Hey guys i bought my male budgie in october and after like 7 days my friends bought me a girl budgie and i was like okay bcs i had a budgie before that sadly he died. and i thought its good idea to give them some time after 4 months they are super scary im not screaming at them im not punching them i give them food give water give toys and when i try to pat them they run away and when i release them from the cage they dont want to come back idk what to do
I need your help guys
- Thread starter dida123
- Start date
gIVE THEM TIME. ALSO figure out what their all time favoite treat is, and they oonly get it from your hand,
Welcome. I have two budgies. It took months of talking to them and being near them. That got me sometimes being able to hold one. But they let me rest my hand next to them. I let mine free fly when I'm home, and they go back to the cage at night. We have members who have worked harder and have more experience with them. Hopefully they will chime in over the next few days. Happy to have you join us
noodles123
Well-known member
- Jul 11, 2018
- 8,145
- 478
- Parrots
- Umbrella Cockatoo- 15? years old..I think?
Welcome!
Birds move in slow motion. Even with daily devotion, you are looking at a multi-month effort here (especially because you have 2).
How was your relationship with the one you had before your friend gave a you another? Were either hand-tamed/hand -raised?
You may want to consider separating them into their own cages. It is quite probable that they have bonded to each other, which means you will always take back-burner priority. One reason people warn against multiple birds is the challenge that comes with bonding. It can be done, but having 2 means that there is an extra hurdle for you, plus the risk of eggs and hormonal issues.
You should try to just get them used to your presence around the cage/cages (do quiet things, interact passively)--sit by the cage and read, go about your business, change out their food and water etc--get them comfortable with the fact that you are not a threat...After a week or 2 of that (maybe less, depending on where you are with them right now), see if they will take food from your hand etc. If they don't, don't push it--just let them see you put the same treat from your hand to the dish. Do not try to touch them until they are comfortable taking food from you hand---repeatedly and without hesitation. Even then, I would sort of try to wait for them to initiate further contact. Once they are taking food from your hand in the cage, see if they will do so outside of the cage etc...But just know that whatever time you expect it to take, multiply that by 5-10--that is how parrots tend to roll lol.
If you are taking them out and can do so safely, do it at a time when they are very hungry (so that they might go back in for food). I would probably get them out one at a time because them being out at the same time is just going to complicate the entire process. Consider hanging a sheet or something if the space is too large and you need them to stay in a smaller area (just be very careful about them slamming into things because a broken neck or concussion is not what you want).
Try not to lock them back up every time they go back into their cage. It would be ideal if you could get to a point where you could leave the cage open long enough for them to come and go as they please (AKA, I'm not going to get locked up every time I go back in)...You don't want them to associate their cage with a prison. Eventually, you may want to look into stick/target training using a clicker, but that is probably a long way off.
Note: I already advised that you separate them, but if this is a male and a female, it is all the more imperative that you do-- I would separate them either way, but you must if they are of the opposite sex. Also, do not provide any huts/tents/tubes/boxes/nests within their cage (or outside of their cage---blankets, pillows, under furniture etc). This will make them hormonal and a hormonal bird is often going to exhibit heightened aggression, screaming, etc.
Budgies are prone to 'egg-binding' (which is basically where a big egg forms and then gets stuck). It can be deadly and it is pretty common. This is one major reason why you don't want a hormonal female to lay any kinds of eggs (even non-fertile ones). A female bird can lay an infertile egg at any time if her hormones are activated.
If your bird ever does lay and you think they eggs are fertile, you must remove them and replace them immediately with dummy eggs, or quickly boil them like a hard-boiled egg and return them to the cage. They need to stay in there until the female loses interest (taking them too soon will just lead to more egg-laying and hormones). In terms of non-fertile eggs, you still need to make sure that the female loses interest before removing them. Non-fertile eggs can occur with or without another bird present, but they are just as dangerous in terms of medical concerns.
Make sure that your female budgies have access to cuttlebones and get lots of green veggies, because if they ever do lay, this can help prevent egg-binding. Again, even if these are 2 females, it is important to understand that they can still lay eggs and same-sex pairs will sometimes engage in sexual behavior and this can still result in egg production/problematic behaviors.
Birds move in slow motion. Even with daily devotion, you are looking at a multi-month effort here (especially because you have 2).
How was your relationship with the one you had before your friend gave a you another? Were either hand-tamed/hand -raised?
You may want to consider separating them into their own cages. It is quite probable that they have bonded to each other, which means you will always take back-burner priority. One reason people warn against multiple birds is the challenge that comes with bonding. It can be done, but having 2 means that there is an extra hurdle for you, plus the risk of eggs and hormonal issues.
You should try to just get them used to your presence around the cage/cages (do quiet things, interact passively)--sit by the cage and read, go about your business, change out their food and water etc--get them comfortable with the fact that you are not a threat...After a week or 2 of that (maybe less, depending on where you are with them right now), see if they will take food from your hand etc. If they don't, don't push it--just let them see you put the same treat from your hand to the dish. Do not try to touch them until they are comfortable taking food from you hand---repeatedly and without hesitation. Even then, I would sort of try to wait for them to initiate further contact. Once they are taking food from your hand in the cage, see if they will do so outside of the cage etc...But just know that whatever time you expect it to take, multiply that by 5-10--that is how parrots tend to roll lol.
If you are taking them out and can do so safely, do it at a time when they are very hungry (so that they might go back in for food). I would probably get them out one at a time because them being out at the same time is just going to complicate the entire process. Consider hanging a sheet or something if the space is too large and you need them to stay in a smaller area (just be very careful about them slamming into things because a broken neck or concussion is not what you want).
Try not to lock them back up every time they go back into their cage. It would be ideal if you could get to a point where you could leave the cage open long enough for them to come and go as they please (AKA, I'm not going to get locked up every time I go back in)...You don't want them to associate their cage with a prison. Eventually, you may want to look into stick/target training using a clicker, but that is probably a long way off.
Note: I already advised that you separate them, but if this is a male and a female, it is all the more imperative that you do-- I would separate them either way, but you must if they are of the opposite sex. Also, do not provide any huts/tents/tubes/boxes/nests within their cage (or outside of their cage---blankets, pillows, under furniture etc). This will make them hormonal and a hormonal bird is often going to exhibit heightened aggression, screaming, etc.
Budgies are prone to 'egg-binding' (which is basically where a big egg forms and then gets stuck). It can be deadly and it is pretty common. This is one major reason why you don't want a hormonal female to lay any kinds of eggs (even non-fertile ones). A female bird can lay an infertile egg at any time if her hormones are activated.
If your bird ever does lay and you think they eggs are fertile, you must remove them and replace them immediately with dummy eggs, or quickly boil them like a hard-boiled egg and return them to the cage. They need to stay in there until the female loses interest (taking them too soon will just lead to more egg-laying and hormones). In terms of non-fertile eggs, you still need to make sure that the female loses interest before removing them. Non-fertile eggs can occur with or without another bird present, but they are just as dangerous in terms of medical concerns.
Make sure that your female budgies have access to cuttlebones and get lots of green veggies, because if they ever do lay, this can help prevent egg-binding. Again, even if these are 2 females, it is important to understand that they can still lay eggs and same-sex pairs will sometimes engage in sexual behavior and this can still result in egg production/problematic behaviors.
Last edited:
EllenD
New member
- Aug 20, 2016
- 3,979
- 70
- Parrots
- 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"
It's not anything you're doing wrong at all...Most Budgies that are sold as pets are not hand-raised as babies by a breeder, they are raised totally by their parent birds, and pretty much all of the ones sold in pet shops, especially the big pet shops, are not even interacted with by a person at all until they get to the pet shop they are shipped to, and they are at least a few months old...So they are essentially "wild" birds when they are originally purchased. That's why they are acting like wild birds, because they are...
Budgies are parrots, so they have the intelligence of a 2-3 year-old human child, and as such, when they are not hand-raised nor even handled or interacted with by a human when they are young babies and they are essentially "wild" birds that were born/raised in captivity, they are going to retain all of their natural instincts of survival, and people are going to be 'predators" until they are hand-tamed by a person...I've hand-tamed dozens of parent-raised, non-tame Budgies that have come from pet shops like Petco, PetSmart, Petland, etc., and on-average it takes between 6 months to over a year of working with them every single day without fail for about 15-30 minutes a day, to get them to the point where they will willingly step-up for you onto your finger. So it's a marathon taming a Budgie, not a sprint.
Here are the best tips I can give you for working on hand-taming your two Budgies (by the way, do you know their genders? Because if it's a male/female pair, you're going to end-up with eggs):
#1) Make sure that you have their cage(s) located in the "main room" of your home, meaning the room of the house where you and the others who live there spend most of their time when they are home. Usually this is the living room, family room, den, TV room, etc. Their cage needs to be located in the room where people spend their time, because just simply being among and around people constantly will help tremendously to ease their general fear of people. If you keep their cage(s) in some spare bedroom or other back room away from "where the action is" in the house, they are never going to stop fearing people.
#2) Unfortunately you got a second Budgie and put them in the same cage together (I think), so you need to really think about separating them into two different cages. There are a bunch of reasons you should put them into their own cages, but if you want to hand-tame a non-tame Budgie or Budgies, then it's going to almost be impossible to do when they are bonded so closely to each other. When given the choice between bonding with another Budgie or a person, they are always going to choose the other Budgie. And the two you have have been living together for months already with no fighting or aggressiveness (I'm guessing they don't fight, if they do then they must be separated), so that means that they like each other and are probably bonded closely already, and the chances of you hand-taming both of them together like this are slim...If you separate them into two different cages then they both are going to be much more apt to bond with the person trying to hand-tame them. Also, if they are a male and a female, then you must separate them because not only will you be getting fertile eggs laid constantly, but the female can be literally "bred to death"...
#3) STOP REACHING YOUR HANDS INTO THEIR CAGES TO TRY TO GET THEM OUT!!! Parrots/birds are very, very territorial, and their cages are their "Safe Space", and they will not EVER want your hands inside trying to grab them. Even the most hand-tame parrot who is closely bonded to their human owner will still give that owner "warning bites" when they stick their hands inside of their cages, even just to feed them and give them water each day...I have a 3 year-old Quaker Parrot who is the sweetest, gentlest, most loving bird in the world, and who is bonded to me like my own child. She flies to me when called, she allows me to hold her, flip her over and scratch/touch her everywhere, sleeps on my shoulder for hours, snuggles, etc. But whenever I put my hands inside of her cage, to this day after having her since she was 11 weeks old, she still gets very upset with me...So I simply open her cage door and let her come out on her own, and then she's fine...So the only time you should EVER put your hands inside of their cage is to quickly change their food and water, and that's it. Don't attempt to touch them inside of their cages right now, and you shouldn't ever try to grab a bird around their body...
#4) You're going to have to start working with them each on a one-on-one basis, and never try to work with them at the same time, and never work with them while the other is in the same room, nor when their cage is in the same room. If you try to hand-tame/train them when they are in the same room they are not going to be interested at all in you and will only try to get back together. And the same goes for their cages, if you work with them in the same room where their cage is located, they will only focus on getting back to their cage...So you need to choose a "neutral" room where you can take their cage, let one of them out into the room, take their cage back outside of that room, and then shut the door, so you only have one bird with no cages in the "Training-Room", and this will keep each bird focused on only what you are doing...It will also remove any "Safe-Spaces" that they will continually try to get back to instead of paying attention to you. It must be a room with a latching door obviously, and it should be a room with carpeting so that you can work with the bird on the floor (soft landings as well). If carpeting isn't an option that's fine, just make sure that you can take one bird at a time into it for Training/Taming sessions and you can take their cage back out of that room after getting them out of their cage and into the room, then shut the door...The best way to do this is to carry the cage into the room and either remove the bottom of the cage and open the door, then put the upper part of the cage on the floor and try to get them down onto the floor, then remove the top part of the cage also from the room.
***It will also help greatly is you have a "Training-Perch/Stand" for them to perch on when doing training sessions, in-fact it's almost essential and required when first starting to train/tame a Budgie. For them you just want a small, tabletop perch that you can just carry to the room easily and put down on the floor or on a table, and this will eventually be the place that they will each go to as soon as they enter the room. You can usually buy the very small, tabletop perches for around $10-$20 at some pet shops, all bird shops, or better yet you can build one from PVC piping and fittings you buy from Lowes very, very cheaply...I'm not talking about a large on that stands on the floor or anything elaborate at all, I'm just talking about a portable little perch that is meant to sit on a tabletop and is only about 1 foot long or so total. They consist of only a single perch that is about a foot long and small in diameter for a Budgie, and it's connected to a base that is flat on the bottom so it can sit on a tabletop, and the whole thing weighs less than a pound. You don't want anything elaborate or distracting or huge, you just need a portable perch for them to sit on while you're working with them.
#5)****This one some people will disagree with, but as someone who has hand-tamed/trained dozens and dozens of non-tame Budgies I can tell you that it will help you tremendously in hand-taming them both; in addition, since you are totally new to owning parrots/birds and you've never hand-tamed one before, and because you've already had them for 6 months and have had issues with them flying all around the room, I think what I'm going to suggest is not only the best option for you, but almost necessary for you to succeed in taming your Budgies...(The worst thing you can do when trying to hand-tame a bird is to chase them all around the room trying to catch them to get them back inside the cage, and then have to grab them and put them back in, every time you do that you set yourself back to the beginning because you're scaring them to death)...My suggestion is that you take both your Budgies to either an Avian Specialist Vet or a bird shop and have both of their wings clipped. This is going to help you so much with hand-taming them, especially since you've had so much trouble trying to get them back inside of their cages. Like I said, every time you chase them around the room and grab them to put them back inside of their cages, you're setting yourself back to the beginning...
Budgies are parrots, so they have the intelligence of a 2-3 year-old human child, and as such, when they are not hand-raised nor even handled or interacted with by a human when they are young babies and they are essentially "wild" birds that were born/raised in captivity, they are going to retain all of their natural instincts of survival, and people are going to be 'predators" until they are hand-tamed by a person...I've hand-tamed dozens of parent-raised, non-tame Budgies that have come from pet shops like Petco, PetSmart, Petland, etc., and on-average it takes between 6 months to over a year of working with them every single day without fail for about 15-30 minutes a day, to get them to the point where they will willingly step-up for you onto your finger. So it's a marathon taming a Budgie, not a sprint.
Here are the best tips I can give you for working on hand-taming your two Budgies (by the way, do you know their genders? Because if it's a male/female pair, you're going to end-up with eggs):
#1) Make sure that you have their cage(s) located in the "main room" of your home, meaning the room of the house where you and the others who live there spend most of their time when they are home. Usually this is the living room, family room, den, TV room, etc. Their cage needs to be located in the room where people spend their time, because just simply being among and around people constantly will help tremendously to ease their general fear of people. If you keep their cage(s) in some spare bedroom or other back room away from "where the action is" in the house, they are never going to stop fearing people.
#2) Unfortunately you got a second Budgie and put them in the same cage together (I think), so you need to really think about separating them into two different cages. There are a bunch of reasons you should put them into their own cages, but if you want to hand-tame a non-tame Budgie or Budgies, then it's going to almost be impossible to do when they are bonded so closely to each other. When given the choice between bonding with another Budgie or a person, they are always going to choose the other Budgie. And the two you have have been living together for months already with no fighting or aggressiveness (I'm guessing they don't fight, if they do then they must be separated), so that means that they like each other and are probably bonded closely already, and the chances of you hand-taming both of them together like this are slim...If you separate them into two different cages then they both are going to be much more apt to bond with the person trying to hand-tame them. Also, if they are a male and a female, then you must separate them because not only will you be getting fertile eggs laid constantly, but the female can be literally "bred to death"...
#3) STOP REACHING YOUR HANDS INTO THEIR CAGES TO TRY TO GET THEM OUT!!! Parrots/birds are very, very territorial, and their cages are their "Safe Space", and they will not EVER want your hands inside trying to grab them. Even the most hand-tame parrot who is closely bonded to their human owner will still give that owner "warning bites" when they stick their hands inside of their cages, even just to feed them and give them water each day...I have a 3 year-old Quaker Parrot who is the sweetest, gentlest, most loving bird in the world, and who is bonded to me like my own child. She flies to me when called, she allows me to hold her, flip her over and scratch/touch her everywhere, sleeps on my shoulder for hours, snuggles, etc. But whenever I put my hands inside of her cage, to this day after having her since she was 11 weeks old, she still gets very upset with me...So I simply open her cage door and let her come out on her own, and then she's fine...So the only time you should EVER put your hands inside of their cage is to quickly change their food and water, and that's it. Don't attempt to touch them inside of their cages right now, and you shouldn't ever try to grab a bird around their body...
#4) You're going to have to start working with them each on a one-on-one basis, and never try to work with them at the same time, and never work with them while the other is in the same room, nor when their cage is in the same room. If you try to hand-tame/train them when they are in the same room they are not going to be interested at all in you and will only try to get back together. And the same goes for their cages, if you work with them in the same room where their cage is located, they will only focus on getting back to their cage...So you need to choose a "neutral" room where you can take their cage, let one of them out into the room, take their cage back outside of that room, and then shut the door, so you only have one bird with no cages in the "Training-Room", and this will keep each bird focused on only what you are doing...It will also remove any "Safe-Spaces" that they will continually try to get back to instead of paying attention to you. It must be a room with a latching door obviously, and it should be a room with carpeting so that you can work with the bird on the floor (soft landings as well). If carpeting isn't an option that's fine, just make sure that you can take one bird at a time into it for Training/Taming sessions and you can take their cage back out of that room after getting them out of their cage and into the room, then shut the door...The best way to do this is to carry the cage into the room and either remove the bottom of the cage and open the door, then put the upper part of the cage on the floor and try to get them down onto the floor, then remove the top part of the cage also from the room.
***It will also help greatly is you have a "Training-Perch/Stand" for them to perch on when doing training sessions, in-fact it's almost essential and required when first starting to train/tame a Budgie. For them you just want a small, tabletop perch that you can just carry to the room easily and put down on the floor or on a table, and this will eventually be the place that they will each go to as soon as they enter the room. You can usually buy the very small, tabletop perches for around $10-$20 at some pet shops, all bird shops, or better yet you can build one from PVC piping and fittings you buy from Lowes very, very cheaply...I'm not talking about a large on that stands on the floor or anything elaborate at all, I'm just talking about a portable little perch that is meant to sit on a tabletop and is only about 1 foot long or so total. They consist of only a single perch that is about a foot long and small in diameter for a Budgie, and it's connected to a base that is flat on the bottom so it can sit on a tabletop, and the whole thing weighs less than a pound. You don't want anything elaborate or distracting or huge, you just need a portable perch for them to sit on while you're working with them.
#5)****This one some people will disagree with, but as someone who has hand-tamed/trained dozens and dozens of non-tame Budgies I can tell you that it will help you tremendously in hand-taming them both; in addition, since you are totally new to owning parrots/birds and you've never hand-tamed one before, and because you've already had them for 6 months and have had issues with them flying all around the room, I think what I'm going to suggest is not only the best option for you, but almost necessary for you to succeed in taming your Budgies...(The worst thing you can do when trying to hand-tame a bird is to chase them all around the room trying to catch them to get them back inside the cage, and then have to grab them and put them back in, every time you do that you set yourself back to the beginning because you're scaring them to death)...My suggestion is that you take both your Budgies to either an Avian Specialist Vet or a bird shop and have both of their wings clipped. This is going to help you so much with hand-taming them, especially since you've had so much trouble trying to get them back inside of their cages. Like I said, every time you chase them around the room and grab them to put them back inside of their cages, you're setting yourself back to the beginning...
EllenD
New member
- Aug 20, 2016
- 3,979
- 70
- Parrots
- 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"
Just to elaborate a little on clipping their wings as an option...There are a lot of people who are against ever clipping any bird's wings, not because it hurts them and not because they won't grow back-in quickly, but rather because they don't believe that you should ever take the ability to fly away from a bird. Now I totally agree with that on a permanent basis, and there are unfortunately some people who do something called "pinioning" their birds, which is a horrible, abusive, painful, barbaric practice of removing a bone in one of their wings so they can never fly again. That's just sick and should be illegal, and not many people do this anymore...But we're not talking about doing anything that is painful, dangerous, risky, or at all permanent. As I stated, as long as they clip their wings correctly they will grow back-in fully in around 2 months. And even though all of my own birds are fully-flighted and not clipped (they are all very tame and well-trained, and I have no reason to keep them clipped), I do believe that clipping a bird's wings should be the decision of only their owners. It's a very personal decision, and in a lot of cases there is a need to keep their bird's wings clipped all the time for their safety, or because the owner is disabled and wouldn't be able to get up to get the bird if they got stuck somewhere, etc. So it's a totally personal decision that is only your decision. So you should take both sides of the argument, weigh the good and the bad, and then make your own decision. Again, I'm only talking about clipping their wings ONE TIME to allow you about 2 months to be able to work with them without having to chase them constantly, which is only setting you back and making the situation worse, and also so that you can allow them both to have at least a few hours every day of out-of-cage-time even now while they are still not tame or trained, as this is necessary to keep them physically and psychologically healthy. The idea is that you will be working on hand-taming exercises every single day for the 2 months they are clipped, for a daily training/taming session that last between 15-30 minutes each. Then after 2 months goes by and their wings grow back-in, you will be able to leave them flighted because you'll have them to the point where you'll be able to get them to step-up for you when outside of their cages so you can put them back inside of their cages without having to chase them and grab them.
Clipping their wings is completely painless for them, and it's also very temporary. When done correctly by someone who knows what they're doing, a wing-clipping will only last for about 2 months before they grow back-in and they can fly again. So that will give you 2 months to commit to working with each of them every single day, the idea being by the time their wings grow back-in they will be trained/tamed enough that they will be stepping-up for you whenever you put your finger down in front of them for them, and you will no longer have to chase them around the room, but rather just be able to walk up to them, put your finger out for them, they will step-up onto your finger, and then you can just carry them over to their cages and put them back in.
Clipping their wings does a lot to help hand-taming/training a Budgie: It makes them unable to simply fly away whenever you are trying to work with them, and that's the main benefit. The other thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is that regardless of whether they are tame or not, you should be letting both of your Budgies out-of-cage-time every single day, and we're talking at least 3-4 hours every single day of letting them out of their cages for them to stay physically and psychologically happy...I'm willing to bet that you haven't been doing that because they are so difficult to get back inside of their cages...So clipping their wings will allow you to give them the much-needed out-of-cage-time that they must both get every single day...
***If you're not planning on committing to working with each of them every day for at least 15-30 minutes each on hand-taming/training exercises, then clipping their wings isn't going to help with hand-taming them, so you really do need to commit to the process. But if you do commit and you work with both of them every single day, then you'll end-up with 2 very loving, friendly, hand-tamed Budgies...
***Very important...If you do decide to get their wings clipped, you MUST REQUEST/DEMAND to the person who does it that they "Only clip the outermost 5-6 Primary Flight-Feathers on BOTH WINGS, and that's it. They must not clip any more than the outermost 5-6 Primary Flight-Feathers and not go into the Secondaries, and they must clip BOTH WINGS, not just one wing." You have to actually say this to whomever is going to clip them right before they do it, so write it down, it's that important...If they clip any more than the outermost 5-6 Primary Flight-Feathers they will drop to the ground like a stone and hurt themselves or worse; they should be able to glide to the floor gently and with control. And if they only clip one wing instead of both (which is an old-fashioned way of clipping a bird's wings that has been proven to be terrible), what happens is their balance will be off, and not only will they drop to the ground like a stone while flipping around, but they will also end-up damaging their spines do to the uneven pull to one side of muscles...So they must always clip BOTH wings...
Clipping their wings is completely painless for them, and it's also very temporary. When done correctly by someone who knows what they're doing, a wing-clipping will only last for about 2 months before they grow back-in and they can fly again. So that will give you 2 months to commit to working with each of them every single day, the idea being by the time their wings grow back-in they will be trained/tamed enough that they will be stepping-up for you whenever you put your finger down in front of them for them, and you will no longer have to chase them around the room, but rather just be able to walk up to them, put your finger out for them, they will step-up onto your finger, and then you can just carry them over to their cages and put them back in.
Clipping their wings does a lot to help hand-taming/training a Budgie: It makes them unable to simply fly away whenever you are trying to work with them, and that's the main benefit. The other thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is that regardless of whether they are tame or not, you should be letting both of your Budgies out-of-cage-time every single day, and we're talking at least 3-4 hours every single day of letting them out of their cages for them to stay physically and psychologically happy...I'm willing to bet that you haven't been doing that because they are so difficult to get back inside of their cages...So clipping their wings will allow you to give them the much-needed out-of-cage-time that they must both get every single day...
***If you're not planning on committing to working with each of them every day for at least 15-30 minutes each on hand-taming/training exercises, then clipping their wings isn't going to help with hand-taming them, so you really do need to commit to the process. But if you do commit and you work with both of them every single day, then you'll end-up with 2 very loving, friendly, hand-tamed Budgies...
***Very important...If you do decide to get their wings clipped, you MUST REQUEST/DEMAND to the person who does it that they "Only clip the outermost 5-6 Primary Flight-Feathers on BOTH WINGS, and that's it. They must not clip any more than the outermost 5-6 Primary Flight-Feathers and not go into the Secondaries, and they must clip BOTH WINGS, not just one wing." You have to actually say this to whomever is going to clip them right before they do it, so write it down, it's that important...If they clip any more than the outermost 5-6 Primary Flight-Feathers they will drop to the ground like a stone and hurt themselves or worse; they should be able to glide to the floor gently and with control. And if they only clip one wing instead of both (which is an old-fashioned way of clipping a bird's wings that has been proven to be terrible), what happens is their balance will be off, and not only will they drop to the ground like a stone while flipping around, but they will also end-up damaging their spines do to the uneven pull to one side of muscles...So they must always clip BOTH wings...
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