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Dinah the demon birdie!!

DerbyBirdy

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So! We've had Dinah for about a month now. (Here's her story: We may have fallen in love..... | Avian Avenue Parrot Forum Things were going great the first week, but after that... it's been a whole different story. :shakehead:

At the bird shop, she was super sweet. We first met her out of her cage. One of the employees just handed her to us, explaining that she's been working on socializing her and the little linnie had been doing a good job! She perched patiently on our hands, let us hold her on her back in our hands, and even hung upside down for us! When we did get close to her cage, she did have a tendency to get "flighty" and try to fly to her cage. We found that she was really fast on the ground and wasn't super eager to step up from the floor. She was real timid whenever we tried to get her to step up, and it was more difficult trying to get her to come out of her cage; we would have to grab her... then she's totally fine with us handling her once we caught her. We were smitten, so we spent some more time with her some days after and took her home a week later.

The first week Dinah came home was fine... her behavior was the same as it was when she was in the shop. But then, a switch flipped. One day I was trying to get her out of her cage to have some outside bonding time. She did her usual thing of trying to run and hop away, but then she started screaming at my hand! She was a really quiet girl at the start, and I had never heard her yell at me.

Since then, she's become extremely bitey! She starts getting defensive and making angry noises whenever our hands get near her or her cage. I even have trouble opening her cage door to change her food/water. When before she would just run away from our hands when we asked her to step up... now she lunges and chases our hands. And when she does bite, it hurts!! I know we're supposed to NOT react when a bird bites you... but her bites are nothing compared to Ollie (our tiel); she will grab on and bite at our knuckles, cuticles, and the webbing between fingers... like she knows what hurts! Jack's fingers (and nose!) are so cut up from her bites!

Also, she's not eating right!! At the shop, they fed her a house mix of Zupreem pellets and seed mix. We wanted to take her off the Zupreem and onto Tops pellets (the Zupreem was making her poop red!) But now, all she eats is seeds. We've tried switching to Lafebers avi-cakes, but she picks out all the seeds and leaves the pellets! When we took her to her first vet visit (and follow-up 2 weeks later), the vet suggested we try Harrison's pellets since they were small... but Dinah wouldn't touch them! She would whine and skitter around her cage until we put something more palatable in her bowl.

My hope is that she's going through a hormonal period. She's just hitting 11 months. But it worries me a lot that it happened so soon after bringing her home. I just want her to be happy. She just seems so bored in her cage, even though I leave her toys to chew on and foraging treats. I want her to spend some more time with me and Jack so that she can be more comfortable... but she just gets so mad when the fingers appear!! We will sometimes towel her (she is more calm that way) and give her love and attention with our hands to show that Fingers Are Friends!

Sorry for the long rant, but I'm really worried. Did we do something wrong? Did we take her home too soon since she was just learning how to socialize? Should we have left her alone for the first month? :sad1:
 

LunaLovebird

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I don't know much about Linnie's, but it sounds to me that she's cage territorial, and she doesn't appreciate the hand invaders getting in her space. Have you tried using a perch to get her to come out and changing things over then? Other than that, perhaps just try rewarding her good behaviour as much as you can with treats and ignore her when she's bad. It is also possible that she is in need of a bird friend.

How did you switch her pellets over? As in, did you just stop with the Zupreem cold turkey or gradually add the TOPS? I think TOPS can be a bit tricky for some birds to get in to. Perhaps go back to the Zupreem for now and try mixing in a bit of Roudybush (crumbles maybe) or Harrison's.
 

sunnysmom

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I would suggest not grabbing her and trying to let her come out on her own. You can leave the cage door open and put a perch outside the door with a favorite treat or toy. You can also see if she'll step up on a perch. I think you inadvertently have taught her that hands are scary things and have to reteach her that they're not. You can also try hand feeding her treats.
 

jmfleish

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Linnies are special little birdies who are extremely flock oriented and seem to have a true aversion to hands. I would stop forcing with your hands. Let her come to you. Ours love to hang out with us, especially if we have food but never got used to our hands. The worst thing you can do is force your hands on them. Also, I would seriously consider getting a second one. Out of all my experience with parrots in general, I have never seen a more flock oriented parrot in my life. Sometimes they will bond with other small birds, but they seem to do best with another Linnie. As for food, try Roudybush mini. Good luck and don't give up on her. I think you'll see some improvement if you just try not using your hands.
 

santacruzjack

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Linnies are special little birdies who are extremely flock oriented and seem to have a true aversion to hands. I would stop forcing with your hands. Let her come to you. Ours love to hang out with us, especially if we have food but never got used to our hands. The worst thing you can do is force your hands on them. Also, I would seriously consider getting a second one. Out of all my experience with parrots in general, I have never seen a more flock oriented parrot in my life. Sometimes they will bond with other small birds, but they seem to do best with another Linnie. As for food, try Roudybush mini. Good luck and don't give up on her. I think you'll see some improvement if you just try not using your hands.
We've definitely stopped forcing our hands on her at this point, we open the cage door and let her come to us and she is willing to, especially when there's millet involved. She still likes spending time on our shoulder, doing other family activities, so we're just keeping hands out of the picture as much as possible. I told Lauren the same thing about perhaps getting a second Linnie because of their flock reliance.... She and Ollie, our cockatiel, are only just now having their first interactions since she's out of quarantine and she is being polite for the most part, but Ollie clearly wants to make a friend and she clearly does not.... Whenever he goes in for a preen she goes in for a CHARGE!!!! Otherwise they're doing okay together, but I definitely don't think we're the friends that she wants, and neither is Ollie.
 

jmfleish

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Linnies are generally very, very friendly birds. I would just give her some time and maybe just consider getting her a Linnie friend.
 

DerbyBirdy

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I have tried on several occasions to offer her treats by hand... But she gets angry and bites at my fingers! Same thing happens when I have some millet in an open hand near her without moving. She'll slowly make her way over because she wants the millet, but bites very soon after.
 

Lady Jane

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This behavior you describe is totally opposite of my Linnie experience. Everyone has said they are fantastic eaters. Have a rapid metabolism making them want to eat. The Linnies I had would eat just about everything I offered them. It did not matter how it was served up either. I fed the goldenfeast blends and not pure seeds. Linnies really need to be with other Linnies, not a different species. Because this bird has such unusual Linnie behavior I would have a complete medical check by avian vet. Part of the issue could be that she was purchased in a pet store and not from a breeder. Pet store life for a bird is just the pitts! In the photo it looks like her wings are clipped. Not being able to fly could be another frustration. They love to climb. If you don't have any climbing toys like a net or scarf hanger I suggest you do that too.
 
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jmfleish

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Mine are all really good eaters too and we do the Petite Hookbill mix from Goldenfeast mixed in with the Roudybush mini pellets and mine are total pigs. I've never had just a single Linnie and I've never seen this behavior either. I never even thought of it but if you haven't had her to the vet, that might be the next step you take. It does seem like unusual behavior for a Linnie to me.
 

DerbyBirdy

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This behavior you describe is totally opposite of my Linnie experience. Everyone has said they are fantastic eaters. Have a rapid metabolism making them want to eat. The Linnies I had would eat just about everything I offered them. It did not matter how it was served up either. I fed the goldenfeast blends and not pure seeds. Linnies really need to be with other Linnies, not a different species. Because this bird has such unusual Linnie behavior I would have a complete medical check by avian vet. Part of the issue could be that she was purchased in a pet store and not from a breeder. Pet store life for a bird is just the pitts! In the photo it looks like her wings are clipped. Not being able to fly could be another frustration. They love to climb. If you don't have any climbing toys like a net or scarf hanger I suggest you do that too.
To be clear, we didn't buy her from a pet shop, we got her from a bird shop that focuses on rehoming birds and sells babies from breeders. The breeder had her wings clipped when we got her.

She has seen an avian vet twice, like I mentioned. She was deemed completely healthy with the exception of a sinus infection that was treated with antibiotics. So, overall she's perfectly healthy.
 

DerbyBirdy

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We have discussed getting a second Linnie, but are curious as to how two females would get along in the same cage. We know that with cockatiels, two females tend to be more aggressive towards each other.
 

Laurul Feather Cat

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The first week was your honeymoon period and now that is over and she is showing you she does not trust you yet. You are frustrated she will not takes treats from your hand, but that is easily solved by eliminating the hand. Put a treat bowl on the front of her cage and every time you walk past, bend down, saw hello and plunk a small treat in her bowl and walk away. This shows her your presence leads to getting yummy goodies.

She needs to be hand held perch trained; just hold out a six inch dowel up to her as if it were your finger and tell her to step up. If you need to you can use a treat to get her to put a foot on the dowel at first to start the training. Once a hand is not involved in stepping up, it should be much easier to work with her. You have to gain a parrot's trust before they will trust you and stop defending themselves from you and that means going at their speed: which is often dead slow! No forcing behavior, not grabbing, no bullying. You can also do target training to help you clear her away from her food bowls so you change them.

Food changes are difficult at best. You have to do the change over slowly, not suddenly. So go back to offering the Zupreem, but only offer it at half the amount she was getting and put another pellet of your choice in the bowl as well. It takes a while, but eventually, she will eat the other pellets.

I have never had any thing but really mild hen on hen aggression with cockatiels. I had a hen flock cage for years with ten individuals which had no problems, ever. The only time I had hen aggression is when they wanted to sit on the same eggs in the same nest box.
 

Lady Jane

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Perch training is a good idea. Some Linnies just do not like hands. I really think if they are Step up trained early on this fear goes away. If you can train your bird to step on a perch you are on your way. My female Linnie was also clipped severely and was very slow to grow flights back. Took a little over one year. I got a tall ladder and put it on the floor up to the cage door. She climbed up right away to get back in the cage. She seemed more content after this. Then my male who could fly took to the ladder too. Then they could make a decision on their own to go back in the cage. It was so cute to see how much fun they had with the ladder.
 

santacruzjack

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Dinah jumped onto Lauren's shoulder after we let her explore outside of her cage for a while, she was climbing around the cage bars looking for a way to get to us, jumped to the table, then to lauren's legs.... Lauren is terrified of Dinah's biting power so she instantly hid her fingies under her legs, and everything went great! Dinah played with the laces on her gym shorts for a while and then leaped up her chest, and started preening and beak grinding.

After that Ollie was on my shoulder, and he ended up wandering over to Lauren's tummy for some scritches, hence the following video. They've been doing really good together today, Dinah even made attempts to preen Ollie instead of vice versa, although he's a bit scared of her since she charged him... Still, progress is happy :)

 

Heather F

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Awww she looks sweet and happy as long as the scary hands aren't coming for her. Linnies have the cutest little faces. :heart:

As for Ollie... :faint: Boy does he love his scritches. :heart::heart::heart:
 

DerbyBirdy

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An update on Dinah's behavior. She's still pretty terrified of our hands, but we have figured out her buttons. We can get her to step up without much angry biting. We've been able to offer her actual scratches once we've slowly put a hand over her body. She fluffs right up as long as we're scratching the right parts of her head!

She's still being pretty stubborn with her food. We're feeding her a combination of cockatiel seed mix, Harrisons Ultra Fine pellets, and Lafebers Avi-Cakes. She still always picks out the seeds from the avi-cakes, but we're trying not to replace her food super often or giving her too much. She complains (((loudly))) when there aren't enough seeds in her bowl, but we're trying to ignore her crying. It's hard balancing getting her to like us and getting her to eat right!

Here's a video of her accepting head scritches... plus our tiel, Ollie chattering in the background.

We are considering getting her another linnie friend (somewhere down the line). We're worried if two female linnies will be too aggressive with each other. We definitely don't want a boy linnie because eggs. Thoughts on two girls?
 
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