(soft music)
- So these guys
are better housed separately.
This is one of the reasons
and I'm sure two food dishes would help
which I could definitely do here
but I wanna show you guys it,
add it towards which is why I have done one food dish
but these guys get very aggressive.
So I put my hand here.
There we go.
They got aggressive towards each other
but that'll happen to me too.
I'm only getting bit,
but I'm going to demo it
so you guys can see am not full of crap
because for the most part you've only seen them nice.
So they do not wanna be touched
and obviously like bit back away first.
It's really if you push that you get bit okay.
So in any time you don't wanna take
a bird away from its food
but this is the time that they would be aggressive.
So if I tried to pick them up,
I would get bit right now
especially (mumbles)
you can kind of see that.
(birds quacks)
Yeah so there's goes all (mumbles)
with my hand.
They're escalating right now.
So I'm gonna get out of this situation.
There's a lot of ways to avoid the situation.
One is not caging these guys together,
especially around meal times.
So doing mealtime somewhere else
doing multiple food dishes
lots of different scenarios
that you can do.
You can use play stands.
You can have them station
before you feed their food.
You could use multiple areas.
So I could put the food in here
and then target them into here from somewhere else.
There's a lot of different ways that you can avoid
food aggression,
food-related aggression.
Speaking clearly is not happening today
but I think one of the main reasons
that Lefty was deemed aggressive
is misinterpretation and poor environment.
So not poor environment as in
not kept up nicely,
but just poor environment.
As in the environment,
wasn't set up for him to succeed
and look like he was a good guy.
So one of the things that I think happened
with Lefty is that anytime
he was given food or water
people tried to change it.
He would get aggressive.
I also think that anytime they tried to have him step up
they weren't using food rewards.
They weren't having him have an incentive to step up.
Like, why should it he step up?
Just because you want him to
not a good enough reason for him.
So of course,
he's gonna lunch.
He's gonna act aggressive.
He's gonna show no interest
in wanting to interact
because there's no reason to interact.
You have to realize when you don't have any sort
of formed relationship with a bird
you can't just expect it
to want to have a relationship with you
until you prove why are you worthy.
Make it worth their while,
you know, birds are kind of not kind of,
they're very self-serving.
So what's in it for them.
Think about how can I make this situation
something where the bird wants to do
what I want it to do.
You need to make it worth their while.
So I think that's a lot of it is just misinterpretation
him looking aggressive all the time.
He was also in an environment at the rescue
where he was surrounded by lots of other birds,
lots of people,
a lot was going on.
So there wasn't really focused just on him
and setting him up for success.
It was just kinda like,
Hey will you step up.
No, okay well he's aggressive.
So I don't really feel like he was quite given the chance.
And I don't think the environment was set
up for him to succeed.
There are certain instances
where he does get all Quaker
and aggressive and it's usually
a teaming up thing with this guy.
It's usually started by, (mumbles)
which he's more obvious
in his aggression signs
because he talks
and because he has the eye pinning,
it's way more obvious
whereas Lefty he'll just kind of crouch down
and start quacking
and making those sounds.
But he's not always very serious about it.
I mean, there's been maybe twice
that he's gotten mad at me.
And once was when I woke him up.
'Cause we were traveling late
and I didn't want him to sleep in the carrier.
I thought he might wanna sleep in the play stand my bad.
I got bit.
And then the other time was
when I was experimenting with having them in the aviary
for longer and longer amounts of time
without daily interaction of training.
And I wanted to see how long it would take for him
to revert back and go wild or aggressive.
And during that experimentation
I found the lucky or the lucky
the magic number of days in which he reverted back.
And now he doesn't revert back
because we've established so much
with so many variety of people,
varieties of people.
Gosh my speaking guys, sorry
(laughs)
since he's formed relationships with me,
my husband, my daughter,
our friends, he's a lot less picky
and he doesn't just revert back super easy.
He gives everybody a chance,
which is really, really cool.
So it takes a lot now to get him to go aggressive.
But there are those instances
where you know food
I get food aggressive.
I mean, I treat it like
it's the last slice of pizza on earth
and I don't wanna share
it's like get own.
So there's certain things
where you can't really expect an animal,
not to be possessive of their food
and you need to know to just not take it away.
So don't give it and then take it away.
Don't taunt or tease,
you know, just certain things
where it's kind of more common sense.
You can't blame the animal for feeling that way.
Like don't take away my food.
And then there's also ways to set that up for success
so that the people giving the food and delivering the food.
And if you need to take spoiled food away
you can do so in a safe manner.
So there's a lot of ways
around that target training stationing
all sorts of stuff that you can do
with multiple environments,
foraging trees,
foraging stands,
place stands,
multiple cages, aviaries
all that kind of stuff to set it up for success.
So you're not in that situation,
but yeah.
So I just wanted to show you guys
a little bit of aggression,
'cause I know that they've
especially Lefty has somewhat looked perfect.
And I guess I want you guys to know it's not perfect.
I'm just aware of what could go wrong.
And I try to make sure
that every situation is set up for success.
And if there's a failure that
we're all learning from it and able
to shape the next interaction better.
So I hope that makes sense.
I hope you guys understand
mostly why Lefty was deemed unadoptable
and uninterested in people
and interacting with people.
And that is the thing with most birds
is they're not given an incentive.
They're just kind of
humans have this expectation of this animal
should want to have a relationship with me
'cause I'm awesome.
But you got to prove that you're awesome.
They don't just right off the bat believe it
and think that they should interact with here.
You've really need to win their trust
and form a relationship
that's built on fun,
interactions where they wanna continue to interact with you.
So that's a huge part of it.
And I know a lot of you are like,
Oh, I don't wanna train my bird.
I don't want it to do tricks.
I don't wanna have to give my bird
food for it to like me.
But if you're building on nothing,
treats are a great way to establish a relationship
and associate yourself positively
in a bird's mind because we know
that they love food
who doesn't love food.
(laughs)
So it's a great incentive to use,
to start pairing yourself
and associating yourself positively.
And then after a while,
you don't need to use that reinforcer anymore
because you become the reinforcer.
You become the person that that bird
is honestly wanting to hang out with
because the interactions have been awesome.
So it doesn't always stay there with food.
But I think starting there is great.
I wish people wouldn't put it down so much
and act like it's a terrible thing,
but people are gonna say what they gonna say
(smack kisses)
Kisses, kisses for cuties.
(laughs)
Lots of kisses for cuties.
(laughs)
yum yum yum
delicious, they're so cute.