My parrot Kiwi, is holding her foot up at me with a flat bottom facing me...

[Turningpoint]

My wife's Orange Wing does all those things and never bites. She's only a year old. When my wife enters the room in the morning LP (her zon) fans her tail, her eyes pin on and off and flash an orange iris ?, she streches her neck and literally slides and glides up and down her perch...like a model on a runway, so pinning and such is not ALWAYS bad. She never lets me pet her at all, but if I slowly put my finger by her foot, she raises her foot and touches my finger then takes if away. For her I think it means," there, I touched you, now don't try to touch me". But she will step onto my hand, take food, and 'shadow box' with me', but she really doesn't want me to pet her...at all. I'm part of the flock but my wife is her only love. Sorry, I rambled on, but the foot raising I found relevent to your post. Our Amazon is unbelieveably gentle.

 

[ann]

You could put a really tough boot on and let her crawl to you on the florr and investigate the boot, that's whet the amazon at my local pet store likes lol. You could also dim the lights and get some treats and sit quietly on the floor with her, she will feel a little insecure and will probably come to you, be gentle but nt afraid, they're more likely to bite when your afraid f getting bitten. Hope this helped and good luck, your doing great!

 

[KellyH]

Yes, it's true that amazons will also tail fan and pin their eyes when they are excited. But - when they are excited they are also more likely to bite. Does that make sense?

My guy will pin his eyes in the evening while I am giving him head scratches through the cage bars but he doesn't fan his tail while doing it. So I know he's excited or enjoying the head scratch but not getting ready to bite.

Bird body language takes a while to learn and although there are some things that are similar with every bird, there are also going to be some things that each bird will have unique to itself.

Even though my bird's wings are clipped, he will still fly to me when he really, really wants to join me while I'm making supper in the kitchen. It's a good 8 foot distance from his cage to the kitchen counter but he has done it at least 3 times. I always laugh because he must have to work really hard to make it all the way there. So just because they want to fly to you doesn't mean it will be to attack (even though Kiwi has done it once before). I almost think that maybe she did it because she got really, really excited while you were dancing??

 

[Clueless]

I've tried exercise & tried tap dancing near the birds. Not good - they get SUPER excited! I wouldn't DARE to put my bare skin near them at those moments.

With rescues (or maybe parrots in general, who knows) - I've found to move slowly. They seem calmer at night time, shortly before bed. That's when I work with mine the most. But check out the time that they get radical - they know when it's bed time and after that the terrible twos arrive in full force and it can get ugly.

Secret comes down the top of her cage and hunkers down with the wings fluttering when she wants me to come get her (HIM darn it). Anyway, I had moments of terror when I first got the parrots. Secret flew off the cage and stalked me (I'm going to write a book sometime to help pay for their upkeep). So yes - it's okay to be scared at first but the folks on here are correct - you CANNOT be scared, they sense it and know it. I just limit my interaction with them to behind bars for a little while until I overcome my fear and want to share one-on-one time (and maybe flesh) with them again.

And yes, Secret has occasionally flown from her cage when she wants attention or I leave the room suddenly (wings are clipped so she doesn't get far). She always has an expression on her face of "how did I get here?" . . . . hilarious