I have a flyer on my hands

Perjo has turned into a curious and impatient FiD and loves to take flight to either find me or see what all the fuss is in another room.

I’m glad she’s not too skiddish to fly but a CAG that likes to take flight a lot brings a whole new set of issues with it.

Safety being first and foremost.

Ah, the joy of flight. Our ekkie gets the zoomies, and he loves playing hide-and-seek with my partner. We often wear him out with a game of hide-and-seek before tucking him into bed now.

We are always conscious of what doors are open or closed. Kitchen door is often closed unless we're in there to supervise him (but never while we're cooking). Bathroom door is open (he'll fly to the sink and wait for me if he wants water), but the toilet is always closed. If we need to move in and out of the house, the curtains are closed, so he can't fly out, or we put him back in his cage entirely.

He's such a good flyer, practicing all sorts of manoeuvres that sometimes resemble a fighter jet and sometimes resemble a helicopter. He knows how to fly through something that's smaller than his wingspan. So we practice hand signals with him - if I'm closing a door and he's in the air, I'll show him a stop sign, so he knows to divert. We also practice recall regularly.

We've taught him where all his safe places to land are - he has set areas to perch in each room (though he doesn't always stick with them). We've also made sure to implement potty perches in each area - he gets a treat if he goes there. But he also does revenge poops now, purposefully flying to the wrong place when he's upset that we're ignoring him.

I love the fact that he's flighted. When he's tired of us humans, he'll fly off by himself and chatter away in another room. When he's thirsty, he'll fly to his cage and walk himself in. When he's tired from a day of flying on his kite-line or hanging out with friends, he'll tuck himself into 'bed'. When he wants to play, he'll dart around the rooms, looping around, trying new tricks mid-air - he has such fun, he'll wear himself tired. If he's uncomfortable with a situation, he will fly straight to me for safety.

I m totally in your boat, my friend. After years of recall training, Parker has FINALLY learned what his wings are for, and taken pleasure in using them for naughty things.

And of course, he’s discovered them *after* he’s already destroyed them for the winter, so he’s can’t fly anymore, per se. But for the first time ever he left just enough flight feathers to flutter down quite safely to the floor from his play stand we often park him on at night when we’re watching TV but not holding him. He used to sit so calmly up there relaxing. Now he’s trying to fly to my partner (his favorite) or to the ground to explore under the sofa - a HUGE nono for ekkies and their hormones.

This is creating a new suite of challenges to be overcome. Safety first!

I TOTALLY sympathize with you!

DRB said:

Perjo has turned into a curious and impatient FiD and loves to take flight to either find me or see what all the fuss is in another room.

I’m glad she’s not too skiddish to fly but a CAG that likes to take flight a lot brings a whole new set of issues with it.

Safety being first and foremost.

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Oh nice, good for Perjo!

It's true, safety does become a much bigger issue. I've invested a lot in tarps of all sizes. And purchased a lot of appliance covers etc...

Have you taken any flying videos yet?

Some species are inherently skilled fliers and readily adapt to the confines of a home. Others are ponderous and clumsy. Hope Perjo is either the former or develops the skills to safely navigate.

Some members hand-carry their bird room by room and preview each wall, piece of furniture, mirror, window, etc.

Happy to read Perjo and Doodles like to flap flap. I WISH Amy would try! But if he did,I have visions of him zooming down the halls looking for me and his best bud BB.
BB on the other hand is a superb zoomer. He'll contact call for me and I'll tell him I'm in the bedroom,then I hear him yelling as he flies from Amys play top,down the hall,and a hard right turn into my bed room and land perfectly on my shoulder. :18:
There is a partial partition/wall between the living room and kitchen with an open window type thing in the middle, and access points at either end of the kitchen. "Just for fun" Beebs will zoom full throttle around the partition,and at times take a short cut by zooming thru the "window"..all the while yelling his full head off. David sits on the couch,his mouth open wide,shaking his head in BB's expert zooming skills. It IS quite amazing watching the little Fluffboy do his thing!


Jim

How wonderful to hear of flying! So great for health of mind and body! Of he hasn't been flying long, then his flight will vastly improve with time, and the desire to zip around will likely decrease. If you provide a few hang out perches just for him, with easy to shred stuff zip tie to them it helps a lot! At least for me and mine, they just fly to their hanging perches and very rarely go furniture or shelves.
I'd love to see pic and vid

We are owned by a Free Roaming DYH Amazon and is a very strong and talented flier. When he first came to take-over our home, he had been serious cut to a Fly Like a Dropped Rock status. As he recovered his flight abilities we busied ourselves with teaching him safe fly paths, safe landing zones and that windows, mirrors and framed Art are in fact a Hard Surface...

Recall Training, IMHO, is the most important tool to teach your Flighted Parrot. Like with Bonding and Relationship development and 'Step-Up,' it must be an automatic... You ask for a Step-Up, your Parrot Steps-Up! You call for Recall and your Parrot returns to you!!! Failure of your Parrot not returning to a Recall is akin to watching as your Parrot flying away...

Most individuals respond with; I have no plan to Free Fly (outdoors) my Parrot, s/he only fly's in our home. A flighted Parrot increases the likelihood of a Parrot mistakingly flying out the door, etc... Example, you are stepping out the door and your Parrot is flying to you and misses a shoulder landing and continues straight out the door. A recall, is the only tool you have to define a return...

In house safety: As stated above, you must walk each safe flight path with your Parrot. Starting from the primary location to its short and long flight (including everything in between. It's all on you!

I use the Real Estate Agent Home Tour as my method of choice and once your Parrot has all the paths and landing zones in place. If nothing changes in your home, you repeat the training at least once each month. If something changes, furniture is moved, or added, plus anything added or removed along a flight path, that is flight path is reintroduced when the change occurs.

The most dangerous flight is one driven by fear as the first three to five seconds is just plan go!!! No preplan, just Go! When your Parrot has defined flight paths trained and practiced, they set in and take-over rapidly. At a rate of 39" (1 meter) per second of fear flight most Parrots can easily be into a wall before non-trained routes are defined. Within half that time, a trained and practiced route will set-in.

The most dangerous flight is one driven by fear as the first three to five seconds is just plan go!!! No preplan, just Go! When your Parrot has defined flight paths trained and practiced, they set in and take-over rapidly. At a rate of 39" (1 meter) per second of fear flight most Parrots can easily be into a wall before non-trained routes are defined. Within half that time, a trained and practiced route will set-in

Steven my Good Friend...you hit this statement square on the head!
As most of us know,Cockatiels can,and DO,freak-out very easily. It doesn't take much at all for BB to go all cattiwumpus,hat high in the air,beady little eyes the size of dimes,yelling at the top of his air sac,as he flies helter-skelter with absolutely NO CLUE in where he is going or doing And all it takes is a SNEEZE or cough,or something dropped in the NEXT room to set him off. At his last wellness check he got his sleeves shortened,for his own good..and safty. Even though he knows where/what walls and doors are,,mirrors...window/shades...twice he has crashed into something after loosing his mind :02:
When he is in control...he is in CONTROL...but when he freaks out..BEWARE!

I hope Perjo has better control!

Jim

CAGs tends to be belly heavy fliers, but Perjo does very well. She had two favorite landing spots that she actually hovers like a helicopter before landing. She’ll literally slow down and just suspend herself like a hummingbird for a sec.

I’m gonna have to try to get her to start wearing the flight harness soon to see if we can work in harnessed flights outside maybe this summer or next summer.

DRB said:

CAGs tends to be belly heavy fliers, but Perjo does very well. She had two favorite landing spots that she actually hovers like a helicopter before landing. She’ll literally slow down and just suspend herself like a hummingbird for a sec.

I’m gonna have to try to get her to start wearing the flight harness soon to see if we can work in harnessed flights outside maybe this summer or next summer.

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As are Amazons! Both are referred as a heavy bodied birds, as they fight surfaces are smaller than, say a Macaw. Macaws are by design, long distant fliers, whereas, Amazons and CAG's are shorter distant fliers, but can be very acrobatic in their flying as you are seeing with your girl's ability to helicopter /hover and then land. It is their ability to compress a larger ball of compressed air (high pressure zone) under their body between their Wings and Tail feathers.

I have never trained for outside flying as we live in Red Tail Hawk Central...

See Wrench's Salty Thread, he as has a process of harness training that works!!!

Also, one of the biggest secrets is that Salty has an unbreakable Trust Bond, which in my mind is a founding requirement for harness training.

Enzo LOVES to fly, and i must say, she is a very good flier. In the UK houses are a lot smaller that in the states (and hugely more expensive!!) so she has less 'open space' to fly so more acrobatics come into play with her. For instance, my hall way is maybe 4 foot wide by the door, she can fly at normal speed , stop,turn around and fly back pretty much within her wingspan..... it always impresses me that.

The big problem with a parrot that has unrestricted access to our house is chewing, if it can be shredded, it will.... door frames, bannisters, curtain poles, curtains, beds, towels, you get the idea. Im on first name terms with the local joiner as im putting his kids trough college.


Get a slow motion video of him, you will be amazed at the flight and how much goes on taking off, flying,turning and mostly the stopping/landing. Those wings too, pretty big for a relatively small bird, Enzo shakes her tail feathers like crazy in flight but it seems its out of enjoyment rather than actually steering her.


One more thing about flight in the house, try and get him to fly down stairs as much as possible, he will likely not want to at the beginning, Enzo hated doing it and would only fly down if I rustled the packet of her favourite treet in the kitchen whilst i excitedly call her. Now she flies up and down quite happily. A very useful skill if she flies away, goes to the top of a tree and is scared to fly down again.

Debbie is an awesome and talented flier! Flies throughout the house, reversing course and hovering as necessary....the only down side...her independence and stunt flying has made it a challenge to cage her when we need to leave the house....treats in the cage worked for awhile but...she is a CAG and figured out it was a trap...and decided to just out wait us....so now we make sure we have plenty of time before we have to be anywhere...lol

It will be difficult but I need to get a video of Perjo’s helicopter impression, and I don’t mean a vocal one I mean her ability to hover in the air as she approaches me to land. Maybe it’s normal but it strikes me as remarkable and I wouldn’t think CAGs would fly like this .