Day 2 ~ I'm seriously in LOVE!

[Sherry1]

I almost can't even take his cuteness!! It's killing me that for his first week home I'm only to handle him 3 times a day for 15 minutes to let him have time to acclimate. He already learned 'step up' so we keep working on that and now I'm teaching him 'step down' when I put him back in his cage so he'll know to go onto the perch in his cage. I have no clue what kind of things he can learn but I'd love to put a word to him 'fluffing up' if possible. Every time he fluffs up I say, "Fluff fluff". What kind of tricks do your birds do?

 

[SilverSage]

Aw, how cute! I've never met a Dusky

 

[Allee]

What a little beauty! I Love the name!

Lots of easy tricks. Wave, shake hands, spin, flip, wing raise, and lots more. The birds usually pick and choose the ones they want to do.

 

[IRNMom]

He is a cutie!

 

[thekarens]

Precious!!! Beautiful conure!

 

[LeaKP]

I LOVE conures, this will be an amazing lifelong friendship. Congratulations!

 

[MikeyTN]

What a cute baby!!!!

You don't have to follow it to a T on the 15min deal. It can be longer then that. I actually handle them a lot longer and more times during the beginning to get them used to the idea.

 

[Puck]

He is adorable!!!!! So happy for you two!!!

 

[Sherry1]

I really had no idea how smart they are. I bought his 'baby cage' which is what they suggested for the first 4-6 months then he'll move into his 'big boy cage'. The baby cage doesn't have locking doors and they just slide up and down. I asked if he would be able to open them and the girl assured me he wouldn't. She said the babies are just learning how to feed themselves and he wouldn't even think to try to open the doors. Yeah, well.....he CAN open them. I had some wire twist ties that I tied them shut with. That stopped him all day yesterday. Then today I see him try to open one of the doors a couple of times, then he goes to the other side of the door where the twist tie is and starts pulling on it and loosening it to the point that he almost had it off. I can't believe he figured out what was holding the door shut. I think I have a clever little monkey on my hands!

 

[MikeyTN]

Some babies are super clever! The youngest of the five I recently weaned, she learned to wait at the bottom feed door where I would open for her to come out to be fed, she comes right out when I open it so she's the first one to be handfed before the others as the other 4 clinging on the top door fighting to see which one comes out first. This took her one time to learn that she gets fed first if she just stays on the bottom.

 

[Birdman666]

It's soooo odd to see them with baby eyes like that... to me, a dusky conures eyes are the thing that pops out at you, and his just aren't all there yet! Demitre's eyes were beautiful, and amazingly expressive...



My dusky conure was fully trick trained and the smartest trick bird I ever had. You didn't have to show him anything twice, and he LOVED showing off...

He could fly to me on command.

Poop on command.

Turn around.

Wave.

Lay on his back in the palm of my hand.

Roll over.

Fetch.

Catch and throw a little ball.

Skateboard.

Basketball.

Bowling. (He even was learning to set up the pins after knocking them down when he died.)

Kick a toy soccer ball into the net.

Pick up a toy plastic hockey stick, and shoot it into a goal.

The well trick. (crank the bucket up from the well, take the treat from the bucket.)

Wind up the toy car.

Wind up the music box.

Play peek e boo.

Take objects off a shelf and put it in a toy grocery cart.

Take a toy baby, place it in a toy carriage, push it to me.

He was out and about trained.

He also knew quite a few words and phrases in context.

And he could be really funny. He had comedic timing.

 

[Birdman666]

What a cute baby!!!!

You don't have to follow it to a T on the 15min deal. It can be longer then that. I actually handle them a lot longer and more times during the beginning to get them used to the idea.

Yeah, actually, I don't know where this 15 minute rule even comes from.

My rule of thumb with new birds who demonstrate that they actually want to be handled, are ready to be handled. Period!

They acclimate better when they bond to you, i.e. get handled more, not less. So handling them less means they acclimate less quickly... so I'm not sure about that advice. "Settling in period" always went against my gut instinct. I always erred on the side of interaction. You can always leave them alone if they are acting like they just don't like it.

A bird in a new place will be apprehensive. So the sooner he is shown "the rules, and the routine" the sooner he gets in the swing of things. The more he is allowed to fester, the more he interacts on his own terms, and not on the basis of how things are going to be here. (i.e. they are more prone to "argue" about things.) To me, the first few days in a new place, are the EASIEST time to change behaviors. New place = fresh start. I don't know how things were before bird, BUT THIS IS HOW THEY ARE DONE HERE! For the most part, I've found they accept it if done in a patient, and gentle but firm manner...

What you don't want to do is handle them all the time, so they expect to be handled all the time.

What you also want to do is to structure the interaction with them, and set up a routine for them, so that they "get a flow" for the pattern of the day. Once that routine is set, the bird will just automatically adjust to it.

This is when we eat. This is our set play time. This is when we just sit and watch TV, or interact. This is the time you have to entertain yourself and play on your own. And this is our set training time, where I teach you all sorts of new and wonderful things... (that's the one I keep down to 15 minutes or so a day. After that they start losing interest.)

As a rule of thumb, set things up the way you want it to be in the future. Don't hold the bird a lot now, and then lose interest later on... that's how screamers are created!!!

Conures are shrunken macaws, which means they are one of the most attention oriented creatures on the face of this planet...

If they don't get the good kind of attention, they will do something to create the bad kind of attention... because any attention is better than no attention!

AND BEWARE OF CONURE SPOILED BIRD SYNDROME!!!

IT CAN BE ALMOST AS BAD AS A TOO WITH SPOILED BIRD SYNDROME...

That is something that can be hard to "un-do" once it starts. So don't start!

 

[Chunky]

What a cry shame to lose such an intelligent bird like that. Heartbreaking.
Chunky is only 12 weeks old, but ive only trained him to do the lie in palm of hand trick, and cured the nippiness with pressure training. He is that good now i like him nibbling my ears. It tickles.

 

[Birdman666]

I really had no idea how smart they are. I bought his 'baby cage' which is what they suggested for the first 4-6 months then he'll move into his 'big boy cage'. The baby cage doesn't have locking doors and they just slide up and down. I asked if he would be able to open them and the girl assured me he wouldn't. She said the babies are just learning how to feed themselves and he wouldn't even think to try to open the doors. Yeah, well.....he CAN open them. I had some wire twist ties that I tied them shut with. That stopped him all day yesterday. Then today I see him try to open one of the doors a couple of times, then he goes to the other side of the door where the twist tie is and starts pulling on it and loosening it to the point that he almost had it off. I can't believe he figured out what was holding the door shut. I think I have a clever little monkey on my hands!

All of my conures were smart enough to work cage latches. The spring loaded ones (avian adventures/Kings), they couldn't open. (So they opened their treat cup latches instead... if they can reach them, they can open them.) OH YEAH, THAT'S A PUZZLE TOY.

WE USED QUICK LINKS, OR ZIP TIES, FOR THAT ONE. BUT A CONURE CAN AND WILL SNAP A QUICK TIE, EVEN THE THICK ONES, EVENTUALLY, AND THEY CAN LEARN TO UNDUE QUICK LINKS AS WELL, BUT THAT USUALLY TAKES LONGER IF IT'S THE BIG MACAW SIZED ONES, AND YOU TIGHTEN THEM GOOD!

TWIST TIES CAN BE AN INGESTION HAZARD. I'D USE SOMETHING ELSE!!!
ACCIDENTS HAPPEN...

 

[Birdman666]

Some babies are super clever! The youngest of the five I recently weaned, she learned to wait at the bottom feed door where I would open for her to come out to be fed, she comes right out when I open it so she's the first one to be handfed before the others as the other 4 clinging on the top door fighting to see which one comes out first. This took her one time to learn that she gets fed first if she just stays on the bottom.

YEP! You usually don't have to show them something twice... If they do it, and it works, they do it!

If you reinforce it, they do it all the time, and they learn to do it on cue...

And if it's something they do naturally, all you have to do is figure out a cue for it, do that every time they do the behavior, and BOOM, suddenly they learn that one on cue too!!!

SERIOUSLY, THEY ARE THAT SMART!!!

Which also means you can ACCIDENTALLY train them to do things you don't want to do...

Like scream, and bite, and throw tantrums...

I've seen large macaws that were "inadvertently" trained to chase people around the room. So, watch what behaviors you're reinforcing... and reinforce the right ones.

 

[Birdman666]

What a cry shame to lose such an intelligent like that. Heartbreaking.
Chunky is only 12 weeks old, but ive only trained him to do the lie in palm of hand trick, and cured the nippiness with pressure training. He is that good now i like him nibbling my ears. It tickles.

An OWL ate him...

As smart as he was, he wasn't "street smart." The owl didn't come after him. He went to go see the owl...

He was flighted. I couldn't get there in time to prevent him from becoming lunch! Recall is an inexact science, and doesn't work if they get spooked. We were outside in my back yard, and the kids next door were playing baseball. The ball went over the fence, and whizzed by him.

He was off to the "safe spot" where the big bird hangs out...

THAT IS NOT A MACAW. THAT PARTICULAR BIG BIRD IS THE KIND THAT EATS YOU, STUPID BIRD!

He was fearless, and hanging out with big macs, I guess, made him lose some of his fear of bigger birds. Out there, they enter the food chain, where they are not always equipped to handle it...

 

[Chunky]

What a cry shame to lose such an intelligent like that. Heartbreaking.
Chunky is only 12 weeks old, but ive only trained him to do the lie in palm of hand trick, and cured the nippiness with pressure training. He is that good now i like him nibbling my ears. It tickles.

An OWL ate him...

As smart as he was, he wasn't "street smart." The owl didn't come after him. He went to go see the owl...

He was flighted. I couldn't get there in time to prevent him from becoming lunch! Recall is an inexact science, and doesn't work if they get spooked. We were outside in my back yard, and the kids next door were playing baseball. The ball went over the fence, and whizzed by him.

He was off to the "safe spot" where the big bird hangs out...

THAT IS NOT A MACAW. THAT PARTICULAR BIG BIRD IS THE KIND THAT EATS YOU, STUPID BIRD!

He was fearless, and hanging out with big macs, I guess, made him lose some of his fear of bigger birds. Out there, they enter the food chain, where they are not always equipped to handle it...

OMG! That is just awful. The poor wee thing. So he went over to make friends and ended up as lunch. I dont know how i would react if that happened to one of mine. You must have been devastated.

 

[Birdman666]

Actually, I believe he sought out the owl because he thought that was the safest place to go with all the kids around.

The big bird is in the tree across the street, and nobody messes with him over there...

It was a great horned owl that lived in a hollow in my neighbor's tree... He'd been living there as long as anyone could remember and my birds were just used to his presence. He wouldn't have bothered them, BUT when a snack actually wanders into your den and tries to snuggle up to you... LUNCH IS SERVED.

It was the complete absence of fear for this particular predator, who had been around without incident for YEARS...

You can hardly blame the owl in that instance.

The kids spooked him, but it wasn't their fault.

I had him outside flighted, but he'd been going outside flighted for more than half a decade at that point... without incident. And I was giving him a quality of life most pet birds simply do not get...

So, the most to blame would be me, I guess.

But mostly, it's one of those instances where bad things sometimes happen to good birds. (Or in this case, little stinker birds! Cuz he was the biggest "little stinker" I ever owned! In part, because he was so smart... which is why I always liked working with the "evil" birds. They were usually just that smart, and if you could harness that... )

Okay, I'm rambling. I'll shut up now.

Sorry. Guess I hijacked another one...

 

[Chunky]

At least he had a great life with you flying free and having so much love from you.

 

[Sherry1]

I removed the twist ties as soon as he figured out they were there because I figured he could chew through them pretty easily. I have carabiner clip on the front door and that is working and then I put paperclips on each side of the food/water doors and that is working for now. The little stinker.

I'm trying to follow all of the 'rules' to the tee because I don't want to make any big mistakes with him. I was also told not to let him go on my shoulder and to have him just do his 'step up' exercises from finger to finger. Well, I had him on one hand and I was doing something with the other hand and he figured out he could run up my arm real fast to my shoulder and now he isn't happy just going finger to finger he wants to run to my shoulder every time.

He was so cute last night though as we got home a little later than normal and I think he was sleepy because all he wanted to do was snuggle under my sweatshirt. Getting him on a consistent schedule is hard because I work 3 days a week and those 3 days I leave at 9am and don't get home until about 8pm. My 15y/o son is helping to give him some mid-day company on those days but he already very much prefers me. My husband was trying to play with him tonight and he just kept flying back to me. He loves his momma! I'm surprised how quickly he's been able to transfer his loyalties from his momma who raised him onto me. I admit that I love that he loves me though!!!