IndianRingNeck.com

Hello, I am new to this forum and have exhausted my internet researching skills looking for a process to help with my new bird. I acquired her from a breeder that had her returned to him. She was handfed and is spunky and healthy. I am converting her to pellets and she eats fresh veggies in the morning. The problem is she was fine with me when I brought her home but the instant and I do mean just laid eyes on my husband she started bending her head all the way back and ran to the bottom of the cage and clucked and coo'd. Since then she charges me, attacks the bars on her cage when I try and change the water (now getting good at feeding and watering with adept use of towels). She won't let me get close enough to open the cage to let her out so I have to use long tweezers. She comes out and her area it is hard for her to get to me so she can see me and gives me the evil eye but can't actually get to me to take another chunk out of me (5 so far..bleeders). It has only been a month and I am trying to just talk to her softly every so often. She is in my home office so I am with her all day. I am her main caretaker. I was able to do some target training with the above mentioned long tweezers and a chopstick and she responds really well. She will take a treat from me with no problem and the another time take the treat, drop it and rip my hand up. Any advice on where to go with this? She is _besotted_ with my husband as previously mentioned and never nips or even looks like the little predator of death that I see.
Thanks.

My female ringneck is quite choosy when it comes to who handles her. For example, my Devri will not tolerate anyone handling her but me. In fact, I don't let other people handle her as I don't trust her at the moment. She can easily bite and I know it will not be a pretty sight. Anyway, I don't want to disappoint you, but what I did to help alleviate her biting problem was to use positive reinforcement to try and change her behavior. (We are almost there! Woot! Woot! ) She will bite the heck out of my nephew, but we are changing that-- surely but slowly.

So, I guess the question is what can you do?

Have your husband sit down with the bird and reward her when she's near you. Gradually decrease the space between you and the bird and have your husband reward her. This must be done consistently, until the bird changes her perception of you.

As counterproductive as this may seem, the next advice I'm going to tell you is to stop the baby talk with her while interacting with her. I find that females in particular, when they hate a certain person, you'll notice they will immediately pin their eyes and flare their crest feathers. Also, avoid eye contact at the moment. Your overall goals should be just to ignore her. Pretend like she's not even there. I promise, I've used this technique and it works wonders. Eventually, curiosity will get the best of her and shall start to open up.

Also, avoid keeping your hands away from her when you're not training her as I know it is quite painful when a ringneck decides to bite . I have been bitten so many times and I am often shocked at how painful those little beaks can be.

Have you ever been bit by a large bird? I thought I was going to die! I could feel my finger bone crushing like chalk!

But, I bet you're wondering if this technique ever worked?

Absolutely! I did this with my female ringneck Aya and she will gladly accept my nephew handling her. Of course, they both needed training as he needed to become more confident and she needed to accept him. Nevertheless, now she actually clucks for him and tilts her head back! It took almost two years, but we did it!

Just know that biting should be ignored and I promise it will phase out.

Anyway, welcome to the forum and I moved your topic into the behavior section. We look forward to hearing about your training sessions with your new female ringneck. It sounds like she has one dedicated owner.

Best wishes, ;)

IMRAN-C

Thank you SOOoo much for your reply. I will give it a try!

My pleasure!

You're off to a wonderful journey!

Best wishes,

IMRAN-C