- Hey everybody!
Jamieleigh here from BirdTricks,
and today, I'm going to be talking about why parrots bite,
and this is going to apply to parrots of all sizes,
from the smallest budgies, to little conures,
all the way up to big macaws.
(cheerful music)
Berry!
(laughs)
Berry has never seen one of my conures up close before
and she's really considering coming over here.
Don't do it, Berry. Don't do it.
So today, I have with me my sun conure Lily.
She is the oldest of my three sister sun conures.
I also have my budgie Blueberry,
who's really considering dive bombing us right now,
and figuring out how well this conure can fly.
She can fly really well, Blue. Stay up there.
(kiss)
Okay, I'm moving you to this side,
so that Blueberry's not so tempted to jump on us.
So, the number one reason that parrots bite
is because it's a learned behavior
where it's the only thing that they've been able to do
in the past to a human to get it
to stop doing whatever the bird doesn't want it to do,
or it's also something
because we ignore all the kind signs they gave
that they didn't want something.
So for example, when we hold a bird on our hand
and we go to put it somewhere,
we can feel that it doesn't want to go there
because it maybe grips tighter,
it leans away from that surface,
it hesitates going there.
Just all the little subtle nuances of how it-
(laughs)
Blueberry's just talking to my sunny.
Where are you going? Where are you going?
Blue wants to play with you.
Ooh, Blue wants to play with you.
(kiss)
I think you're too big to play with Blue.
(Blueberry chirps)
Lily doesn't even know Blueberry's there.
(kiss)
So cute! You're the cutest.
So back to what I was saying-
Ah! I knew you were gonna do it,
I knew it!
Blue!
Blue's just letting you know that she's queen of the house.
It's her house.
(Blueberry chirps)
Um, train of thought is gone.
Okay! Back to what I was saying,
there's a lot of signs that birds give,
subtle they may be,
that let us know that they are not wanting something.
A bite is kind of the last resort.
However, birds that are kind of conditioned by humans
that all those nice, kind signs that they give
with their feathers, or with their feet,
or with their body language in general
don't mean anything,
then they just immediately resort to biting
because they've learned through human interaction
that all those subtle signs mean nothing
and they're gonna go ignore it anyway,
so why go through and even bother showing those signs
when you can just bite the human
and get the result that you need?
This is why birds bite,
they bite because, usually out of fear
or aggression, or something that they don't want,
and when you ignore that,
that's when you're going to endure that bite.
You're acting like such a baby!
Everyone's gonna think you're a baby bird,
but you're ten years old!
You're not a baby!
But you're tiny.
(Blueberry chirps)
You, however...
Alright.
One of the solutions that I like to offer
is one, videotape your interactions with your bird.
A lot of people tell me,
"My bird doesn't give any signs,
it just bites randomly."
And although that can usually stem to hormones
and hormonal behavior,
a lot of the time, you're just missing the signs.
So a lot of the time, if you videotape
your interactions in slow motion,
you can slow it down, look from an outsider's perspective,
and really start to recognize those things
that your bird does
before it ends up biting you.
It might be stepping away,
it might be raising certain feathers,
it might be a vocalization.
I have a gray who does a clicking sound
when she's aggressive towards another bird.
There's all sorts of little subtle signs
that we can pick up on,
if we really listen and pay attention.
The second piece of advice that I like to offer
is give your bird an incentive to do
what you want it to do.
Don't expect your bird to do want it to do
Just because you want it to do it.
Bird are not about pleasing people,
they're kind of, "What's in it for me?"
So give them something that's in it for them.
Sometimes, when we interact and bond with our bird a lot,
we become that reinforcement and the reason why.
A lot of the time, the bird flies to us,
because it wants to be with us,
because we've developed that awesome relationship.
But if you're dealing with biting,
that's probably not the case for you,
and so, your bird needs a little extra incentive
to make it a little worthwhile for that bird to interact,
and that can be done with a treat.
I have little walnuts here,
come here, Lily!
I have little pieces of walnuts
that make it worthwhile for Lily to do what I want her to do
if I need her to do something specific,
so if I need her to come away from an object
that might hurt her,
or she might ruin it,
I want to have some sort of incentive
instead of forcing her away from that situation.
A lot of the time, people with birds
tend to think of it as,
"No, you can't have that,
no, you can't do this,
no, stay away from that!"
and there's a lot of mystery involved around the house
where the bird just gets tunnel vision
and wants to find out what's so great about
that place that I am not allowed to be.
If you can afford to take the mystery out of those places
and let your bird be there safely,
definitely do that to where it makes the fun go away,
takes the fun right out of it
to explore that little area that they've been wanting
and dying to go to until it's just not cool anymore.
The other thing is just having that incentive,
having that treat value to be able to say,
"Do you wanna earn a treat instead and come over here,
where there's actual reinforcement?"
and making sure that you place those reinforcers
really intentionally,
and what I mean by that is making sure
that your cage for your bird should act as its room,
and it has reinforcements in it
that aren't anywhere else in the house,
so that your bird enjoys and wants and desires
to go back into its cage and spend time there,
especially for when you need the bird
to go back in,
when you have to leave the house.
Other things like that would be
making sure that, for birds that enjoy the cage too much
and are too nervous to come out,
that you build bravery in that bird
and you start putting perches and toys
on the outside of that cage
to encourage the reinforcement
to be brought out of the cage,
so that bird is more likely to come out.
You can get those really cool wooden coconut perches,
they hold, like, a half coconut at the end,
and use it as kind of like an extra serving dish.
I do this for birds that are really fearful
and don't wanna come out of their enclosures.
I'll put them on the outside of the enclosure
and start feeding little bits and treats and meals there
to encourage the bird to come out on their own,
and kind of broaden their safety bubble.
And it's a really, really great tactic.
So using food in a very intentional way,
especially when it comes to treats,
and changing up your routine a little bit
to encourage bravery
will really help birds that tend to bite out of fear
because they'll just be getting
more and more adaptable and braver.
(birds fluttering)
Woo! There she goes.
Lil! It's okay, Lily!
(laughs)
Lily!
(blows kisses)
Come on, Lil! Good girl!
Oh, you still have a nut in your mouth.
Girl!
The last piece of-
The last piece of advice I want to give on this topic
is to check out my beginner course.
It's not just for people that are brand new to birds,
but it's also for people who just have never
delved into the world of training
and want to understand how your behavior
and what you do affects how your bird reacts
and what your bird does.
So human behavior affects bird behavior,
and a lot of people are unaware of this,
even your environment affects their behavior.
So if you start with my beginner course,
it'll really draw that out for you,
plain and simply,
so that you can understand what you can do
just in your everyday environment,
everyday interactions for everyone in your household,
to just make a better bird companion
out of your bird.
It's really just making you better human companions
to your bird, but you know.
Thank you guys so much for watching this video!
Lily thanks you too,
and Blueberry, wherever she is in the house.
Don't forget to check out my beginner course.
I'll leave a link in the video description.
Don't forget to like, thumbs up, and subscribe
if you haven't already,
for more parrot care, and nutrition, and training,
and all the parrot information.
(rock music)