Workshops | Parrots As Pets | Q & A | FAQs
FAQs
How do I stop my bird from biting?
"Biting is just part of having a parrot as a pet.” Does
that sound familiar? It should. It is the most common attitude
associated with companion parrot ownership. However, we
feel the opposite is true. A parrot owner should strive
to never get bit. That is a pretty bold statement for such
a common problem. The fact is that biting is not a natural
behavior for parrots. They don’t bite each other
in the wild, at least not hard enough to make another parrot
bleed.
In the past 15 years or so, Steve Martin has interviewed
many parrot field researchers (personal communications:
Brice, February, 1994, Munn, July, 1998, Gilardi, February,
1999, English, November, 2000, May, 2001) about
biting and dominance. With a combined total of over 35
years of field research, only two of these researchers
have ever seen or heard of a parrot biting another parrot
hard enough to make it bleed. Both of these incidences
were associated with nest holes. One incident involved
two birds fighting over a nest cavity and the other involved
a parrot attacking a young bird in the nest in an attempt
to take over the nest.
Parrots very rarely bite each other in the wild. However,
they often show aggression to protect resources like territory,
mates, desirable perches, food items, etc. These interactions
are generally limited to body language like the raising
of the head feathers or a subtle look of the eye. Sometimes
the aggression escalates to vocal displays such as growling
or even more overt body language like thrusting the beak
forward in a jousting fashion. In the wild, this body language
is usually enough to deter an intruding bird and avoid
negative physical contact with the resource holder.
So, why do parrots bite in captivity? First, if you put
an animal in an unnatural environment you can expect some
unnatural behavior. Second, all behavior is a product of
instinct or experience. A bite from a parrot falls into
one of these two categories. Some biting incidents are
innate and some are learned. Many parrots have been forced
to bite out of fear, or self-defense. Humans tend to be
aggressive in the manner in which they approach and pick
up their parrots. This bold, aggressive action may encourage
a bird to bite out of fear. Most parrots do not have the
option to fly away like their wild counterparts and are
sometimes pushed to the point that biting is the only way
they know to defend themselves or express their displeasure.
Before biting, most captive parrots display various body
language and vocalizations to express their feelings, just
like wild parrots. However, few people ever notice the
slight glance of an eye or the almost imperceptible tightening
of the feathers on the parrot’s head that holds so
much information about its thoughts and feelings. After
all, human communication is generally very bold and obvious,
and has evolved to put much more emphasis on verbal communication
than on body language.
Many, if not most, parrot owners are
oblivious to their parrot's subtle attempts at communication.
They fail to notice the slick feathers, or quick head movements,
as the nervous bird instinctively looks for an escape path,
a common avoidance behavior. Often, the first signs of
nervousness most parrot owners notice are the obvious escape
attempts or the growls and other vocal displays of discomfort
and fear. By this time, they have already missed the myriad
of signals that have preceded this most obvious show of
discomfort and have pushed the bird to the brink of aggression.
Another important point to consider is most of the information
available to parrot owners today does not encourage sensitivity.
In fact, some of the most common teachings today encourage
dominance and aggression when working with a parrot. It
is common to hear and read things like “make sure
he knows you’re the boss,” and “don’t
let him get away with that,” etc. The popular trend
is to dominate pet parrots rather than build partnerships.
This aggressive approach only encourages more biting incidents
as birds are forced to bite to express themselves to their
confidant but insensitive owners.
Parrots bite for the following main reasons:
Play: It is a hard wired, or instinctive behavior for
parrots to investigate a person’s finger or other
body part with their strong beak. This is the way nature
provides information to the young bird about its environment.
It is the responsibility of the owner to tell the bird
just how hard it is allowed to “investigate” fingers
and other objects. A loud and sharp “NO” is
similar in effect to the vocalization that an adult parrot
would use in the wild to communicate to a youngster that
it has exceeded its bounds.
Territorial Aggression: Parrots instinctively protect
territories both in the wild and in captivity. In the wild
a parrot bonds with one individual and will protect their
nesting territory from intruders. Captive parrots also
bond with one individual, often a human. When this happens,
they can aggressively defend a territory and their "human mates" from those they perceive as intruders.
They can easily learn that biting is the only, or at least
the best, way to drive human intruders away from their
territory.
Fear Aggression: As mentioned earlier, many parrots have
bitten out of fear of a human forcing himself or herself
on the nervous bird. This is also an instinctive reaction
that is closely associated with survival. If the bird were
in the wild it would simply fly away. However, most captive
birds are denied the ability to escape and are left with
biting as their last resort.
Learned Aggression: Some parrots learn to bite for a desired
response. This learned aggression is displayed in many
ways. One bird could learn that a light bite to the arm
of its owner when he or she is eating a donut may result
in a piece of the tasty treat being offered to stop the
annoying nibbling. Another bird may learn that a bite to
the finger will cause a person to leave it alone on top
of the cage or on a person’s shoulder, even if it
is for just long enough for the person to go get a dowel
or perch to pick the bird up with. Once a parrot bites
a person for the first time, it may be on its way to learning
that this is a valid way to communicate with humans. Any
behavior that is reinforced is likely to be repeated.
To avoid being bitten, start by developing a positive
relationship with the bird. Try to avoid forcing the bird
to do anything it doesn’t want to do. This is a very
difficult concept for many parrot owners to understand,
especially when the information available to parrot owners
suggests dominating the bird. Plus, many humans have a
fairly good reinforcement history associated with dominating
other animals, such as dogs, and even other humans. It
is a communication strategy that seems, at least to them,
to work fairly well.
Going against this natural tendency
and working to establish a relationship with the bird that
is built on positive interactions is the first step toward
a partner relationship with a parrot. Next, the bird owner
should develop sensitivities to the bird’s communication.
He or she should learn how to read its body language and
listen to what it tells them. Then, they should care about
what it says and allow the bird to be a partner in the
relationship instead of an object. They should learn to
ask the bird to do things and avoid telling it. After all,
rarely does anything, except a predator, ever force a parrot
in the wild to do something it doesn’t want to do.
One more thing that will enhance a parrot owner’s
relationship with their parrot: taking responsibility for
each time the bird bites them. Parrot owners should understand
that biting is unnatural for a parrot, and it is something
that they have either forced it to do or taught it to do.
When they accept this responsibility they will begin to
see that their scars are signs of insensitivity and not
badges of courage. They will also begin to lay the foundation
for a rewarding partnership with their companion bird.
For further information on this question, please
see the links below:
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Answer Option #2
My bird has started screaming very loud, my neighbors are complaining, what
do I do?
Screaming is one of the most natural things a parrot does
in the wild and, likewise, one of the most natural things
a parrot does in captivity. At sunup each morning the forests
are alive with sounds of parrots claiming their territory
and expressing their well being with various contact calls
and other vocalizations. In the wild, parrots scream as
a play behavior, to define territory, and to communicate
many messages to other birds in their community.
This form
of screaming is innate, driven by instincts, and is one
of the reasons that parrots make such challenging pets
for many people. Unfortunately, it is difficult to eliminate
instinctive behavior in any organism.
Screaming can easily become a learned behavior in a captive parrot. Behavior
is a product of it's consequence, and if a parrot's screaming brings its owner
rushing into the room and showing the bird attention, it is very possible the
bird will soon learn to scream for attention.
So, how do you stop a parrot from screaming? That question is similar to asking how
to stop a dog from playing, or how do you stop a child from laughing. However,
parrots are more independent than both dogs and children and are more difficult
to control with negative interactions, which, unfortunately, are the most common
approaches used to modify behavior with both dogs and children.
Few people realize
the power of positive reinforcement and usually resort to the less effective,
but easier to use, negative approaches. Many people have tried covering the cage
of a screaming parrot or squirting the bird with a squirt bottle when it screams.
These methods generally produce only marginal results and rarely stop the screaming
behavior.
If a parrot’s screaming behavior is learned, or, if the bird vocalizes
for a desired response such as getting attention or other positive reinforcers,
it is possible that simply ignoring it may eliminate the screaming behavior.
A behavior that goes unreinforced will eventually extinguish itself. However,
screaming in the form of contact calls in the morning and evening is more hard-wired
and is therefore more difficult to modify.
One skilled parrot trainer taught her Blue-fronted Amazon (Amazona aestiva) to
modify its morning and evening contact calls by ignoring the bird’s natural
loud call and only responding to a soft whistle that the bird had previously
learned from her. The owner went to the extent of freezing when the bird screamed
so it could not even hear her moving in another room. When the bird finally made
the soft whistle, the owner would whistle in response and the bird’s contact
whistle was reinforced. Over time, the bird finally replaced its natural loud
contact call with the much more acceptable soft whistle.
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Is it true that I should not let my bird get above eye level or he will feel
dominant over me?
To put it bluntly, height dominance does not exist in parrots. It is
most likely just a projection of someone’s personal beliefs that seemed to
make sense when applied to parrots. Naïve bird owners searching for easy
answers to complicated problems readily buy into the concept that a parrot
will feel dominant over a person when held above eye level and that the bird
will express this dominance through aggression.
The accompanying myth about
wild parrots forming hierarchies that are coordinated with the position a bird
takes in a tree is equally inaccurate. Parrot behavior is far more complicated
than this.
There is much talk these days about dominance and dominance hierarchies in
captive parrots. To fully understand captive bird behavior people should begin
with an understanding of wild bird behavior. Through personal observations,
discussions with many parrot field researchers (personal communications: Brice,
February, 1994, Munn, July 1998, Gilardi, February, 1999, English, November,
2000, May, May 15, 2001) and review of literature, we have found no evidence
of flock hierarchies in wild parrots. The field researchers all attest to aggression
and disputes among parrots.
However, the aggressors are not consistent from
one incident to another. A bird that loses a confrontation with one bird may
just as well win a confrontation with the same bird later. It could be said
that the winners of these confrontations are dominant over the losers. However,
the dominant position is limited to each specific incident and does not carry
over to future encounters. There is no evidence of social hierarchies in flocks
of wild parrots that resemble social hierarchies commonly found in many mammal
species. If dominance hierarchies exist in wild parrots they are most likely
limited to family groups.
Why then do so many people subscribe to the height dominance theory? For many
people this is a very easy concept to accept. Hierarchies are common in human
societies. When people were young it was the taller people who were dominant
over them, and even as adults their relationships with others are often hierarchal.
Plus, it is not uncommon to see some forms of hierarchies in captive pet parrots.
Again, unnatural environments encourage unnatural behavior. Confined groups
of parrots in small environments will most likely work out dominance hierarchies.
However, if these same birds were in the wild they would not be forced into
these close relationships and they would surely avoid aggressive encounters
with the other parrots.
It is easy for some parrot owners to misinterpret aggression as a parrot’s
desire to dominate. Aggression, for the purpose of establishing dominance,
is common in many mammal species, however, it does not occur in parrots. Parrots
have no natural inclination to form a dominance hierarchy with other parrots
in the wild, or with humans in captivity. Parrots may be moved to show aggression
for many different reasons when they are higher than human eye level. However,
the desire to dominate should not be considered as one of those reasons.
Dominance, in all societies, is based on much more than a few inches of height.
Dominance is about relationships and history. Explaining away something as
complicated as dominance hierarchies with something as simple as a few inches
is very misleading and does not provide a clear understanding of a bird's behavior.
It is best to avoid anthropomorphic interpretations and let natural behavior
be your guide when evaluating parrot behavior.
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Why does my parrot love me and attack my husband?
Most parrots form strong, lifelong bonds in the wild. They spend almost every
minute of their life together, unless the female is sitting on eggs. They groom
each other, choose a nest together, protect the territory together, and raise
and nurture their young together. Bonded pairs of parrots in the wild have
little need for other parrots in their immediate territory.
They may socialize
with other parrots and share communal roost trees, but, most of their day and
night is spent side by side, often shoulder to shoulder with their mate. Their
bond is innate and is one of the greatest influences on their behavioral repertoire.
Companion parrots are fully armed with all the same instincts that their wild
counterparts possess. The urge to bond is just as strong with a captive-bred
bird as it is in a wild bird. It is very natural for a pet parrot to choose
an individual in a household to bond with. A bonded parrot will defend a territory,
which could be anything from a cage, to a room in a house, to the entire house
itself.
A bonded parrot may also establish personal aggression with one individual
in a house who frequently invades the territory. This personal negative history
can manifest itself in the form of routine biting incidents, or even full on
attacks. Bonding and defending territory are personal to individual birds and
therefore vary greatly in their frequency and intensity.
Even though bonding is a natural behavior for a parrot, a bird that is well
socialized with many different people early in life may be less likely to form
strong bonds with an individual in later life. It is best if all family members
spend equal time with a companion parrot to discourage the bird from focusing
on any one individual.
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How do I teach my parrot to talk on cue?
Parrots "talk" - or, more accurately, mimic the human speech that they hear around them - when they are healthy, happy, and at ease in their environment. They talk to entertain themselves.
Parrots mimic sounds they hear often and sounds they like. You cannot make a parrot mimic any sound it does not want to mimic. While all parrots have the ability to mimic speech, not all individual parrots will have the desire to do so. It is for this reason that we always try to discourage people from getting parrots as pets if their main goal is to have a bird "parroting" what they say in their home.
That being said, positive reinforcement can be used to attempt to put sounds, words, or phrases that a bird likes to mimic on cue. If you want a bird to learn to say a particular word or phrase, it needs to hear that word or phrase in its environment on a very regular basis. If a bird begins to copy a certain phrase that it hears, you can begin by giving the bird one of its favorite treats every time it copies that phrase when it's spoken. The next step after that is to then try introducing whatever word, phrase, or gesture you want as the cue before you say the phrase you want the bird to say itself.
For example, if you want your bird to say "I'm a pretty bird" when you say "What are you?", you would start by first simply saying "I'm a pretty bird" over and over and over again in the bird's presense, and then rewarding the bird with a treat if it starts to say the phrase itself. After the bird is consistently saying "I'm a pretty bird" after you say it, you can then start saying both the cue and the phrase together - "What are you? I'm a pretty bird". The idea is that the bird will make the connection between the two parts of the phrase, anticipate that it will be able to earn a treat, and start to say "I'm a pretty bird" before you say it yourself. You can then fade out saying "I'm a pretty bird" yourself, and then simply say the cue - "What are you?" If the bird has made the connection, it should start saying "I'm a pretty bird" when you say "What are you?", and you can give the bird a nice big treat.
While consistently rewarding desireable vocalizations should increase the frequency of these vocalizations, it's also important to remember that a bird may mimic sounds that it hears in the absense of reinforcement just because it likes to mimic those sounds. Even though they were never given treats for it, many a bird has learned to copy the sound of a vacuum cleaner, a water faucet, a ringing phone, or a barking dog because it has heard those things consistently and likes to copy it themselves. Of course, this leads to another important piece of advice where the topic of talking parrots is concerned: a parrot can learn to copy any - yes, any - sound in its environment, so always remember to watch your language when your bird is around!
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