Best Training Treat?

[JBosley]

Hey everyone!
I got my little Cockatiel baby, Lychee, last Thursday night. He is doing great!
I want to start training him to step up, but am having a hard time figuring out an easy treat to use. He takes Safflower seeds from me, but takes forever to eat them... he is not a fan of Millet!
What does everyone use as training treats?

 

[Jas]

My guys have sunflower seeds, safflower seeds, sweet potato, peas, corn and sometimes nuts. Don't rush your bird it isn't a race to get them to do a trick. Do it on your birds terms and make it fun, this way it's a positive experience, remember lychee is still a baby, could you eat a biscuit it a second when you were only a toddler?

 

[Zoepr143]

I agree with @Jas , lychee is still young. I would wait a little bit.
But to answer the question; i use sunflowerseeds and millet

 

[finchly]

I would say, since you want to work with your baby but as the others suggested it’s a little early, just go real easy. You don’t have a full trust bond yet, so make it fun, hold the treat//have him step up, if he gets it go crazy with praise, if not ignore it... but don’t do it constantly. Gentle guidance. He’ll be stepping up before you know it!

Love the name.

 

[Tiel Feathers]

One of my birds didn't like millet when she was a baby. It took her about two months to really like it. She also likes Safflower seeds, and she became faster at eating as she got older. I train her with safflower seeds now, and use millet for my other tiels.

 

[JBosley]

Thanks for all the suggestions and advice!

He is a very friendly fellow so far. He loves being out of his cage, and loves climbing around on me.

All I was thinking to teach this early is step up, I definitely wouldn’t push him! I know he’s still young, but I want to make him stepping up on me more positive. Right now I literally just shove my hand on his chest until he steps up.

He’s by no means afraid of me! We’ve already started to bond. Again, I just wanted to make it more positive! He’s already started to understand it, not as hesitant to step onto me as he was day 1.

 

[Jas]

Put your finger or hand out in front of your bird but higher than the perch that they are on and stay step up, use the other hand to hold the treat in front of Lychee but behind the hand that you are asking him to step up on. Then you could give another seed every few times he does this, or a kiss,head scratch, a foot toy etc.

Edit:can we have a picture of lychee please

 

[Laurul Feather Cat]

A bird will always step up onto a HIGHER perch, it is an instinct they can't resist. They always want to be as high as they can get; it's a safety thing. Which is why it is tougher to teach them to step DOWN off your hand; much easier to teach "step off" instead of down and make sure the hand is lower than the perch they are stepping off.

Oh... The best treat is the one the bird will take without fail. I often use seeds as treats, but when I do I like to use hulled seeds. You can get hulled millet at health food stores, hulled sunflower seeds and even hulled safflower at some places. Luckily most of mine like almonds or walnuts and I just chop the nuts into small pieces so they take very little time to eat.

 

[saroj12]

I use this

Diamond Walnut Topping : Publix.com

 

[JBosley]

 

[JBosley]

A bird will always step up onto a HIGHER perch, it is an instinct they can't resist. They always want to be as high as they can get; it's a safety thing. Which is why it is tougher to teach them to step DOWN off your hand; much easier to teach "step off" instead of down and make sure the hand is lower than the perch they are stepping off.

Oh... The best treat is the one the bird will take without fail. I often use seeds as treats, but when I do I like to use hulled seeds. You can get hulled millet at health food stores, hulled sunflower seeds and even hulled safflower at some places. Luckily most of mine like almonds or walnuts and I just chop the nuts into small pieces so they take very little time to eat.

I've definitely been trying to teach him the right way! So that's good news, haha.
Thank you for the treat ideas... I will definetly find some hulled seeds. The Safflower is working for right now! He'll take it from my hand now, and is always so eager to come out of his cage. So I have been just practicing when I take him out.

 

[Jas]

He's super cute!

 

[JBosley]

@Jas thank you! I’m already in love. We’re currently conditioning him to the flight suit, and to be held for putting it on, as well as for nail clipping!

He’s still not a fan of being held. But doesn’t seem to mind the flight suit being around.

 

[Davi]

It seems to me that you're on the right track, as others have already pointed out! My only observation is that what we as humans understand as "patient" is not always the same as what a young little birdie understands. I've found that stretching my own limits on what it means to be patient (aka, my arm is almost falling off from holding this piece of millet spray in my hand, lol) has helped a lot in strengthening my bond with my birds. They want to know that I can be truly trusted and thrive with consistent behavior and routine. Hope this helps and best of luck! And what a cutie!!!!

 

[JBosley]

@Davi thanks for the advice! Luckily I have a lot of animal experience, so patience definitely isn’t news to me. So far he’ll do anything for Safflower haha

 

[BirdManDan]

I have found that the best way which I was taught by professional bird rainers is to put out several small piles of different treats around in a circle like a clock. Pinenuts at 12, almonds at 1' hulled sunflower seeds at 2 and so on then put your bird in the middle see what it eats 1st, 2nd & 3rd those would be your training treats. Make sure they are not a part of his regular diet except for training. Make sure yourrewardscare random to always keep your bird wondering what's coming and thus more motivated to train.

 

[Shinobi]

I have taught Henry to step up and down from both inside and outside the cage. while people feel that's it's good to allow their birds free-range within their home, I personally like to be able to get Henry in and out of his cage when needed and without causing any stress to Henry. I used a clicker and treating treats to achieve this.

I would put Henry on his T-stand and gave him a sunflower seed and click the clicker. This indicates that training has started.
Then in my right hand I held the clicker and the sunflower seed. The set up was the clicker in the palm with my middle finger on the button and the sunflower seed held between my thumb and index finger.

With my left hand I made a pistol, so my finger was parallel to the T-stand and about 3 cm away. Then I would bring my right hand up behind my left hand and show Henry the sunflower seed and say, "step up". if after 15 to 20 seconds Henry hadn't stepped up onto my left hand I would remove the sunflower seed from his sight.

Wait 20 seconds and reshow the treat. When Henry stepped up onto my left hand and took the sunflower seed I would click the clicker at the same time.

Then to teach him to step down, with henry still on my left hand I would bring it parallel to the T-stand and about 3 cm away. Then with a sunflower seed in my right again, I would bring my right hand up, So the T-stand is between my left and right hands.

show Henry the sunflower seed and say, "step down". if after 15 to 20 seconds Henry hadn't stepped down onto the T-stand I would remove the sunflower seed from his sight.
Wait 20 seconds and reshow the treat. When Henry stepped down from my left hand, onto the T-stand and took the sunflower seed I would click the clicker at the same time.

The advice I can give is
1 move slowly around the bird
2 let the bird come to you.
3 Don't force the bird to do anything that it doesn't want to do.
4 make the trust building and bonding sessions (training) fun
5 end all training sessions on a positive.
6 patience.

Remember food is a great motivator.

 

[JBosley]

I have taught Henry to step up and down from both inside and outside the cage. while people feel that's it's good to allow their birds free-range within their home, I personally like to be able to get Henry in and out of his cage when needed and without causing any stress to Henry. I used a clicker and treating treats to achieve this.

I would put Henry on his T-stand and gave him a sunflower seed and click the clicker. This indicates that training has started.
Then in my right hand I held the clicker and the sunflower seed. The set up was the clicker in the palm with my middle finger on the button and the sunflower seed held between my thumb and index finger.

With my left hand I made a pistol, so my finger was parallel to the T-stand and about 3 cm away. Then I would bring my right hand up behind my left hand and show Henry the sunflower seed and say, "step up". if after 15 to 20 seconds Henry hadn't stepped up onto my left hand I would remove the sunflower seed from his sight.

Wait 20 seconds and reshow the treat. When Henry stepped up onto my left hand and took the sunflower seed I would click the clicker at the same time.

Then to teach him to step down, with henry still on my left hand I would bring it parallel to the T-stand and about 3 cm away. Then with a sunflower seed in my right again, I would bring my right hand up, So the T-stand is between my left and right hands.

show Henry the sunflower seed and say, "step down". if after 15 to 20 seconds Henry hadn't stepped down onto the T-stand I would remove the sunflower seed from his sight.
Wait 20 seconds and reshow the treat. When Henry stepped down from my left hand, onto the T-stand and took the sunflower seed I would click the clicker at the same time.

The advice I can give is
1 move slowly around the bird
2 let the bird come to you.
3 Don't force the bird to do anything that it doesn't want to do.
4 make the trust building and bonding sessions (training) fun
5 end all training sessions on a positive.
6 patience.

Remember food is a great motivator.

Thank you!!!!

Lychee is great with his step up now. He doesn’t like me in his cage, he always moves away from me. But he does come to the edge of his cage, then does a step up onto my finger. Once out of his cage he will gladly step up!

He loves safflower seeds and now enjoys millet as well! What kind of clicker do you use? Lychee is afraid of the ones I have...

 

[Shinobi]

Once, like everyone else I was inexperienced in the training of birds. But I did research and found that the method that stood out from the rest was clicker training. it's been used on just about every animal, including humans. Of course, you can substitute the clicker with words, but unless you use the same words all the time the bird will become confused. because It's harder to be consistent with WORDS then from a CLICK from a clicker and Clicks won't confuse the bird. Where has words can. Without the trainer realising, the word can be changed. It doesn't seem much, but it is to a bird. Has an example you might be saying "good boy". Then you say, "that's a good boy" or you’re a good bird. Timing is also important. There are excises available to help get the timing of the clicker right, like bouncing a tennis ball and clicking each time the tennis ball hits the ground. (or saying the cue word)

The clicker is the bridge between you and your bird and you use that bridge to highlight the bird’s desired behaviour to your bird. Training treats are not the bridge, they are the reward at the end of the bridge and patience is the time taken to go over the bridge.

The first stage in clicker training is teaching the animal to associate the clicker sound or another chosen marker such as a whistle or word with a training treat. When the sound marker is used, a training treat is immediately offered. The sound marker is used to signal that a desired behaviour has occurred. Some approaches are:

1. capturing: catching the animal in the act of doing a desired behaviour, for example hanging upside down or hopping. Eventually the animal learns to repeat the behaviour for a treat.

2. shaping: gradually building a new behavior by rewarding each small step toward it, for example training the parrot to turn around.

3. Target training: using a stick to get the animal to move to a desired location or position.


The last stage once the behaviour is learnt, is to add a cue for the desired behaviour, this can be a word or a hand signal. The animal will have learnt that after completing the desired behaviour a treat is on the way. Once a behaviour is learnt and is on cue (command), the clicker and the treats are faded out.

So in a nutshell, clicker training achieves better cognitive connections results.

The only source of knowledge is experience. So, for the inexperience to become knowledgeable, they must do.​

 

[JBosley]

Once, like everyone else I was inexperienced in the training of birds. But I did research and found that the method that stood out from the rest was clicker training. it's been used on just about every animal, including humans. Of course, you can substitute the clicker with words, but unless you use the same words all the time the bird will become confused. because It's harder to be consistent with WORDS then from a CLICK from a clicker and Clicks won't confuse the bird. Where has words can. Without the trainer realising, the word can be changed. It doesn't seem much, but it is to a bird. Has an example you might be saying "good boy". Then you say, "that's a good boy" or you’re a good bird. Timing is also important. There are excises available to help get the timing of the clicker right, like bouncing a tennis ball and clicking each time the tennis ball hits the ground. (or saying the cue word)

The clicker is the bridge between you and your bird and you use that bridge to highlight the bird’s desired behaviour to your bird. Training treats are not the bridge, they are the reward at the end of the bridge and patience is the time taken to go over the bridge.

The first stage in clicker training is teaching the animal to associate the clicker sound or another chosen marker such as a whistle or word with a training treat. When the sound marker is used, a training treat is immediately offered. The sound marker is used to signal that a desired behaviour has occurred. Some approaches are:

1. capturing: catching the animal in the act of doing a desired behaviour, for example hanging upside down or hopping. Eventually the animal learns to repeat the behaviour for a treat.

2. shaping: gradually building a new behavior by rewarding each small step toward it, for example training the parrot to turn around.

3. Target training: using a stick to get the animal to move to a desired location or position.


The last stage once the behaviour is learnt, is to add a cue for the desired behaviour, this can be a word or a hand signal. The animal will have learnt that after completing the desired behaviour a treat is on the way. Once a behaviour is learnt and is on cue (command), the clicker and the treats are faded out.

So in a nutshell, clicker training achieves better cognitive connections results.

The only source of knowledge is experience. So, for the inexperience to become knowledgeable, they must do.​

I’m a professional dog trainer! So I definitely agree with you about clicker training.

My problem is Lychee is afraid of the noise the clicker makes.... I have tried two clickers, he’s afraid of both! I’m very new to birds, is there a quieter clicker for birds I can find?

So far I’ve been using the word “yes” to mark behaviours as this is what I use in dog training when not using a clicker.