help with african grey..
Rob Ross
hello there, Charlotte is a congo afg who is 2 years old. she is a very
tame and sweet bird. she has this one HORRIBLE habbit that i must break....
it is a high pitched screach that she will do when either my boyfriend or i
walk in her room. it is so ear piercing that it makes your ears ring for a
long time. and she does it constantly. i am ignoring her when she does
this, since i don't want to incourage it. what can i do to make her stop. i
tried yelling at her, but all she did was say (i love you baby.) and
started laughing.. my conure is also doing it, but his is not as loud as
hers. any idea's how to get her to stop this. i can tolerate anything else
with her, her excessive talking sometimes for 8 hours straight, her
mess,her dandruff anything but this piercing shreak. please help my
boyfriend is also very upset by this, she will do it 5 times when you walk
in her room.
help i am loosing my hearing,
thanks,
Lisa p.s thanks for your help.--
If it's about "birds" you must be talking to Lisa
RLROSS "Don't mess with it get a larger hammer!"
Mary Ann Carroll
I suggest that you mist her with a mist of water like you would water a
fern. It would be gentle enough not to hurt her. Say no and mist the
bird that should do it after a while.
mac
Elizabeth Cook
Only two things come to mind:
1. I seem to remember Sally Blanchard commenting on a similar
talent that her grey had, and how painful it was. Just not
necessarily associated with entering the room. Also, she didn't
have any suggestions as to how to solve the problem; perhaps she hadn't.
2. Makes me think of distracting the bird. Since your grey does
this only when you come into the room, maybe you could teach
her/him a phrase associated with an award that you could use
each time you come into the room. I'm basing this on something I
do with my grey - she knows the phrase "Need a peanut?" When I
come home I usually putter around and check the birds, then at
some point ask her if she needs a peanut. She waits in
anticipation because she loves her peanuts.
First you would teach your bird to associate a phrase with a
favorit treat. Once you know it associates the two, (with a grey
only a couple of days), then each time you enter the room, say
the magic phrase quickly following it with the reward. It may
take a couple of tries to get the timing down. Start the phrase
before you enter the room - maybe even hold the treat around the
door without the rest of you so your bird spots it, gets
distracted, then you follow through with the treat and your
presence. Do this consistently (being sure not to reward the
screech - that is, if s/he gets the screech in before it gets
the treat, withold the goodie). After a few weeks of this, when
everything is real consistent, try entering the room with just
the phrase, no treat or maybe alternating the reward. Just be
sure to use whatever is really loved by your bird. Ultimately,
you should be able to wean it away from the treats. Let us all
know if this works.
1- Te
==========Rob Ross, 5/12/96==========
Heather Sparrow-Rebane
In article <319777...@post.dcsd.sj.nec.com>, Mary Ann Carroll <mar...@post.dcsd.sj.nec.com> says:
>
>
>I suggest that you mist her with a mist of water like you would water a
>fern. It would be gentle enough not to hurt her. Say no and mist the
>bird that should do it after a while.
>
>mac
NO, NO, NO, NO!!!!
Being misted should be a pleasant association for your bird. (Mango
the aquatic ringneck would let me bathe him all day every day) The last
thing you want to do is give the bird a fear of bathing, since it's
necessary to keep them in the best possible feather.
When Mango screams persistently for no apparent reason other than to make
me nuts, I give him the evil stare and a very stern "No!" If this
doesn't put an immediate stop to it then I take him into the "Bad Bird
Room" (my walk-through closet) and leave him alone in the dark for 10
minutes or so. It settles him down beautifully. Sometimes I just throw
the cover over him for 10 minutes or so if I'm too lazy to schlep his
cage around.
Robert Wiegand
Mary Ann Carroll <mar...@post.dcsd.sj.nec.com> writes:
>> she has this one HORRIBLE habbit that i must break....
>> it is a high pitched screach that she will do when either my boyfriend or i
>> walk in her room. it is so ear piercing that it makes your ears ring for a
>> long time.
>I suggest that you mist her with a mist of water like you would water a
>fern. It would be gentle enough not to hurt her. Say no and mist the
>bird that should do it after a while.
I would have to disagree. Many birds like getting sprayed and cleaning their
feathers is good for them. Spraying shouldn't be used as a punishment,
it should be something you try to get them to enjoy.
For the screeching I would suggest you just turn around and leave the
room. Only go to the bird when it's acting nice.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bob Wiegand | Education makes a people easy to lead, but
Motorola Inc. | difficult to drive; easy to govern, but
bwie...@sesd.cig.mot.com | impossible to enslave - Henery Peter Brougham
EENEI
Elizabeth cook is on the right track. there are many thing you can do to
correct incorrect or undesirable behavior and one of those things is to
train an incompatable behavior if you train your gray to say hello every
time you walk into the room he can't say hello and scream at the same
time. Another that does not work all of the time is to put the behavior on
cue and never give the cue, in this situation you have it on cue ( walking
into the room ), but you will need to change the cue to a hand wave or
what ever and try giving the cue only sometimes, this rarly works to
extinguish the behavior but it did work on a cockatoo here.
You can also connect the screaming to something negative that the
bird does not like what ever that may be and negatively reinforce the
screaming and this is best done if the bird thinks you had nothing to do
with it. for ex. if your bird does not like having his cage moved you
could tie a string to the cage and have someone tug his cage when he
screams, in his mind his screaming caused the world to shake. many of the
details have been omited ( maybe not enough ) if you need more help feel
free to E-mail me.
Eric Edwards
Bird Trainer
Natural Encounters Inc.
( EE...@aol.com )
Richanna Patrick
In article <4n5pin$p...@worm.hooked.net>, rlr...@worm.hooked.net (Rob Ross)
wrote:
> hello there, Charlotte is a congo afg who is 2 years old. she is a very
> it is a high pitched screach that she will do when either my boyfriend or i
> walk in her room. it is so ear piercing that it makes your ears ring for a
> this, since i don't want to incourage it. what can i do to make her stop.
Try what I did with Rusty, my Timneh grey. Rusty started a horrid scream
about 3 months ago, where it came from I don't know but it sure sounded
primal. It was an "I want you NOW scream". If I was in eyesight of him and
he screamed I walked out of his sight--but as soon he made a nice whistle
(or used one of the many words he knows) I spoke to him as I hurried back
into the room.
If I was busy and couldn't leave the room, I just got quiet and ignored
him (sometimes turned my back on him), but then spoke and walked over to
him immediately when he used one of the nice whistles.
If I was already in another room and he screamed that scream I would not
reply with my "Here I am" answer whistle until he made a nice whistle.
It worked, the scream is no longer part of his calls. Last month I had to
do the same thing when he picked up that annoying 'tiel scream when we
birdiesat "Spike" for a week. That is nearly gone now. Whew!
The important thing is not to yell ANYTHING back because it will reinforce
that their scream got a response--be it movement in their direction or a
sound from your voice, which is exactly what they wanted. Now when Rusty
calls me he does his come here whistle--łWheeeooooweet!˛ Which can get
annoying when repeated endlessly, BUT itąs alot more tollerable than a
repeated ear splitting łBrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaacccccccckkkkkkkk!!!
: )
If you teach your bird other whistles such as a łcome here˛ whistle, or
other short pleasant two tone whistles, (low tone whistles are easier to
listen to after he has learned them and keeps repeating them.) If your
bird has many sounds to choose from, you can reward the more pleasan
ones.
Works for me, Good luck.
--Richie