Wayne361
12-04-2013, 05:05 PM
Just wanted to say hello and introduce myself.
I live in Oshawa, Ontario and became a parrot owner going on 3 years. My wife and I were looking for a bird for probably a year prior to aquiring Oscar, a re-homed Senegal parrot. Never had a bird before so I did lots of online research etc prior to ownership. Wanted a re-home for ethical/personal reasons.
Oscar came with some behavioural issues, namely biting/aggression, fear of most things, and extreme mood swings i.e. some days he seemed happy and wanted out of cage to interact and the next day he wanted nothing to do with anyone and would hiss and lash out if you opened his cage.
I researched online how to rectify the behavioural issues and all signs pointed to "training" as a means to the end. So using this info I started training Oscar. This was no small feat to begin with since he was absolutely terrified of the training perchs I made and likewise with chopstick I hoped to use to start in target training. This allowed me to research and implement desensitizing methods Once he figured out that the chopstick wasnt going to be used to kill him in any way he took to target training like a duck to water. This enabled me to desensitize him to other objects and the training perches were the first item on the agenda. Before this becomes a novel, I taught him about 4-5 basic tricks and progressed to flight training. He was previously clipped but had grown his fights back in but was unwilling to fly unless frightened. Flight training went very well to the point that he is now a confident flyer.
The purpose of all this training was to increase his tameness, fade away undesirable behaviours (biting, lunging, fearfullness etc) and build our bond. Training has done all of those and I am very proud of how far Oscar has come as he is now a very confident, much happier, vastly more tame, healthier bird than when I aquired him. In retrospect I think his agression was fear motivated because he never had the self confidence that training/flight allows a "normal" companion parrot. This is one of the reasons I am so against clipping as I have seen the difference in an unclipped flight trained bird.
All training is based on positive reinforcement (of which I am also a strong proponent) and I am continualling advancing new training scenarios and tricks.
I hope to help others out in terms of what I have learned and benefited from, as well as continue to learn as my journey in parrot ownership moves forward.
Wayne
I live in Oshawa, Ontario and became a parrot owner going on 3 years. My wife and I were looking for a bird for probably a year prior to aquiring Oscar, a re-homed Senegal parrot. Never had a bird before so I did lots of online research etc prior to ownership. Wanted a re-home for ethical/personal reasons.
Oscar came with some behavioural issues, namely biting/aggression, fear of most things, and extreme mood swings i.e. some days he seemed happy and wanted out of cage to interact and the next day he wanted nothing to do with anyone and would hiss and lash out if you opened his cage.
I researched online how to rectify the behavioural issues and all signs pointed to "training" as a means to the end. So using this info I started training Oscar. This was no small feat to begin with since he was absolutely terrified of the training perchs I made and likewise with chopstick I hoped to use to start in target training. This allowed me to research and implement desensitizing methods Once he figured out that the chopstick wasnt going to be used to kill him in any way he took to target training like a duck to water. This enabled me to desensitize him to other objects and the training perches were the first item on the agenda. Before this becomes a novel, I taught him about 4-5 basic tricks and progressed to flight training. He was previously clipped but had grown his fights back in but was unwilling to fly unless frightened. Flight training went very well to the point that he is now a confident flyer.
The purpose of all this training was to increase his tameness, fade away undesirable behaviours (biting, lunging, fearfullness etc) and build our bond. Training has done all of those and I am very proud of how far Oscar has come as he is now a very confident, much happier, vastly more tame, healthier bird than when I aquired him. In retrospect I think his agression was fear motivated because he never had the self confidence that training/flight allows a "normal" companion parrot. This is one of the reasons I am so against clipping as I have seen the difference in an unclipped flight trained bird.
All training is based on positive reinforcement (of which I am also a strong proponent) and I am continualling advancing new training scenarios and tricks.
I hope to help others out in terms of what I have learned and benefited from, as well as continue to learn as my journey in parrot ownership moves forward.
Wayne