Our Cinnamon Green Cheek seeks revenge, is this normal behavior?

To begin,

I must say our bird is fairly spoiled, stays out of his cage all day long on his play gym, and I'm a stay at home mom so he's with me all day. He gets along with the entire family and is very social. I love him more than I can possibly express. We KNEW when we got him a year ago their personality, but we were not prepared for the sheer love and delight he has brought to our family.

With that said, he's vengeful!

We spend a great deal of time with him. One of his little perks is that he does NOT like to have his tail touched, EVER. We know this so we respect him and we do not touch his tail feathers. He is very good at clippings, etc. and rarely ever nips or bites at any of us. He has NEVER bitten hard.

A scenario of his revenge (which happens every now and then):

While reaching for the remote control my husband happened to brush against his tail feathers. Ok, normal bird would bite you or if you got out of the way forget about it. Not Polly. My husband got up and went to another chair, Polly literally jumps off the couch and runs across the room so he can get his revenge. He never forgets. He will chase you through the house until he is satisfied that he's gotten even. If you do something he doesn't like and you wait an hour....he'll remember and he'll get revenge at first chance, he cannot get it out of his head.

He won't bite you hard, but he will babble and snort and lightly "bite" until he is satisfied that he's gotten "back at you".

Are any other conures vengeful like this? I have never understood it.

My little green cheek will ride my shoulder, if I go to the fridge to put cream in my coffee he will run down my arm and pinch me...pretty hard, he hates the carton. Anything else I take out of the fridge he wants some of it.

There are certain things that just hack him off. I Can't say he follows us to another chair, but sometimes if he is in a "mood" he doesn't want us sitting on "his" couch. He will move to us when he is ready shortly thereafter.

I think they are pretty quirky birds but well worth their little hangups. I never dreamed I could love a bird that much.

We just have to learn what sets them off I guess and not do it when they are around which can be difficult when they are always around.

Also, my baby spends most of the day out of the cage as well, but I have been putting him back in his cage for 30 min to an hour at a time and that seems to make him more appreciative when he comes back out. I think they feel they own everything when they are out continually.
Good luck with your baby.

That is sooooo funny. I can just picture it.

Loki has done something similar. I forget what Hubs did exactly, but Loki went after him full force! He ran across the couch, right up to Hubs and bit his ear, on purpose, to purposefully hurt him. We're still not always sure what sets him off, we say he's "not stable" and a little "bipolar", so who knows? But I've seen the behavior you're speaking of and my guess is, it's just a personality thing. Your Polly just holds grudges and is vengeful. My Loki just prefers to take care of it right then and there

"You do me a favor, I'll do you a favor. You cross me, I'll cross you right back. That's the Conure Way!"

Polly sounds adorable! And quirky. And altogether a normal conure. He just has a very clear understanding of the social contract.

From all the books I read and all the research we did before we got him, I came to a VERY fast conclusion that many "experts" do not give the birds credit. They are more intelligent than I could have ever imagined.

After he's gotten even though, all is good then. He let's it go after that.....

I tend to look at it (happily) that he trusts us fully. He is allowed to seek his revenge and not be scared that we'll seek revenge back. He is not scared of us which is a good thing.

He is stubborn though, hard headed.....and stubborn. And quirky, and adorable, and I love him more than I thought was possible.

He chased our rottweiler into the kitchen a few weeks ago because the rottweiler sneezed and scared him to death. That's a long walk for a little bird too. I had to intervene before he actually got to the dog, but he was babbling and snorting the entire walk....going to seek his revenge. Our dog is terrified of him, fyi.


If we set up a "Polly Cam", we could have probably won America's Funniest Videos multiple times, he's so hilarious.

ROFLOLOLOL!!!! Your post totally cracks me up how you describe your bird....I can TOTALLY relate!

Our Franklin is also a "revenge seeker" (although he hasn't done it in months now and he never went to quite the extent that your guy has...but he'll definitely chase you down to the other side of the bed, or the couch..that kind of thing...he'll run at ya, in an aggressive position, head, neck and back feathers all ruffled up...total attack mode...

Anyway, what I think discouraged him is IF something triggered that behavior, the second he'd start to "chase" I'd toss a towel, shirt, blanket what ever we had handy..over the top of him and just leave him covered until he decided to walk out.

Granted, Franklin is a tunnel burrower anyway in the blankets and loves to be in and under things so this wasn't scary for him. But it DID redirect his attention instantly, without us having to try and remove him from the situation risking getting bit or "fighting" with him.

He'd sometimes walk out from under the "cover" immediately and sometimes he'd "stew" for several seconds, even up to a minute...but when he came out...he was back to or sweet Franklin.

It's been months now and he hasn't had a "revenge" moment at all. In fact...until your post...I had forgotten about them, so I had to chuckle.

Good luck!

Toni

SarahP said:

From all the books I read and all the research we did before we got him, I came to a VERY fast conclusion that many "experts" do not give the birds credit. They are more intelligent than I could have ever imagined.

After he's gotten even though, all is good then. He let's it go after that.....

I tend to look at it (happily) that he trusts us fully. He is allowed to seek his revenge and not be scared that we'll seek revenge back. He is not scared of us which is a good thing.

He is stubborn though, hard headed.....and stubborn. And quirky, and adorable, and I love him more than I thought was possible.

He chased our rottweiler into the kitchen a few weeks ago because the rottweiler sneezed and scared him to death. That's a long walk for a little bird too. I had to intervene before he actually got to the dog, but he was babbling and snorting the entire walk....going to seek his revenge. Our dog is terrified of him, fyi.


If we set up a "Polly Cam", we could have probably won America's Funniest Videos multiple times, he's so hilarious.

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Oh my gawwwd! Sooo hillarious!!!

I totally understand when you say he's stubborn, hard headed, quirky and adorable and you love him more than you thought possible.

That's EXACTLY the same feelings we have for our Franklin. I think they might be brothers or "besties" or something...because you are describing our Franklin as if he's been with you for the last year.

Of course it's his "quirkiness" that makes us love him all the more.

Toni

LOL, Loki ruled the roost, so to speak. Onyx, our Boston Terrier, is also terrified of Loki! And poor Sugar is terrified of him as well, despite not really having done anything to deserve that (except being extremely curious about her). My daughter scared the living you-know-what out of Loki, completely by accident, when we first brought him home that he's terrified of her, the only person or thing that he's scared of

I don't know,they are all funny. LOL. My husband calls from work sometimes and when I tell him what Polly has been up to today he literally laughs until he has an asthma attack.

He keeps us all very much entertained.

I really think the thing that also relates to his "revenge attacks" is the simple fact that he literally has no fear. No fear at all. It's like he thinks he's human size, or dog size and doesn't realize he's so small. Our dogs are literally TERRIFIED of him, they will run out of the room full speed if he is down, and then Polly seems to puff up like he's so proud of himself. If he could talk well, I think he would say "yeah! that's right! Who's your daddy now punk dogs....you got nuthin on me!!"

He's a giant king size personality in a small little package. In all honesty, I almost got an African Gray but I'm SOOOO glad I got a conure instead. We always ask ourselves how a bigger bird could possibly be funnier than Polly is, because he is our "one bird show".

He's a burrower as well, I bought him a ferret blanket that has tunnels and straps inside to attach toys to. He loves that thing. He learned to play peekaboo with pillows on our couch, it's his favorite thing to do in the world. He'll go run and hide behind the pillow and then stick his head out yelling "PEEKABOO!"

I love him

Does Polly "Strut"?? Loki struts almost like a rooster, when he's very happy/excited/proud of himself. It's hilarious to watch! And yes, GCC's are like little Napoleons. They do not realize their size at all and think they're the biggest, baddest bird in the world!

Grey's can be pretty hilarious too. And Too's. It's all on their personalities. Sugar has us in stitches daily, Loki not so much.

Guava struts around with such attitude. She puffs up, sticks her chest out, extends her tail feathers, and prances around with an angry look on her face. Oh, she's such a little diva. It is hilarious! I need to catch it on video AsAP!

lexx510 said:

Guava struts around with such attitude. She puffs up, sticks her chest out, extends her tail feathers, and prances around with an angry look on her face. Oh, she's such a little diva. It is hilarious!

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Only occasionally is there puffing, but usually it's just the strut. Hilarious!

Guava is definitely a major puffer. My girlfriend calls her Puffer Pooh lol.

Yes Polly Puffs AND struts. We laugh at him all the time because he can make himself SOOO TALL!

I don't know why I always talk in an Italian accent when I'm mimicking Polly. His personality just reminds me that if he WERE a human, he would probably be a 5 foot Italian wannabee gangst/mobster.

You lookin at me? I'll show you lookin at me!

He always does this really WEIRD "hopping" stand up straight move. He'll get down really low on his belly, then he'll hop and make his body tallest he can, all in one move. It's like some kind of conure "hokey pokey". It's like his "peekaboo" when there is nothing to hide behind, while he's on top of his cage. I think he thinks if he gets low enough, that's like "hiding", then he'll jump up and hop and yell "PEEKABOO!"

I didn't even mention his newest endeavor, and I'm not sure where it came from.

Does any of your conures swing on their bars? He has a pretty sweet setup in that he has a big cage, and then my husband made him this cool "ladder" that attaches his cage to his playpen.

Well, last week he amazed us that he's learned to do "somersaults/circles" on the top bar of his playpen. He holds the barrwith his beak for balance I guess, and then he circles really f. He'll go around 3 or 5 times. Always 3 or 5 times, never any different.

He started this last week, and when he would get done we would say "TADA " and give him all sorts of praise! So now last night he started throwing in a 1 legged hang with a barely audible "TADA" at the end.

I NEVER know what he's going to do next.