Pip’s not a pooper!!

PipnMe

New member
Jul 21, 2017
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Pip the Pineapple GCC
Hatch Date: May 20, 2017
Hi guys! My little pineapple GCC has never liked pooping in his cage (he’s only a year old) I assume this is because he thinks of it as his nest? Since he would hold his poop while I was at work all day and wouldn’t go till I could let him out and poop in the sink, I did some research and figure that he best way to solve pip’s pooping issues was to get him a day time cage. The new cage did the trick, for all of two weeks and now he refuses to do his morning poop there and when I came home from work yesterday i noticed he only had three poops there! What do I do? I don’t want my little buddy to get any heath complications because he won’t poop in his cage!
 

itzjbean

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Jan 27, 2017
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You're right that it's not good for a bird to hold it for 7+ hours until you get home from work. I had a similar experience to this.... I had a Jenday Conure and trained him fairly quickly to be potty trained, to be on my finger and he would go to the bathroom over the garbage or sink, but over time he refused (like yours) to go poop inside his actual cage. This got to be too much for me to take him out after all my school and extracurricular activities, I ultimately ditched the potty training (stopped taking him to go over garbage, etc.) and he eventually reverted back to going inside his cage.

If you are home a lot this wouldn't be a huge problem, but as it is working all day, it isn't necessarily that good for them to hold it that long. I would stop bringing him over the sink if you can't be there at home to let him go every couple hours.
 

EllenD

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Aug 20, 2016
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Senegal Parrot named "Kane"; Yellow-Sided Green Cheek Conure named "Bowie"; Blue Quaker Parrot named "Lita Ford"; Cockatiel named "Duff"; 8 American/English Budgie Hybrids; Ringneck Dove named "Dylan"
I agree, it's not healthy at all for him to hold it that long every single day like that, toxins can actually build-up in their bloodstream due to that, among other issues.

The best way to nip it in the butt is to simply stop taking him to the sink to poop at all, not when you get home, or ever. When you get home from work you can let him out of his cage or whatever it is you do, but don't take him to the sink anymore. Eventually he'll just go when he realizes that he doesn't have a choice. You've given him a choice to wait until he's taken to the sink, so he has been choosing the sink, but with no choice he's just going to have to go in his cage.
 

LordTriggs

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May 11, 2017
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Surrey, UK
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Rio (Yellow sided conure) sadly no longer with us
what I would potentially try is to see if you can do is to wait until he does a poop in the cage before letting him out. Then the moment he does give some praise and 'release the beast'
 

IndySE

Active member
May 5, 2016
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Southern California
Parrots
Kermit, ♀ GCC (Green Demon)
Try a night cage. It should be a small cage with very few toys he only sleeps in at night. Birds seem to have a built in instinct to hold in their poop wherever they roost for the night -- point in case, Kermit poops in her day cage, but holds it in 99.9% of the time in her night cage. Maybe it's a built in survival instinct (i.e. if I poop at night, predators will find me?). Anyways with a night cage, maybe you can retrain your guy to not see his big "day cage" as a roosting place.
 

Sunnyclover

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Jan 11, 2017
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Black Capped Conure -North- Hatched 10/10/18
You need to poop train him to go in the cage which means you need to teach him a phrase or signal to go poopy. Then you can start training him to go in his cage by saying the phrase and giving him a treat when he goes in the cage. It will take time and dedication on your part and some people might not agree but this is my only idea for you. My 2 conures are trained to go on command and will go anywhere I ask them to go and they freely poop in their cages. However, I have sleep cages for them that they refuse to go in and they do their big morning poop in the sink every morning which is amazing for me because I dont have to clean as often.
 
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PipnMe

PipnMe

New member
Jul 21, 2017
57
1
PA
Parrots
Pip the Pineapple GCC
Hatch Date: May 20, 2017
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Thank you guys so much! It makes a lot of sense that letting him poop in the sink would be causing a problem. I'll stop letting him poop in the sink and see how that works him! I'll keep ya'll posted! Thanks!!
 

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