he just sits on the door opening and eventually tries to fly and flops onto the floor. And then trying to get him back in is a disaster! I can't get near him, he doesn't know how to step up, and if I do manage to pick him up, as soon as he gets 2 inches off the ground, he flops away again. I've tried putting his ladder up to the cage so he can climb back up, but he doesn't use that either. Usually I end up toweling him and putting him back in.

So my question is: While I continue to try to earn his trust, should I try to let him out of the cage? I feel that all the fuss of trying to get him back in un-does any progress I've made so far. And is there a point where I should just accept the fact that he just doesn't want to be handled?

Thanks for taking the time to read this,

Bob

Sounds like your 'tiel may not have been handled before.....and, there are birds that prefer not being handled, even though they have been companion birds for years.....

I might be inclined to back off trying to handle the bird until it seeks out that type of attention.....you mention its wings seem short,,,its wings should fold to the length of its body, the wingtips sould reach just past its butt when folded, if the don't, either it hatched with deformed wings or someone may have pinioned the wings...there is a procedure that was used to keep birds from flying, where the wrist joints & wing tips were removed (think your hands removed at the wrists).....while the procedure was used mostly on chickens & turkeys, it has been used on breeding parrots and display birds and private swan, goose & duck flocks.....if this bird has been pinioned, that could be the reason it shies away from hands.....your description of the bird flopping to the floor might also suggest that it has been pinioned.....

If you could post a good pic or two showing its wings folded against its sides could show whether the wings have been pinioned.....

Thanks weco. I will try to get some decent pics for you to see.

What I'd like to know is whether I should I just leave him in the cage or try to get him some out-of-cage time? Once he's out, I can't get him back in without a kerfuffle and feathers flying.

I don't know how high his cage is off the floor, but you could just leave the cage door open & let him climb out on his own...maybe padding the floor with a couple of blankets so if he heads for the floor he won't get hurt.....

If you let him out after dark, you can turn out all the lights & just pick him up...when you pick him up, just keep talking to him so he know's it's you & not something wanting to eat him.....if a 'tiel's/pinch doesn't bother you, handling him like that may help calm him down about his friendliness.....

If you can get him into a room where you can close off the room and work with him on the floor it would help. Perch training is essential to get him to learn to step up without trying to bite you. Over time he would be more calmer and easier to handle.

I would just recommend leaving him in his cage and feeding him by hand until he gets more comfortable with you. Once he's more trusting you can try taking him out again.

I used to feed my tiels first thing in the morning before I gave them fresh food. They became so used to this kind of interaction that they'd demand it by following me around... even my most skittish cockatiel who takes flight any time he thought I was out to get him started to enjoy it so much he was flying to me without food present!


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q88bN30qOjo]Sunshine in the Morning - YouTube[/ame]


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9w9w8nMRmw]Hesitant Faye - YouTube[/ame]


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rH9ZWxhCSAE]Not So Hesitant Faye - YouTube[/ame]


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjKmHswgiHs]Cockatiel Feeding - April 24th - YouTube[/ame]

So here's a picture. Hopefully you can see OK.

I'm no expert on avian anatomy, but it appears he has no flight feathers(?) He's never been clipped as long as we've had him.

As for his behavior the last few days, I've just been sitting by his cage, leaving him inside and talking to him. He almost always comes right to me, holding on to the side of the cage with his feet and beak. Normally he'll just sit there and I can put my face right up to the cage and touch my nose to his beak, and he doesn't seem to mind, but as soon as I move my arms or hands, he moves away. And Monica, that's the problem with trying the hand feeding. He shies away from anything I put near him. Even if I try to hand feed him a millet spray, which normally he just gobbles up like it's the last one in existence, he won't come near it.

This afternoon, I sat with the side of my head against the bars, with my hair sticking through, to see if he would preen me, and he did. We also shared some food as well... sorta. Usually if I eat near his cage, he goes to his bowl and eats. And tonight he ate some broccoli from his bowl as I was eating some. I consider that a small victory as he doesn't seem to want to eat anything but seed. Anything else he just ignores or throws out of the food bowl. But it seems that if I make enough eating noise when I'm eating it, he gets intrigued and at least takes a nibble of whatever food I'm eating. It's hit or miss on if he'll eat more than just a few bites, but it's progress!

A few weeks ago, there was a day when he was out of his cage and on the floor, I lay down on my stomach with my chin on the floor and he walked right up to me, and put his beak right against my nose and sat there for like 5 minutes, just looking at me and eventually he scooted over to the crook of my shoulder/neck and laid right down, snuggled up against me. I thought he was possibly comfortable enough to let me touch his tail feathers, but as soon as I moved my hand, he ran away.

So it seems like he wants attention, or at least feels safe enough to be very close to me, but touching is not an option at this point. And even if he is one of those that never wants to be touched, I really would at least like to be able to train him to step-up so I can get him out and put him back in his cage.

Thanks again for all of your advice.

If he's always been on seed, watching you eat other foods is probably a good idea, as birds don't know other foods are food unless their parents, siblings or other flock members show them, by eating it.....

You see in this picture shows the flight feather been clipped and when you see from the sides it looks just like yours. Depending on how long you've had him, he may not have grown them out yet as they would only grow out IF they've been knocked out or pulled out. Otherwise you'll have to wait until molting before they'll be replaced. I highly doubt the previous owner would be stupid enough to clip off the wing itself as it will need some major surgery to fix it as the bird would be bleeding to death from the clip itself. But some times IF the feathers been chewed on down to the stubs they will not grow out nor fall out during molt unless you take a tweezer and pull it out which I have done in the past to help them grow feathers back out. I had to have the vet's help to do my Macaw's wings as he chewed them down to the stubs. Since we pulled them, they've grown out nicely but there's still a few to be pulled.

Drumphan, I know where you are coming from about hands. My cockatiels range in behavior from very skittish to very friendly. My most skittish cockatiel *does not* like physical or hands off interaction with me... he prefers other tiels to human interaction - and that's just fine by me! If I get too close to him, he typically flies off or moves away.

A few years ago when I had a small flock of adult budgies, I decided to try an experiment... none of them were tame and none of them would come to me. I started out by offering food to the budgies first thing in the morning from my hand. It was the regular food that they got in their dishes and if they weren't interested in eating from my hand, that was ok! But of course there was at least one budgie who was curious enough to eat from my hand, and if one did it, well, monkey see, monkey do! I had 5 budgies eating from my hands! After all the food was gone, I'd replenish the food in their cages for the day and repeat again the next day.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUx81WHTUwk]1 Bird in hand Leads to Many - YouTube[/ame]

A couple weeks later, instead of having my hand inside the cage, I had it just on the outside of the cage... and if the budgies wanted to continue eating from my hand they had to come to the door of the cage, and fly the short distance to my hand to continue this behavior.

Not long after that, I was standing four feet or more away from the cage and the budgies were flying out of the cage and to my hand! It had been about a month since I started this behavior, and the budgies were comfortable flying to me for this simple interaction! And to get them back in the cage all I had to do was replenish their food!

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlSm4uFZzVU]More Budgies!!!! - YouTube[/ame]



I had no interest in doing this with my cockaitels! I didn't even plan on it! But one day, I had a hand raised cockatiel that hadn't been handled in years (do to the previous owner getting busy with school, girls and sports) following me around the room at feeding time. I thought it was odd behavior because she never had shown any interest in interacting with me before... and one day, she landed on me. I thought it was Casey, but "she" felt a little too heavy, and I didn't notice who it was until she, Sunshine, took off. It took Sunshine another attempt at landing on me before it finally "clicked". My stupid little human brain couldn't fathom what she wanted at first, until I attempted to feed her. She was very hesitant and unsure about it, but it was what she wanted. After all, she saw me feeding the budgies by hand, why not her, too?

I don't have a video when we first started this behavior, but I do have this one, that shows just how comfortable she got with me and how confident she was in herself.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q88bN30qOjo]Sunshine in the Morning - YouTube[/ame]



Well, ok, I'm feeding Sunshine, one cockatiel out of my entire flock. Still have no thoughts or ideas of feeding the rest of the flock... but, monkey see, monkey do... and Faye, a new cockatiel to the flock who hadn't been handled in who knows how many years and has been in at least 3 homes prior to mine, and lost her mate a year before she came to me (I have photos of both in their previous home - in the filth that they were kept in)... well, she started "following" me around, too.

So this first video shows just how hesitant and unsure Faye is of this behavior. She wants it, but she's also uncomfortable with the idea. There's food right behind and below her in the video, but no, that's not what she wanted! She wanted that same behavior that she saw between me and Sunshine...

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9w9w8nMRmw]Hesitant Faye - YouTube[/ame]


Up until this point you can see that I've been feeding seeds in all these videos. Faye is a bit quirky... because the first thing she ate when she joined the tiel flock was pellets. She had been on a seed only diet for I don't know how many years, but she ate pellets no questions asked! Ate them as if she's always eaten them... so this next video shows Faye eating pellets from my hands. You can see how relaxed and calm she is in this video and how comfortable she is with my hands.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rH9ZWxhCSAE]Not So Hesitant Faye - YouTube[/ame]



And sure enough, if you feed one cockatiel, you end up feeding the rest, by hand, too! After Faye started to demand this behavior, and I started feeding her by hand, I ended up feeding the rest by hand as well - if they wanted it. They didn't have to, but if they wanted to I was more than happy to share! I used seeds, pellets and millet.

Tomi Girl, another tiel that I took in near 50% underweight (I first weighed her in at 56 grams, but that was after she had eaten some food - she now weighs over 90 grams) was fine flying to a dish (that I held) to eat out of it, but refused to fly to my hand to eat. If I held my hand up near her perching spot, she would happily eat from my hand then, but she did not want to physically touch me otherwise.






When I first got Tomi Girl, she refused to eat millet. Didn't matter where I hanged it in her cage or even if I placed it in the dish, she wouldn't eat it. What an absurd idea! A cockatiel that doesn't like millet? That's unheard of! But there she was, plainly refusing it! She didn't start eating it until she joined the tiel flock and saw them eating it... and only then did she realize that it was tasty stuff. I ended up using millet to teach her to become comfortable with the idea of touching my hands.

Tomi Girl is far more comfortable with humans than Pistachio is, yet I did the same behavior with Pistachio as I did with Tomi Girl... and Pistachio, as skittish as he is, actually made that step (and flight) onto me quicker than Tomi girl. In fact, he became comfortable enough with me that in a very short amount of time (shorter than I ever expected) he flew to me! He landed on me without any food present and patiently waited until I could present him with food. A bird that had absolutely no interest in me was all of a sudden flying to me of his own choice. I never expected this of him. I never thought he would.



So this next video shows how comfortable both Tomi Girl and Pistachio became with my hands. They were both comfortable enough to now fly to my hands to eat.


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjKmHswgiHs]Cockatiel Feeding - April 24th - YouTube[/ame]




If this post isn't long enough, well, you can read the longer version (with more details) on another (dead) forum.
"Self-Taming" Cockatiels - BirdBoard

Like Monica says monkey see monkey do! That's the way it works, as long as you can get one to do it the rest of the group follows. My boys are good to me now days. Nobody bites me anymore as I can handle all of them these days.

I just wanted to say that that's pretty precious the way he wants to come up and touch your face, even on the floor - it's just hands that are scary (for now). He sounds like a sweet little bird and, as with all things bird, it will just take some time. I bet you'll have him stepping up onto a perch soon.

MikeyTN said:

Depending on how long you've had him...

Click to expand...

We've had him for 4 years at least, and have never had him clipped. Does that shed any light on it?

Monica -- do you think I should take his food bowl out overnight and then try hand-feeding him in the morning, replacing the bowl afterwards?

-Bob

Drumphan said:

MikeyTN said:

Depending on how long you've had him...

Click to expand...

We've had him for 4 years at least, and have never had him clipped. Does that shed any light on it?

Monica -- do you think I should take his food bowl out overnight and then try hand-feeding him in the morning, replacing the bowl afterwards?

-Bob

Click to expand...

IF you can hold him to observe his wings, it would tell you more about what happened. Like I've said sometimes they will chew them to the stubs where they will not fall out. It's highly likely that someone might of chopped them off too short to begin with and the bird finished the job by chewing to the base.

I had a cockatiel that couldn't fly either... she gave herself a one sided permanent "clip" by destroying the feather follicles on one wing.

As for the food dish, ya, that would work. I only give my birds enough food to last them for one day. They usually eat most of it, and might have some left over during the night.. and that is typically dumped and refreshed in the morning. If you feed more food than what could be eaten in a day, then removing the dish right before they go to sleep and feeding first thing in the morning after they wake up works. If after 5-15 minutes (or however long you are willing to wait) and he's not interested, just put the food back in his cage and try again the next day! Use his regular food, use his favorite treats, anything he likes!

He sounds like he's already tame and friendly, he just has an aversion to hands that he's afraid of and has never learned to get over. If he can learn that hands mean good things, he can learn to accept them. Right now the goal is to get him "ok" with the idea of eating from your hands. Once he becomes comfortable with the idea and eagerly anticipates you feeding him, then you can start working on him stepping up... but for now, we just need to get him ok with the idea of eating from you. Don't worry or stress about anything beyond that! Baby steps.