Where To Get Great Parrot Cages

I've been doing some research lately, because we have a lot of customers come to ask constantly, asking us about different products they should purchase for their parrots. And in particular their seems to be two things that people are constantly asking bout more than others... one is what type of cage should they buy for their parrot... and the other is what type of food should they feed their parrot. I'm not going to bother you with another post on food right now, because if you look at some of my earlier posts this month, you'll see that I've covered a lot of issues concerning food. And for good reason, it's one of the most IMPORTANT things to consider when buying things for your parrot. However, today's post is about something else... cages! I've been talking to a company lately who has been doing some amazing things in the world of parrot cages. If you've been a fan of the hit TV show, Extreme Home Makeovers, then you've probably seen the cages that are made by the company I'm talking about. Cages By Design is a company that specializes in two types of cages... parrot cages, and reptile cages. And were responsible for supplying one of Extreme Home Makeovers families with replacement cages for their reptiles. And did amazing work. I was so impressed by this company that I called up Adam, the owner of Cages By design, and right now I'm trying to convince him to offer you, my customers and subscribers, a special deal on some of his cages. I won't go into how much of a discount we're talking about, but just wanted to let you know that if you've been looking at this companies amazing cages you'll be happy to know that I think I'll be able to get them for you cheaper VERY soon! So until I do work out a deal with Cages By Design, I want you to do two things... one is stay tuned to this blog for updates on how this deal pans out, and two is to go to Cages By Design's website and just look at all the things they put into their cages... they even have the option to install 'full spectrum' lighting into your cage for you. Which is a huge deterrent to feather plucking!

3 More Articles For Cockatiel Lovers

As promised, I've got some more great articles for you today... More specifically articles that I think will give you some good guidelines to help teach your Cockatiels how to talk. So I'm sure all of you Cockatiel owners out there, are happy about his blog entry :-) The first article shows you where to find lots of different cockatiel recordings, that you can get for free, or purchase, and then play back to your cockatiel to teach him to talk better. The second article shows you some great places to find cockatiel sound files. These were kind of hard to get a hold of, but I think you'll find some great free resources in this article. And lastly we wanted to find you some great places to find Cockatiel Sound Clips... but this was pretty hard, so I've posted an article with some video clips of my cockatiel singing a great theme song that I'm sure you'll recognize. It's to a VERY popular children's cartoon show... I'm curious to see how you like it. I'll be back later today with some more tips for you. Cheers... Chet

Sun Conure Clip Art

I've been going on a rampage lately creating articles for parrot owners. It just seems like the internet is so full of crud, that I've got to start doing something about making our site become a place where people can come for parrot information... and really find it. So I wanted to give you another update on some articles we've posted in the Article Section of Our Website... and one that you might find particularly interesting. It's about Sun Conure Clip Art. From time to time I get people asking me where they can find clip art for this pretty little bird, so I decided to post an article that points you in the right direction on some of the easiest places to get Sun Conure Clip Art. Now I don't have clipart posted for you in my article, it just shows you where to go to get it... but hopefully that's all you'll need. Plus I've got another article posted about Conure and Playstand information that should help you out if your NEW to the world of Conures. It's good information, but if you're already an expert with Conures, you can probably don't need to read it... Instead I'd wait for some of my more advanced training articles coming soon! That's all the updates for now... Stay tuned over the next couple weeks as I bring you lots and lots of great content that I hope you find valuable!

Quick Diet Tip For Your Parrot

I get tons of my students asking questions about all sorts of topics related to parrots, in my inner-circle membership forum. And from time to time I like to share those responses with you, as customers can come up with fantastic ideas, that are just too good to keep hushed away in my forum. So I wanted to share this question from a lady in my forum, who's name I do not know, as she uses a code name... "Hi if anybody has tips on how to get my parrots to eat pellets instead of the mixed seed diet please can you let me know...I have been trying to do the 50% pellet and 50% mixed and that is not working...i dont think the pellets are that hard that they cant eat them cause their beaks are strong... ...also now ive tried soaking them a bit to make them soft and that is not working either....What can i do to get them to move to the pellet diet, please help me in anyway u can :-( Because the sooner i can get them to move to the pellets the sooner i can start taming them and training them... " Now listen to a suggestion one of my other students gave her, that combines the strategy of using the Lafaber brand of parrot treats called "Nutriberries"... but with her own, very ingenious twist: "Hello, I converted all my cockatiels to pellets by trying the parakeet size pellets, breaking the Nutri-berries and then reforming the balls with pellets mixed in. I would only give a few of the nutriberries/pellet balls at a time, but I left just pellets in the bowls all day. It also helped that I knew how many nutriberries my birds ate, I counted the balls I placed in the cage and subtracked what was left (before I even tried mixing in the pellets). That way I could make sure that they didn't get too much nutriberries and not have an appetite. I also counted the loose pellets I would leave in the bowl, to help keep track of how many pellets they ate. They would get a couple of nutriberries in the middle of the day and the rest of their daily allowance in the evening. This didn't work quite as well for my meyers parrot, as she would pick out the pellets and throw them on the floor, but she did get some... now she eats them well. I did use the brown natural pellets after trying the colored pellets, the natural Zupreem goes over best, although they will also eat Harrison pellets. My parakeets also converted well to the natural zupreem... they do not like any of the colored pellets and I don't like feeding my birds dyes anyways. Even after converting to pellets, make sure they still get fruits, vegetables, eggs, chicken/protein, pastas. Do not give chocolate, avocados, coffee... cheese you can give in very minute quantities as parrots are lactose intolerant, My cockatiels will kill for a ham and cheese sandwich. Pellets aren't a cure-all for nutritional deficiencies... " Cyndi Isn't that a great idea? Cyndi took what we taught her, broke the pellets up, and put even healthier pellets into the Nutriberry balls, then were already in there, and now even her parakeets are converted... that's awesome! And her birds will enjoy a doubling of their lifespan because of it. Just thought you'd want to hear some of the stuff that goes on with my students behind closed doors!

Updates & More Training Articles For You

I'll keep this post short, but I wanted to let you know that I'll be adding several training articles on a variety of topics all about parrots, and posting them on my website. These articles will be to mostly help new people figure out what type of bird they would like to own, and give some good general information. But if you're looking for more advanced information, and you want it for free, then make sure you sign up for my free videos and tips, delivered monthly to my email list. It's chalked full of tons of great parrot training tips, health info, and a lot of diet information as well. Just thought I'd let you guys know!

How To Stop Your Parrot From Biting In One Day!

Oh... the sweet smell of VICTORY! I don't know about you and your personality, but this whole parrot training thing is addictive to me. I just love it and can't get enough of it. And hands down... my most favorite part of training a parrot is that breakthrough moment, when you've been training for days, or weeks, and the bird finally starts to get it! WOW... I love that feeling. There's nothing like finally connecting with an animal that was not put on this earth to communicate with me, wasn't given the ability to speak my language, and yet here we are, face to face, speaking a similar language and developing a relationship, and a bond. It's a bond that has two way communication. The parrot lets me know when he wants to do, or not do things, I train him acceptable ways for him to do so, and then I train him, signals that let's him know when I need him to do something for me to! And the REALLY great side benefit of all this is that for some reason, I'd SWEAR it's a UNIVERSAL law, that whenever you take a living being, be it an adolescent child, your spouse, a dog, horse, cat or in our case... parrot, and improve the level of communication between yourself and that other being, an amazing thing happens! The relationship is ALWAYS strengthened. It's never failed to work for me... every time that I've taught an untrained parrot his first trick, he started biting me less. And when I taught him his second trick... he bit me even fewer times! Well, throw another point on the board for this theory, because I've proved it once again. Three days ago, I shared with you what I wanted to do with my Parrotlet, Ricky, and how bad he had become, and how I was going to basically treat this blog as a live journal, and talk you through everything I trained Ricky that day. I thought it would be a week or two process... Boy was I wrong! I'm hear to tell you that it took one day. That's it! Not more or less. One full day of random clicker training sessions, while the bird was presenting bad behavior was all it took to cure Ricky of his biting, during this peak in his hormonal cycle. But I do want to make two points that I think are the reason Ricky was able to make such quick progress. The first is that I didn't let the problem go for more than a week. I took action quickly and didn't let a bad habit form, and get out of control. And the second reason requires a guilty admission before sharing it with you... I'm LAZY! Yep, that's right, I bought this little bird, he was cute, he was little he was a baby, and such a sweet angel that I was happy enough with his behavior that I didn't feel I needed to train him to do a bunch of things. After all... he was a little Angel. But! I'm not stupid, and I realized that the reason he was an angel was because he was a baby, and that the day was coming when my little baby would grow up, and start showing some bad behavior. So even though I didn't train him every trick in the book, I did do one thing... I target trained him. And to be honest I did teach him one trick, but only one... to crawl through a paper towel roll, but that's it. I did this because I wanted my parrot to have some level of communication with me, even it it wasn't much so that when tough times came, I could fall back on our basic understanding of what targeting was, and use it to handle him when he got temperamental. And I think the results speak for themselves. Don't ever think you don't have to train your parrot. Doing so is foolish, and a pipe dream, if you ever want to have the best relationship possible with your bird.

How Parrot Trick Training Cures Agression

Yesterday I promised to share with you another example of how training a parrot to perform a task, can help calm down his aggressive behavior... ... so here I am to deliver that promise! If you've followed what we do at BirdTricks.com and you've read the story there about how I got my start in parrot training, you already know of my beloved Macaw, Tiko! I won't go into the whole story here, but basically I was raised by parents who purchased Tiko as a pretty pet for themselves... I think my cute little 5 year old begging may have also had something to do with it... but never the less, my parents did not know what it took to take care of a bird once it turned from a cute cuddly baby into an adult parrot. So when the bird was 15 years old is when I first started taking interest in figuring out what it took to tame and train a parrot. That's enough of Tiko's background... let's skip forward to when I when I got married... ... I hadn't been spending as much time with my Macaw for obvious reasons, and was about to introduce my finance' to Tiko for the first time... and when he saw her he through a fit, went into a rage and was VERY pissed! So pissed that as long as my wife was not in site he would be super loving and cuddly, but bite the living hell out of me the second she came into the room, and Tiko saw her. So as a quick fix, I decided to offer him a cue to a trick he knows... by the way he knows over 20 tricks... and see if he would respond. And wow what a difference. One second he's screaming and lunging at me to stay away, probably upset that I brought another lover into our little relationship, and then as soon as he saw the cue for 'the wave'... ... all the bad behavior instantly vanished, he picked up his foot, and gave the cutest little wave you've ever seen. And it had such an impact that after I rewarded him with a banana chip, he even let me pet him on the head, when 5 seconds ago he didn't want anything to do with me. I'm telling you! Trick training your parrot is WAY more important that people realize, and it has way more benefits than just being a cute source of entertainment for you and your friends. I'm not sure how it works, but training any animal a behavior, and then giving that animal the cue for that behavior while the animal is under stress, does something to the animals brain. My guess is that an animal under stress welcomes the comfort and structure that a training environment offers. The parrot is in a new situation, he's scared or angry, because he doesn't know what's going to happen. But then you help bring structure back into his situation by asking him to perform a behavior he's already done with you hundreds of times... and my guess is parrots, along with other animals welcome the structure that performing learned behaviors on cue provides.

Update To Ricky's Training Sessions

WOW! I've trained a lot of parrot's to overcome their bad behaviors, but the power that constructive training, whether it be in a child, teenager, or hormonal parrot is nothing short of amazing. I shared with you earlier today how over the course of this last week, our Parrotlet, Ricky, entered into his first hormonal season. But that I wasn't worried, because I'd practice what I preach and had taught Ricky how to do two things... he is target trained, although I admit his attention span is pretty short. And Ricky is trained to crawl through an empty toilet paper roll on command... in fact we just got it on video a few months ago, and are thinking about adding the how-to footage to one of our next courses. But anyways... ... My point is that while Ricky was still a sweet little baby parrot I taught him who was boss, and how to follow instructions. Admittedly I didn't do this as much as I should have, but I knew that I wanted to teach him something before he hit the hormonal season, so we would have developed a base of communication that I could fall back on... and I had at least done that. I also shared how yesterday I made the decision that I was going to start training Ricky again, nothing much, just to relax and calm down instead of attacking the sides of his cage when I walked by. I did this with a few random training sessions throughout the day, where I'd give him a few rewards, and here I am writing this post to you at my computer with Ricky kindly sitting on my shoulder. The taming only took 1/2 a DAY! After a week of not being able to pick him up without Ricky making my finger bleed, a few targeting sessions when Ricky presented aggressive behavior throughout the day, did something inside him to remind him that he likes me, and that he's trusted me before and I've always rewarded him. Now I'm sure I'll need to do more training every day, I'm not saying he'll never bite me again, but I am saying that something about getting an animal to perform a trained task, no matter how small, while they are VERY upset, has DRASTIC impact, and often suddenly changes that animals behavior immediately. I've got some more examples I'll share with you of how this same principal works with training macaws that I'll share with you tomorrow.

Ricky's Parrot Training Update

I thought I'd share with you how some of my most reason parrot training sessions have been going with the newest addition to our flock... Ricky "the Parrotlet" Ricky has now officially reached the first stage of being hormonal. It's that time of year when the days are getting longer, and his breeding hormones are in full swing. Which means he's now started biting for the first time. But this is no shock to me... I've been through this with all of my other parrots, and I knew it was only a matter of time before my parrotlet went through the same phase. But there is one major difference between my parrot getting hormonal, and thousands of other parrots getting hormonal. I know how to handle it, don't get stressed out thinking this is the end of my cute little parrot's loving relationship with me, and have a step-by-step plan to implement. While other parrot owners have no idea how to train their parrots, and throw in the towel... giving up on a bird that needs nothing more than a little instruction. So I thought I'd share some of what I'm doing with Ricky's parrot training schedule with you over the next couple of weeks. Right now Ricky is at the stage where he wants to defend his cage by attacking anything that comes near it, hauls off lunging at fingers and guests, even if they're just walking by. You'll see the feathers go up on his back, and he paces the perimeter like a sentry guard. ... that is until I used a few techniques on him ;) The first thing I did was set up Ricky in a cage where he could get 14 hours of sleep every night. This way I could get him out of the cage he was so territorial of, and cover it for 12-14 hours every night, getting him the sleep he needs to better control his hormonal triggers flipped on by the longer daylight hours. The cage only had water in it, and no food. I did this because Ricky's main cage is an aquarium, and he's constantly hiding food in the floor, and saving it for later... which makes a training diet impossible, because he's always full, and has access to food he's hidden even if I take out his food dish. And I needed to set him up on a modified training diet where he would at least be hungry when he woke up in the morning and thus more willing to work for treats. So his new parrot cage was set up for SLEEPING ONLY and when he woke up I immediately fed him through rewarding him with treats for performing tasks, immediately followed by full access to his food dish for the rest of the day. This way he's getting more than enough food to maintain a healthy body weight. Do not STARVE your parrot. This worked wonderfully as last night he got plenty of sleep, and when he woke up, I gave him several target training sessions while he was still in his cage, maybe 5-10 clicks and rewards for touching the target stick. I want to get to the point of doing more of this, but his attention span has not been developed yet for long training bouts. Then I let him out of his sleeping cage, and did 2-3 click and rewards for targeting on his cage top, let him hang out for a few minutes and then put him in his main cage for breakfast and access to his toys... which he LOVES! The first days RESULTS... He's attacking about 50% less as we walk by his cage throughout the day, and calms down quicker when we're persistent about letting him out. Pretty good for day one, I'll be keeping you posted often as we progress throughout the days and weeks ahead.

Avoid Your Parrot's Biting With These 3 Tips

Well... It's that time of year again :( The time of year when parrots start to show their signs of coming into a hormonal state, and start getting more mean. It's the time of year when more parrots are given up for adoption then ever before. So I thought I'd give you 3 quick tips for getting your parrot through this time in his life, with the least amount of heartache possible. Tip #1 Give Your Parrot 12-14 Hours Of Sleep That's right... parrot's need 12-14 hours of sleep. And they sleep when it's dark outside. So this time of year, when the days get longer and longer, there's less darkness, and thus less sleep. This is part of what triggers breeding responces in parrots, and can turn them hormonal. But making sure your parrot get's 12-14 hours of uninterupted sleep, in pitch darkness will help curb this hormonal reaction Tip #2 Target Train Target training your parrot is a way to train your parrot to touch objects as a reward for treats. And the great part about it, is that if your bird is so hormonal he won't let you touch him, you don't care... because target training is done with a stick, and you'll be out of reach for your bird to bite you. It's the perfect way to still interact with your parrot without being bitten. Tip #3 Be Aware Of Body Language Most parrot owners train their parrots to bite them, by reacting incorrectly to their parrot when it bites them. The sudden act of jerking away & screaming after being bit, teaches your bird that biting you get's you to leave him alone. And to parrots like Cockatoos, screaming can be exciting, so they may try to bite you again, just to make you scream because they enjoy the sound. I know... it sounds sick, but it's true. My advice... avoid getting bit, and become a student of reading your parrot's body language, and you'll start to notice signs that notify you to stay away from your bird.

More Progress With Getting My Parrot To Eat Other Foods

Thought I'd jump back on my computer and give you guys a quick update about how well these NutriBerry Treats from Lafaber.com have been working. As I last mentioned, these conversion treats, designed to get parrots who have never eaten pellets, to start eating them, by hiding them in a sweet tasting ball, stuck together with molasses and full of higher nutritional value than just seeds... were working great for my Parrotlet, "Ricky". And he's now eating all sorts of foods! But the process took a little bit longer for my Cockatiel Magoo, who has been slowly starting to eat new foods... that is until last night! After I came home from the gym last night, and slumped my butt down on the coach to take a load off, my wife turns to me and says, "Chet, look at what Magoo will do for these NutriBerries..." So I watched as my wife took a NutriBerry, and placed in in Magoo's food bowl. And saw Magoo, literally try to run to his food bowl!!! I've never seen any of my parrot's do anything like this before... he actually fell over himself trying to get to his food bowl faster! That's a ton of progress, in just a few short weeks of placing those treats in his cage, only to be ignored... but not anymore! I'm going to be putting together a short video clip of it soon, so stay tuned as it's hilarious. But more importantly, a great step forward in helping my parrot live a healthier life, and prolonging his life through better nutrition. I suggest you constantly strive to do the same... your parrots worth it.

Parrot Training Topics

I don't usually do this, but I wanted to let you know that I've just posted a new page on my website with some beginner type of information, on several different parrot training topics, that you might want to check out. They are fairly basic articles on parrots, and parrot training, but worth checking out none the less. Plus while I'm at it, I thought I'd share another hot parrot training topic with you from our inner-circle parrot training forum, that only my private clients get access too. This question was posted by "Chrissy", one of my valued clients about her friends parrot's feather plucking. A friend recently moved into a new house and put her parrot in it's new room. It is now plucking all its feathers. I told her to get it to the vet as soon as possible because when mine had started I was given a med. to help calm her anxiety which I am hoping will help her situation for a little bit. I 'm writing because I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions to help make the transition go a little more smooth. I know there is no magic fix for this problem and hope her situation will get better soon. Thanks in advance. Here was the answer, my behavior specialist gave her: Moves are almost always stressful for everyone involved, including pets. Some birds can take longer to settle into a new home and new routine, so if your friend has found that her bird is pretty sensitive about change, it may be that this latest change was just too much and the feather picking is the result. Of course there could be something else going on, so it's always good to talk to a knowledgeable vet. Have your friend try to establish some normalcy as soon as possible. Get the bird on a schedule and teach him that meals, playtime and bedtime will occur at fairly consistent times. If she's still having trouble adjusting to the move herself, that can affect the bird as well, so she needs to be aware of that. Let her know that I do consults for all parrot owners, not just Bird Tricks customers, so if she needs more help, she can call me if she'd like. She won't get the free half hour, but my rates are very reasonable anyway. And here's my two cents It's very common for a parrot to freak out during moving, vacations etc. Many parrot owners come home only to find their parrot so freaked out that it plucked out all it's chest feathers. A few years ago I stumbled across a company that made a great supplement, instead of medication to help fight this issue, and calm a stressed out parrot naturally. You can find that supplement at AvianMedicineChest.com To sum it up, be careful with changing any parrot's environment suddenly. And stay involved in your parrot's life regularly through training, and exposing to multiple people and situations to get him used to being in different environments. He'll not only be happier when you're with him, but less stressed when you leave!

Parrot Trick Training

Parrot trick training is an often overlooked concept topic when parrot owners are wondering how they can improve their parrot's behavior. Trick training is a stimulating, entertaining, engaging environment for your parrot, and to ignore that fact is foolish. I often get emails about people concerning parrot trick training, and how they just think that their bird should just be a bird, he doesn't need to learn any tricks... and if they only knew the damage they are doing to the relationship between themselves and their bird, they'd shut up in a second. Any parrot can be trick trained, even if it's a parrot that won't let you touch him. There are plenty of tricks that can be trained, that don't need you, the owner, to touch your bird, and yet still give you a way to interact with him, teach him how to communicate with you, and teach him to follow rules and guidelines. It is this act of teaching a language that makes parrot trick training so effective, and if you would just give it a try, or pick up some of my parrot trick training videos, I promise you would notice your parrot being more obedient and biting less frequently within days, and at the worst... weeks. So give it a try, you have nothing to lose, and everything to gain. Your parrot is longing for a way to interact with you, and trick training might just be what he's looking for!

Foods To Help Your Parrots Eat Healthier

Do you ever have trouble getting your parrot to stop eating a 100% seed based diet? Well you aren't alone... I have thousands of clients asking me about this same parrot diet question every year, and I've finally got a great answer. There are now websites that make transitional foods, for parrots. These are foods, or treats that have seeds that the parrots will try to eat, but packaged up in a way, that to actually eat the seed, the parrot is forced to nibble on or around pellets, and other healthy goodies hidden in the treats. You can find two of these types of treats at this website at Lafaber.com I first heard about this website from an interview I did with a behavior consultant who I'm constantly calling on for her amazing parrot training advice... consultant Kim Bear Kim told me about two products this company makes, one of them being called "Nutriberries" and the other called "Avi Cakes" both of which were designed to help your parrot make the transition from an unhealthy 100% seed based diet, to a more well balanced diet containing other foods. I highly recommend picking up both of these items from Lafeber.com and start feeding them to your bird right away. I'm seeing amazing results with how quickly my birds are starting to FINALLY eat pellets, when weaning them using these treats. So until the next parrot training update, keep up the hard work, and feel free to post any success stories about how you've used these treats, or any other advice on this website to better help train your parrot.

Training Stubborn Parrots To Step Up

As you may already know, I give all of my parrot training students access to an inner-circle membership website where they get to rub elbows with my personal parrot behavior cunsultant and I. And the other day this great quesion was asked on the forum, and I thought I'd repost it here on this blog, because I'm sure it will help you in training your parrots. Here was her post: "I'm kind of confused here, Casper will come out of his cage and play on it for hrs don't get me wrong there. When I need to get him in I have to put treat's inside is food dish so he will go in. I just can't get Casper to step up out of or off of his cage and boy I tell you I have been trying to use the treat's every day. Silly part of all this is since he learned to do the wave when the treat's come out that is all he want's to do is the wave now, and the begging for the treat's. So how do you get that foot to come down to my arm instead of a wave? I must sound like a little kid here trying to do this. Will try to keep up the treat reward and keep a positive note." And here's the answer I gave her... pay attention and it will change your parrot's life, if you have a similar problem with your parrot: Chet here with what I would do... I had this exact problem with my cockatiel, wouldn't step up from on or inside his cage to save his soul, simply wasn't an option for him. So here's what I did: First I target trained him. Have you done this yet? If not it's taught on the cd that talks about clicker training for aggressive and scared birds. Forget the part about aggressive and scared birds, and just focus on the method called target training. Or... if you're bird is already trained to wave, which it sounds like he is, make sure he knows how to do it with a clicker, as it will help in what I'm about to talk about. What I did with my 'tiel was let him out of his cage, where he would always climb up on top of and hang out on the top of his cage... again it sounds like your bird already does this too. Then what I did was took the eventual goal, of my bird stepping up onto my finger and broke it down into steps, and decided that I was going to train my bird to walk over and step up onto my finger, totally on his own free will. By this I mean that I laid my finger, in your case your hand, or whatever you want him to step up onto, on the top of his cage, so that if he wanted he could walk over and step up onto it. Which he didn't do for a few days. then I took a clicker, and his favorite treat and just sat there... waiting for any movement my 'tiel made that brought him closer to my finger. At this point he was at least a foot away from my finger. After about 2-3 minutes my bird finally moved, not like he wanted to get closer to me, but in the act of turning to go do something he wanted to do, happened to get about a half inch closer to my finger. So I clicked and gave him a reward. Since he already new what the click meant, this meant to him... Game ON! And the wheels start turning in his little brain to see how he can earn another click and treat. I kept clicking every time my bird got closer until finally he caught on that he was supposed to move towards my hand. When he figured that out, I stopped clicking for coming closer, and started clicking for bumping any part of his toe or toenails against my finger... NEVER moving my finger, even if he stepped on it. We'll do that later. So he eventually realized that all he had to do was step on my finger and he got a treat, and I never picked him up quickly thus violating his trust, or fear of not getting on my finger, so he was more than willing to do it. Then after this behavior was down pat, I'd say after 2-3 days, I started lifting up my finger an inch or two once my bird started stepping onto it, not much, and always staying in my birds comfort zone, as I didn't want to upset him, and violate our little agreement of him being willing to step on my hand as long as I didn't scare him. Then I would click and reward for one second of him sitting on my hand, and put him back on his cage top, and repeat, then two seconds, three seconds etc. you get the point. One note though, is that I rewarded my bird with a click, and then always fed him the treat so that he had to get off of my hand to go get the treat, I didn't want him being bated by the treat, but instead making the decision on his own free will. Try it out, it works awesome, even with scared birds, Chet

Training Parrots To Eat Healthier

I'll keep this short and sweet today,
I just finished a powerful interview and gave it out as a free bonus to
all of my customers who had purchased my
parrot training courses and
videos.

The call was with Robin
Deutsch, the author of "The Healthy Bird Coockbook -- A Lifesaving
Nutritional guide and Recipe Collection" and she really gave a great interview.

For example she talked about how
parrots who are fed 100% seed based diets only, will only live half of
their life, and die prematurely due to malnutrition.

So I recommend you run over to Robin's
website and grab a copy of this her book, because I've never seen a
person lay out such simple strategies for getting their parrots to start
eating a healthier diet and living a longer life.

You'll love this book, don't make the
mistake of not grabbing a copy and reading it over, and over and over...

... Until next time, Best Wishes,

Chet Womach