GCC issues when its just me and him!

[SandieV]

We have a great 1 year old GCC that we got about 10 months ago. He is really my daughters bird, but his cage is in my office so that when she is at school he is not alone all day long. Throughout the day, I will take him out of his cage and spend some time with him. The issue is that he doesn't want to use his perch when its just me and him, he wants to be on me. I work from home, so I can't have him on me all of the time and would love for him to spend time with me in the office but on his perch.

His perch is a rolling one that can move all over the house and has lots of fun things for him to play with. How do I get him to use it when its just him and me? He plays on his perch when he is in my daughters room, right now, its pretty much all day long that he is with her. She has taught him how to Poop on command, how to kiss on command and he says a few words that she has taught him as well: Hey Baby, Rin Rin Poo Poo, and Thank you.

Thanks for any suggestions that you can offer.

 

[wrench13]

You can try teaching to station in place, by a combination of target training and clinker training. Look those up in our search feature above, you will find a lot of information on them.

 

[noodles123]

Also- 1 year is sexual maturity, so make sure everyone is only petting on the head and neck (NOWHERE ELSE) and remove any cave-like/shadowy/tent-like spaces from his cage/access including boxes, huts, tents, hammocks, drawers, low ledges, under furniture/under clothing, piles of bedding/pillows etc). These will trigger amplified hormonal behaviors which may not seem hormonal, but they often are. 10 hours of solid sleep on a light/dark schedule (and no cage covering during the day) is also important for hormone regulation and immune health (as well as behavior that stems for hormones).

 

[SandieV]

Yes we do not have anything in his cage that would create a dark place to hide and its birdie bedtime at 8pm each night. Thanks

 

[noodles123]

So if I were you, I would look into ABA (applied behavior analysis)---it revolves around the idea that every behavior (human or other) is rooted in the desire to obtain 1 of 4 reinforcers/rewards (escape, attention, sensory or tangibles). This is how you could become more popular with your bird---once you stop reinforcing the bad and start realizing what it is that he wants. I will post another link when I can find it in a few minutes.

See my post (6th one down) on the following thread-- your behavior is not the same, but it will give you an idea of how ABA works: http://www.parrotforums.com/conures...-has-become-aggressive-my-7-year-old-som.html

I will also post some links in a second.

See post 9 on this thread for ABA links http://www.parrotforums.com/quakers/85621-casey-acting-increasingly-hostile-towards-fiance.html