Companion to Dictator needs HELP!!

[Morgan_miller]

Hello everyone! I am new here and have found tons of great help just from reading. Now that I have joined, I thought I could reach out for some help and advice. My honey and I recently adopted Hank from a pet store. Hank is a 10 year old African Grey who was hand fed and raised by a family that he was with for 10 years. Hank bonded with a young boy in the family (apparently) When it came time for the boy to go to college, the parents decided Hank needed a new home and was sent to the pet shop. Hank was at the pet shop for 1 month before we came in and decided we could not leave him there another day. While Hank was at the pet shop, he would not let anyone take him out of his cage and would not come out of his cage on his own. He did talk a little to some people and sang to himself a bit. We brought Hank home and have been settling in for the past two weeks. Hank is very talkative and loves to sit on the door of his cage and sing and dance with me. He thoroughly enjoys eating fruit with me (only if it's out of my hand and does not like veggies).

Enter the tough stuff --> Hank is home most mornings by himself at which time I will open the cage door and allow him to hang out on his cage if he so pleases during the day when I am gone. He has a ton of toys and goodies to eat/snack on throughout the day. Hank does not want to be touched or step up. AT ALL. Hank refuses to go back in his cage at night. Ordinarily, I would not have an issue with him hanging out in or on his cage at his leisure, however, Hank is not our only adopted child. We also have 2 large Labradors. Even though they are curious and kind, animals are not always predictable and I would hate to have something happen by mistake. I can not entice Hank into his cage at night or off his cage if we are home and watching a movie and want him to join us. He runs or bites (VERY HARD, not the kind you can grit and bear it, the kind that draws blood and leaves that finger incapacitated for a week or two) or my favorite, flies off his cage with a less than graceful landing. If he flies off onto the floor, he will step up on my hand willingly. I believe he doesn't like being on the floor. When he is on my hand, he will sit until we get remotely close to his cage and then flies off my hand to his cage again (with an even more less than graceful landing). I have tried to calm him by petting and such and he bites....Hard. VERY hard. I have no idea what to do. I am very patient and kind and he enjoys sitting and talking and singing and dancing and eating. But he refuses to be handled. I am afraid that this will lead to too much independence or even more bad behavior or worse, depression. We desperately want him to be a part of our family and eat and go with us to do things and have free reign of the house.

I also know that he will need time to settle in, but how long is too long to let a bird be and settle in? How can you acclimate them to you if you are letting them be? Any help or advise would be so greatly appreciated I can't put it into words.

 

[miloslave]

Hi there! The key here is patience. Lots and lots of patience. My charlie came to me as a 10 month old, and at one stage I believed he hates me, got the bites etc. Point is, it took months for us to get to a place of understanding. He has now been with me for almost a year, sometimes he still backs into his cage when i want to pick him up. Sometimes we still have a battle of the wills when he is sure that he is my boss and not vise versa.
I think he will always be an independent strong willed character.
The thing is, african greys are more independent than many of the cuddle bugs you will see om this forum. I am sure some of them are the exception, and just falls in love with their new owners, but that is just not what I have found with mine. Charlie will on the odd occasion just hang with me, but i found that generally he is just simply too busy to do so.

Hang in there. Right now Hank's cage is his safe haven. You are the stranger that might still eat him. Give it time, see what his personality is. Is he as busy as my Charlie? Always investigating, chewing etc. Is he a perch potato that just like to sit and watch? And once you discovered who he is, you will learn to work around that. For example, I now know that if I want to give any head scritches, I have to wait until just before bed time.
Things like that you will pick up in time. Building trust will not happen in two weeks unfortunately. Except for getting bitten less, the only indication I have truly had from Charlie was one day when out and about, and a stranger wanted to hold him, after less than a minute sitting on the stranger' arm he wanted to come back to me. That was a huge victory for me. But it was also months, and not weeks of building a relationship.

So once again, patience and lots of time. Good luck, it is worth the wait!

 

[DexMom]

Have you tried having him step up onto a long perch? I'm not an expert by any means, actually I'm a novice bird owner, but having my bird step onto the stick when he is being ornery has saved me from many, many bites. It may be that he has only been stick trained and never trained to step onto a hand at all, so you're asking him to do something completely foreign to him. I'm sure some of our more experienced members will chime in with better advice. Good luck and be patient with Hank, hopefully he'll come around soon.

 

[Giggleagain]

Hi Morgan, I'm the adoptive mother of a 9 year old, very independent male Amazon. A YNA (one of the so called "hot three"). I've had prevoius Amazon experience and I've never been bitten by a bird before Willie. I've had him for 5 months, and believe me I have bite experience now! If he had bit me any harder I would have landed in the ER. It was MY fault he bit me. Just because I knew ONE Amazon didn't mean I know them all. Willie taught me that! I didn't give him enough time to adapt to his new environment.

Everything you said in your post is pretty much EXACTLY Willie's behavior, all of it! Well, 5 months into this new life with me, Willie still doesn't step up and still will give me warnings - I pay attention to them now, believe me!

We have learned to trust each other enough that I will offer him food and he will take it gently from my hand. We trust each other enough but only because I have learned to read his body language, I know now that he will warn me ever so subtly and that I better not push it because there won't be a second warning. He has learned that I DO heed his warnings and walk away when he is not ready to interact with me.

Willie's former owner left a "Bible" on how to handle him and unfortunately one of the things she used in order to get him back into his cage was a stick. Stick-training Willie therefore is impossible, he won't even step on a stick when he is on the floor. Her Bible doesn't work, btw. All of it is baloney.

In the past 5 months I've spent a LOT of time getting him back into the cage at night. Together (yes it's together because there are 2 parties to this process), we have developed a routine that is working. I sing the same two or 3 songs while he is sitting on his "balcony" and tell him it's time to go home and to to bed. He would start pacing back and forth letting me know it's not quite time yet, but I just kept up the singing and talking. Then I take his cover and stand in front of the cage (sometimes I have to climb on a chair because the cage is huge and I am small). He will then walk into his cage and perch on his favorite rope. Remember, this took 5 months of small steps. I can get him into his cage in less than a minute now. Sometimes he even tells me when it's time by saying "NiteNite Willie" over and over.

More than anything else, please read Birdman's top sticky on the Amazon Forum. I firmly believe this will work with your Gray also, but if someone would write the same type of post for African Greys it might be even more helpful (Hint, Hint). Without Birdman's advice, as well as all the help I received from all the experienced friends on this board, plus reading this forum from end to end, the last 5 months would not have been as satisfying and enlightening. I would have probably lost a few fingers and would have regretted my decision to adopt Willie.

Who knows? Maybe in another 5 months Willie will step up. Maybe it will take a year or two. Our time is not their time. What we consider "patience" means absolutely nothing to your bird. He won't be ready until he's ready and the more time you give him, the more time you have to learn his body language. Move slowly, speak softly. Don't push him.

PS: don't lose interest!!!

 

[Flboy]

Welcome, very good advice!

 

[Morgan_miller]

Thank you for this! I think just hearing someone with birds tell me it's going to be okay has been the best help! I hope you and Willie continue to make progress. Hank and I did have two nights of victories. The first night having spent 20 minutes telling him it's time to go night night and he finally went into his cage. The second night it took 8 minutes and two peanuts. I did a victory dance and he cat called at me haha. Thank you so much for your kind words.

 

[4dugnlee]

Hi and welcome! I think you are doing great with Hank. It took my Amazon 2 months to come to me. It took my U2 4 months. It just depends on the parrot and what he has/hasn't been through. Do you know how much he was handled at his previous home? Patience is key...don't give up. He will come around.