Need help with older bird

Azuran · Post by **Azuran** » Thu Sep 03, 2009 3:43 pm

Hi again, I'm really happy that after all these years I finally found some place to get info on ringnecks. The rare people who actually even knew what that bird was kept saying it was completely useless noisy machine, so it's nice to meet people who things otherwise.

So I need some help with Ramses (she's a female, I know it's confusing, I didn't name her), with have been with me for over 4 years, despite my best efforts, I haven't been able to get any kind of improvement out of her so I hope some of you will be able to give me some tips.

Ok, so this is the story of how Ramses and I got together, 4-5 years ago, my mom came back from a visit to my aunt's house, dropped a cage covered with a drape in front of me and gave me a work glove. Inside the cage was Ramses, I didn't even knew my aunt had that bird, she didn't kept it long, annoyed by its yelling and her not so friendly attitude and just dumped it at my feet as is tradition in my family to give me all animals with problems because I wanted to be a vet. Back then I only had a little flinch, which tells you how much I knew about parrots.

Since then, things have changed, I've had three cockatiel, a parakeet and a senegal youyou (though that guy is another story) so I'm better with birds, but ramses is still a problem, mostly due to the real lack of information about indian ringneck. So I'm really glad I finally could find this site to help improve her life because despite my best effort, she didn't make any progress since I got her so I need some advice.

Ok, so I am at least Ramses fourth owner. I was told she was hand fed and owned by some guy who stoped taking care of her as he got into university, then his mom had her, then got tired of her and somehow ended up with my aunt a few month before she gave it to me. So I am really not sure exactly how old she is. I'd say between 6 to 9 years old.

When I got her, I'd best describe her as mentally understimulated, she'd stood all the time exatly on the same spot, staring straight ahead, only moving to eat and doing a hell lot of noise. After a month of keeping the door open over 5 hours per day she finally moved and got out. But even now, as she gets out she only go straight to the top of her cage and stop moving.

As for the glove, well she isn't exactly mean or anything. She is totally freaked out by hands, even now, after over 4 years that I change her wather and give her food everyday, no matter how slowly I go and how much I talk or anything she still freaks out any time she sees my hands. Makes me believe someone beat her along the way. When I put the glove on, she actually gets on it, but I can see that she is really tense whenever I'm around her.

I have bases on how to train birds, but with her I really have no idea what to do, I can't really do anything if I can't even touch her, she won't eat any treats I give her if I'm anywhere near and when I'm near she yell really really loudly.

So I'd like to know if some of you have tricks to try to make her less affraid of hands so I could take better care of her and make her life better and tricks to mentally challenge her to wake her up a little. I'm wondering at what point I could make things better since she is already kinda old and seemed to have been mistreated in the past, but I want to make her life better than just standing around doing nothing.

thanks for your advice

bec · Post by **bec** » Thu Sep 03, 2009 4:23 pm

with the fear of hands i was told once that fingers remind birds of snakes try offeriing your fist or forearm as she becomes more at ease with you try offering her a treat from your other hand like popcorn!!
(sounds strange but these guys love it!!!)
alternatly stand near her cage & feed her through the bars (creating a saftey zone for her
where is her cage placed ? could you put her somewhere she can watch you doing things that arnt focused on her? reading telly computor
this will give her a chance to observe you when your not watching & make her feel safer doing so
if any of your other birds are tame let her see you interact with them so she will learn your a good person & arnt going to hurt her
another thing that worked with a bird i had that was hand tamed then badly handled was the hand rearing spoon & egg & biscuit mix got her attention! as soon as i bought it out she flew to the back of my chair & started demanding her share!!
hope this helps if i think of anything more i post later
keep us posted ...good luck!!!

dogsandparrots · Post by **dogsandparrots** » Fri Sep 04, 2009 10:37 pm

hello... you know, I adopted a pair just the same way yours. I used negative reinforcement to get close to them, feel more than welcome to look at a video that I poseted in my webpage. I am also doing something different... here i go... I feed my birds nothing but pellets, then when I'm going to give them seeds or fruits I get them out of the cage and place them on a perch away from the cage (usally a bathroom or an area with no traffic and only one parrot at the time) so I place it on the perch and walk away... I wait about 10-15 minutes and comeback to the room with treats on my hand, without saying a thing I place the treats close to the bird and walk away out of the room. By this, I think, the bird will associate my presence with something good but without the fear of getting the treats out from my hand. I don't know if this is going to work, but I hope that eventually the bird will get the treat from my hand...

Thanks

bec · Post by **bec** » Sat Sep 05, 2009 2:37 am

kieron (the blue bird picured here was terrified of hands when i first got him & went into absolute hysterics if anyone wearing gloves came anywhere near him i had to get my daughter to feed him for me when i broke my wrist because if i even went into the room he freaked (the only timei tried to feed him with the cast he tried to fly through a wall to get away from the evil glove thingy) it took along time for him to come around but these days if i go in his avairy he sits on my head while i change his food
i started with him by letting him watch me & larissa spoiling riku
then i went onto feeding riku a piece of apple saying apple for riku then
putting a peice on top of the cage saying apple for kieron then one day kieron was in the cage i tried doing the apple for kieron through the bars he was very confident this way as the "evil hand thingys "
couldnt touch him through the cage

Azuran · Post by **Azuran** » Sat Sep 05, 2009 6:49 am

Thanks for your advice, for now I've put Ramses's cage on my desk next to my computer, she looks alright with that and look at me with some interest. I also only feed her pellets usually but treat her often to some of my cockatiel's seed, so once in a while I slip in a sunflower seed, she doesn't yell one time out of two XD.

I also took the trick of letting her see me manipulate my cockatiel, at first I wasn't sure about that one since my cockatiel my cockatiel is still not that friendly either and tend to cry for a moment before calming down, but then I deceded it was better to let her see what I was doingthen leaving and let her hear the other bird crying none stop XD She actually really looks interested by what I'm doing with my cockatiel or when I hand feed her.

Yesterday I was able to handfeed Ramses a little, using my glove of course (she really isn't affraid of that one) but it still took a good 30 minutes for her to do it even though she was hungry, but once she'll be more used to being handfed I'll probably try and switch with my real hand.

thx again for all your advices

bec · Post by **bec** » Sat Sep 05, 2009 8:02 am

sounds like your going well & if ramses is more comfortable with the glove of course keep using it !!!!
the whole idea is trust gaining & she obviously trust the glove
with time &patience she will trust you too!