Sun conure crouches low, twitches wings

He seems to do this a lot and I've seen the conures at Petco doing it... Is it a "this is mine" sort of thing?
[ame="https://youtu.be/mFnr1SQ5pdA"]https://youtu.be/mFnr1SQ5pdA[/ame]

I personally have never seen a conure do this, it looks a little odd to me but maybe other conure owners will comment with their thoughts on this. If you haven't had him long, a full checkup at the vet is always recommended and needed to ensure he doesn't have any health problems and is a happy, healthy bird!

To the best of my knowledge It's a begging posture.

My eclectus parrots do this, I remember someone else bringing it up a while back... Owlet!

http://www.parrotforums.com/behavioral/65690-whats-he-doing.html

At the time I believed it to purely be about asking for food, as my hand reared pigeon used to beg for food this way. As time has gone on I've realised it to be a 'beg' in general in the parrot world. It was plumsmum2005 that suggested 'begging' and Scott who suggested "come pick me up".

With my pair it usually means:
"let me out of the cage" or "I want to step up" or "give me something tasty to eat"

Next time you see this behaviour, maybe try and work out what's being asked for, offer an arm/hand to step up onto?

I picked him up off his perch a few min ago and we were chatting, well I was talking to him and he was making a bunch of loud noises back. He then did the crouch and shake thing on my shoulders. I offered my finger to perch and he stepped up and proceeded to crouch and shake again. Weird. Like I said before, I've seen the jenday at Petco do the same exact thing when I take my birds shopping.

When Lincoln does it i believe it's because he wants to fly because sometimes it escalates to full on flapping. Does your conure happen to be clipped? Lincoln's sometimes does it on my shoulder too. And he normally does it when I set him somewhere he doesn't want to be (i.e. on the back of the couch so my parents can watch him while I do something quickly) so I think it's a variety of him wanting to fly and wanting to be picked up.

He does looked clipped but it seems that he still has enough lift to fly. He doesn't fly much but he can. He has food and water on the perch he is on so I don't know why he would be begging unless he is looking for something more treat-like. I made an appointment for the vet to give him a checkup today so I'll ask them about this behaviour too and let you know! Thanks for your support guys!

Your bird is fine. The behavior means that he wants to be picked up or wants to go somewhere else. They typically manifest this body language when they are not confident flyers, or just plain lazy.

My sun conure does not fly well due to an old wing injury, so he does this when he wants to be picked up and taken elsewhere. It's like playing a game of "hot or cold". When we start heading in the right direction, he will increase the wing flutter and sometimes twist his head upside down for emphasis.

That's a very typical begging behavior. He wants you to pick him up, pet him, feed him, or something similar


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Thanks guys! Clean bill of health from the vet too!

I can tell you definitively what that is. Skittles does this a LOT when he is in his cage and wants to come out. It's his way of saying "let me out! let me out!". He'll also do it when he really wants something. But its usually a "let me out" expression.

Yup he is begging. He is saying " Get me off this thing. I want to be with you not this silly tiny parakeet."

I'm happy to hear he feels comfortable enough with me to be asking for attention after just 3 days of being rehomed. his personality is growing as he gets comfortable in his new home and I think he really likes his new cage. The lady I got him from had this little cage and I just told her to keep it, craigslist is awesome I got a huge cage and that perch (the one with all three in the pic) for 120 bucks. not bad right?

we went to the pet store again today to look into switching him to a pellet diet and the conure they have had for months constantly does this begging motion when I walk by. That makes me sad, he is longing for attention and wont get it in a pet store too bad they are asking almost 700 or I would have taken him home a long time ago lol.

I hope you have a big enough place for him because soon there won't be enough room for the two of you once his ego sets in. lol.

One of the great things about sunnies is they are incredibly expressive. I call Skittles my 'little diva' cause he always has to have a say in things and makes his opinion heard.

I have Skittles on the Harrisons HP Fine. He took right to it. I also give him the power treats. Some people on here use Zupreem but I've no experience with them.

That is a very good deal on the cage. I got Skittles a very nice powder-coat cage on Amazon for a little over $100 and its one of those cages you'd pay $400 for easily in a pet store.

Yea I can tell he has a strong personality already. My apartment is not big by any means, hopefully he finds it cozy enough

The vet gave me harrisons samples but they did not carry that brand at petco.

I have a small apartment too- Skitty pretty much rules the roost. He's free flighted pretty much all day so he sees any visitor as an 'intruder' which is why I have to cage him on the rare occasion I have company.

Harrisons is not, to my knowledge, available at chain pet stores. The only places I've seen it legitimately sold is by veterinary offices, Harrisons company, or an online retailer such as Amazon.com or mysafebirdstore. I used to get mine from Harrisons directly, but switched to the mysafebirdstore because I can get free shipping when I do my bulk order and it gets here sooner.

I'll have to look into that, is harrisons top of the line?

I have my three birds, each with their own cage and as long as I am home and not sleeping, they are free to roam the house as they please. The conure has been at my place now like 4 days or so and he seems to like me but when my gf comes over and sits next to me he acts so weird, he gets on my shoulder next to her and will give her this nasty look and leans over towards her opening his beak for attack, then she leans away so he cant reach her and he will back off a little, do some slow head weaving dance thing puffed up at her then proceed to try to get to her so he can attack! he bit me so hard once because my hand got near her hand while he was on me. I mean HARD. right in the middle of my finger nail. its cute watching him "protect" me or maybe its not that and he needs more time to get to know her too but it's taking a lot longer for him to accept her than it was for him to accept me.

I keep telling her, stop teasing him with your finger, he will bite. If you continue to tease and flinch when he comes at you, it's only reinforcing the idea that if he bites, you will move away just like he wants. She goes "so I should let him bite me like you do?" I said... "well... I mean it worked for me but... yea" lol

I'm a bit biased when it comes to Harrisons to be honest. I had a cockatiel who kept getting chronic respiratory infections year after year. I was told by my vet that the reason was that she was malnourished and had a vit A deficiency which made no sense to me. At the time I was feeding her a fancy blend of seeds, commercial pellets and some table foods. But the fancy seeds, she would pick through and the commercial pellets, the vet told me, are mostly filler, dyes and chemicals. I thought he was just trying to 'sell me a bill of goods', so I passed on the Harrisons. I took the anti-biotic for her instead. But she didn't get any better. I called them back several days later and the vet asked me if I tried the Harrisons (he gave me some samples) and I said no. He told me to try it. I did and a week later she was fine and never got another infection.

You can even tell with Skittles. His colors are so much more bright and vibrant and I know its the Harrisons.

As for your gf, I would highly recommend you have your gf get socially interactive with your sun. Suns have a tendency to become overbonded and if they are not properly socialized with others then they will attack anyone who comes near their 'chosen human' because they see that person as a threat.

The biting thing worked for me too. I don't react when Skittles bites (which isn't very often)- he will 'nibble' but it doesn't hurt, hes just being playful. But I use the "no biting" command with him when he bites and he's pretty cooperative with that. If you show a reaction (like freaking out or backing away) to their biting it will reinforce it. It sound silly to just 'let them bite', but it works for me too. Not showing a physical reaction and just saying "no, no biting" in firm words works great for me. When Skittles realizes he's not getting anywhere by biting, he stops.