chris.carr11.cc
New member
Hello everyone my name is Chris and it's been a little while since I've own a parrot. I had a couple in the past (most smaller birds (cockatiel and a GC conure)) but for the last little while I I've been in the Navy so wasn't able to really consider getting one due to the lack of free time I had.
Over the last couple months I have been doing my research into looking to get another bird and luckily about 2 weeks ago I was able to one (white fronted amazon). Was able to get him from someone who never handled or did any training with him (they were intimidated by him). So after them having them for a couple months they decided to get rid of them just because of the bird getting more nervous and scared of people around people.
According to the previous owner he is about 7 months old and a male, but looking at the markings on the face he appears to be older and I don't see any red on it's shoulders like I've seen from all the pictures and articles I've read online. I'm not sure if that is something that will appear more apparent once if ages (assuming the bird is only 7 months). Was hoping someone with more experience with this breed would know more from looking at pictures of him.
Just giving a background of what our last 2 weeks have been like: The first day or two I would just sit by the cage and watch him and do a little talking just to get him less nervous about being in a new house, but the bird was quite reserved and would open it's beak and appear to start trying to lunge from his corner to give off warning whenever I tried to change he water/food bowls out of the cage. After a couple days of letting him settle in I tried to offer the bird food from a larger bowl so it would avoid seeing (and biting) my hands and that didn't go well after about the 4-5 day of him being with me, so I cut his pellets (roudybush) to try and have him work up an appetite. After about 24 hours of about 1/3 of the food he started to have an interest of me providing him fruits/veggies/seeds/pellet mix that I had in my bowl to try and identify his favorite treat (ended up being papaya and banana chips). I started to provide him food from the bowl and clicked with my clicker every time he took a bite. After about a dozen times I would click and then provide the bowl to him and he started understanding what the clicker meant. I then got a dowel and started putting it by him and when he touched it I clicked and provided him with a treat to start target training him. He started understanding what I meant but was still trying to bite and was very nervous of my hands. I did some more digging using Google and the best resource site that there is (Youtube) and came across a technique called the "power pause" where you gradually get to move closer and closer to the bird and I can now get about an inch or so with him being okay for about 6-8 seconds before he gets uncomfortable and starts to try and bite so it's getting quite a bit better after doing that for about a day. He seems to be learning quickly, but we have to work on the trust relationship between us before I make any more giant strides with him.
I'm glad to be part of this forum and looking forward to meeting everyone and learning from your combined knowledge. If anyone has any pointers, advice, or general information regarding this breed please let me know, there appears to be a lot less info then for his larger cousins.
Thank you,
Chris
Over the last couple months I have been doing my research into looking to get another bird and luckily about 2 weeks ago I was able to one (white fronted amazon). Was able to get him from someone who never handled or did any training with him (they were intimidated by him). So after them having them for a couple months they decided to get rid of them just because of the bird getting more nervous and scared of people around people.
According to the previous owner he is about 7 months old and a male, but looking at the markings on the face he appears to be older and I don't see any red on it's shoulders like I've seen from all the pictures and articles I've read online. I'm not sure if that is something that will appear more apparent once if ages (assuming the bird is only 7 months). Was hoping someone with more experience with this breed would know more from looking at pictures of him.
Just giving a background of what our last 2 weeks have been like: The first day or two I would just sit by the cage and watch him and do a little talking just to get him less nervous about being in a new house, but the bird was quite reserved and would open it's beak and appear to start trying to lunge from his corner to give off warning whenever I tried to change he water/food bowls out of the cage. After a couple days of letting him settle in I tried to offer the bird food from a larger bowl so it would avoid seeing (and biting) my hands and that didn't go well after about the 4-5 day of him being with me, so I cut his pellets (roudybush) to try and have him work up an appetite. After about 24 hours of about 1/3 of the food he started to have an interest of me providing him fruits/veggies/seeds/pellet mix that I had in my bowl to try and identify his favorite treat (ended up being papaya and banana chips). I started to provide him food from the bowl and clicked with my clicker every time he took a bite. After about a dozen times I would click and then provide the bowl to him and he started understanding what the clicker meant. I then got a dowel and started putting it by him and when he touched it I clicked and provided him with a treat to start target training him. He started understanding what I meant but was still trying to bite and was very nervous of my hands. I did some more digging using Google and the best resource site that there is (Youtube) and came across a technique called the "power pause" where you gradually get to move closer and closer to the bird and I can now get about an inch or so with him being okay for about 6-8 seconds before he gets uncomfortable and starts to try and bite so it's getting quite a bit better after doing that for about a day. He seems to be learning quickly, but we have to work on the trust relationship between us before I make any more giant strides with him.
I'm glad to be part of this forum and looking forward to meeting everyone and learning from your combined knowledge. If anyone has any pointers, advice, or general information regarding this breed please let me know, there appears to be a lot less info then for his larger cousins.
Thank you,
Chris
