• Welcome to Avian Avenue! To view our forum with less advertisments please register with us.
    Memberships are free and it will just take a moment. Click here

Gabapentin to calm down a loud conure??

Kuzey

Meeting neighbors
Joined
6/16/19
Messages
22
Location
New York City
Real Name
Kuzey
Hello everybody!!

I am relatively new in this forum. I introduced myself and my flock in the Welcome section.

Me and my flock have been going thru such a difficult time lately.

My sun conure Nikki has been extremely agitated for the past few weeks. Anything and everything scares him causing him to throw that annoying conure screech!! It’s not just a scream but it’s an alarm call that puts rest of the flock on defensive perching. When he screeches like that me but most importantly my other birds get alarmed and become on edge for the next few minutes. Each time, first I have to calm myself down then talk to the rest of the flock to calm them down. This happens multiple times a day and I am not sure how much longer I can take it. It used to be few times a day when he saw things that scared him, like umbrellas, spray bottles, backpacks and many more. In those times, I would remove the antecedent and the screeching would stop. But now, he screams for almost anything, like me moving my head or grabbing my phone.

I had a vet appointment yesterday for recheck his butt which was inflamed and he received medication for it. The vet said His health is great and the infection has completely cleared out. I brought up the screeching and asked if she could prescribe a medicine to calm him down a bit. Of course she did not recommend medication route and referred to the problem as “he is being a conure”, which to a large degree I agree. However his behavior effects my physical and mental health, as to every time he screeches I get startled, my hearth rate goes up and I had to calm myself down. I get distracted from whatever I’m doing just to calm down. Then I have to talk to my cockatoos so that they know there is no danger. When I talked to them softly, they stop the defensive perching and start to act normal again. Until they hear me saying “everything is okay bub bubss” with gentle voice tone, they stay at that defensive perching position ( heads down, wings are tucked up, ready to fly) watching out for danger. In order to calm them down, I need to be able to calm myself down which I’ve been struggling with.

Within last two weeks, I even considered the possibility of rehoming him (just the thought of it brings tears to my eyes) but then it makes me feel worse as I know sun conure are one of the most rehomed species due to their loudness. I feel like a failure and do not want to contribute to this huge problem. Also he is bonded with my green cheeked conure, so if I rehome him, I have to send her with him. I can’t separate them as I feel like this would devastate both of them. Finally I love both of them so much!!. I don’t want to give them up but I have to take care of myself in order to be able to take care of them. Because of his behavior and my response to his behavior I can already feel that my bond with Nikki is breaking. Not on my end but mostly on his end. He doesn’t trust me as much and not fully relaxed around me. I don’t want the bond between us to break!!

When I brought up how much distress Nikki is causing to rest of us, the vet wanted to consult some of her colleagues about possible pharmaceutical intervention. Reluctantly she said we could try Gabapentin, a non-psychoactive medicine used for pain management that causes reduced alertness and drowsiness. She insisted that I should try behavior modification and referred me to someone in upstate New York but I do not have the resources, mostly the time, to take on such an extensive and long treatment trial, which doesn’t guarantee the behavior would go extinct as he is a conure.

I’ve read some of the threads here and bunch of other blogs about how to handle screeching in conures. In the past, I used the spray bottle. Such a bad bad idea!!
My latest tool is to put him (with my GCC) in bathroom, which I converted to an oversized bird cage. When he goes bunker I scream “ go to the bathroom!!” From the tone of my voice they know so they fly down and I close the door behind them. I feel horrible for doing that but if I ignore his screeches by putting an earplug or headphones, he becomes louder and puts my cockatoos on edge. I don’t even want to know what my neighbors are thinking. After I put him there, he stays quite for maybe an hour then he starts his contact calls which I ignore. I watch them thru my camera that I placed in the bathroom to make sure they are ok. 5–10 minutes after he stops screaming, I go downstairs and let them out of the bathroom. I bring couple sunflower seeds or slices of apple to reward him for being quite. Few minutes after he is out, Dane thing all over again!!

I know this is a classic scenario for sun conures but has anybody have another tip to how to manage this behavior or has anybody have experience giving Gabapentin to their bird?

Thank you in advance!

B670D46A-AE6B-40BF-AB2B-D92F26FB2EE9.jpeg
This is him being a clown!
 

Karen

Biking along the boulevard
Avenue Veteran
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
10/22/09
Messages
5,041
I know this is not what you're asking, but I don't think Gabapentin will help the scenario you describe.

I feel so bad for Nikki when you describe that he has been agitated and scared for several weeks now. IMO, yelling at him until he flies away in fear and then stays in a room where his contact calls are ignored isn't helping him at all. Reading that broke my heart. Was this scared behavior brought on from his vet visit?

She insisted that I should try behavior modification and referred me to someone in upstate New York.
This sounds like a very good idea. It sounds like you need some guidance how to implement positive interaction with the birds. The fear and anxiety that Nikki is experiencing doesn't sound like something that can be medicated away.
 

Yoshi&Raphi

Rollerblading along the road
Joined
4/12/19
Messages
2,398
Real Name
Raphi
I know this is not what you're asking, but I don't think Gabapentin will help the scenario you describe.

I feel so bad for Nikki when you describe that he has been agitated and scared for several weeks now. IMO, yelling at him until he flies away in fear and then stays in a room where his contact calls are ignored isn't helping him at all. Reading that broke my heart. Was this scared behavior brought on from his vet visit?



This sounds like a very good idea. It sounds like you need some guidance how to implement positive interaction with the birds. The fear and anxiety that Nikki is experiencing doesn't sound like something that can be medicated away.
I strongly agree with what has been said here.
 

webchirp

Joyriding the Neighborhood
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
8/2/10
Messages
17,760
Location
Ohio
Real Name
Chandra
Gabapentin does help with anxiety a bit but I don't think you'll get the desired effect. You really need to modify behavior...yours as well. Screaming bathroom is not going to be helpful although in my head I hear myself say "Chya!" when she is hollering.

@Monica help!
 

BrianB

Rollerblading along the road
Avenue Veteran
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
2/22/17
Messages
1,780
I have three conures that are pets, and a flock of others that are breeders. The pets scream at various times during the day. Sunrise for sure, and for some strange reason at 4 in the afternoon. I either talk to them, or leave the room. The breeders all start screaming at sunrise, then a few do it at noon, and again near sunset. I have a speaker in the room with them and I hooked an Amazon Echo Dot to it. At various times during the day, I play nature sounds, ocean waves, or some other background noise and it really helps quiet them down. Obviously I avoid bird noises because they reply in kind. I try to vary it regularly to keep their interest and sometimes even instrumental jazz works.

I have a pretty low tolerance for loud repetitive noises. It quickly wears on my nerves and leaves me agitated. I wear ear plugs when I go in there to clean, and honestly sometimes I have to stretch it over 2 days because I reach my limit. I do what I can to reduce their stress level, and my own. It must be working because I had friends over this past weekend and they were surprised when I told them we have over 45 birds in the house.

Do what you can to reduce your own stress level and figure out ways you can keep your birds entertained. They are going to scream, but there are ways you can mitigate at least some of it.
 

Fuzzy

Rollerblading along the road
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
10/30/10
Messages
4,331
Location
Jersey, Channel Islands
Real Name
Roz
I would also agree with trying behaviour modification first. All traditional meds have side effects. The liver and kidneys are the usual organs to suffer.

You seem to have a grasp of ABA. Think about what could be reinforcing the behaviour? What exactly happens immediately afterwards? Is it your attention that is reinforcing the scream? Yelling is also attention. Even when you sprayed him with water (not advised) you would have had to approach Nikki (attention) to get close enough to spray. Can you intervene before he even thinks of screaming and reinforce some other... ANY other... acceptable behaviour. Changing behaviour is extremely time consuming in the beginning.

Love the cute photo. He looks totally relaxed in that photo - being with you in that instant is reinforcing to him and you! What else can he do that you can reinforce? Build on those times so that they begin to crowd out the time for the unwanted behaviour!

... which doesn’t guarantee the behavior would go extinct as he is a conure.
Modifying behaviour would most likely take it back to baseline (the rate at which it happened before it became a problem).

Love Brian's idea of playing music or have other background noise. I have the radio going all day here. Sometimes I ramp up the music and act silly with them all - it gets them all screaming/being loud and having fun. It is ok to scream sometimes.
 

TikkiTembo

Rollerblading along the road
Joined
5/13/19
Messages
1,447
Real Name
Chelsea
@Fuzzy 's idea of set screaming times is pretty genius, I think! I wonder if you could turn it into a training/game, like teach him to scream on command for a treat? Then teach him a word for being quieter, and reward that with a treat? Coming from a non expert at all, just a thought from a fellow very loud conure owner :)
 

SgtNikola

Walking the driveway
Joined
3/21/19
Messages
159
Location
Ohio
Real Name
Finn
Sometimes I ramp up the music and act silly with them all - it gets them all screaming/being loud and having fun. It is ok to scream sometimes.
Nika and I yell together sometimes, it's kind of like stress relieving and she's mostly quiet the rest of the time. We also have mini dance parties, those are usually the times shes noisiest.
@Fuzzy 's idea of set screaming times is pretty genius, I think! I wonder if you could turn it into a training/game, like teach him to scream on command for a treat? Then teach him a word for being quieter, and reward that with a treat? Coming from a non expert at all, just a thought from a fellow very loud conure owner :)
That's how you train dogs not to bark all the time, teach them to 'speak'. Found a good video on YouTube for training dogs, maybe you can apply it to Nikki?
 

Monica

Cruising the avenue
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
5/18/10
Messages
11,253
Location
Hell, NV
Real Name
Monica
First and foremost - stop feeding him out of a single food bowl. Instead, feed out of 5-6 different, small dishes placed throughout the cage. Get foraging toys to increase places where you can hide food. Put food in little cupcakes and tie it close. Add medium sized [cleaned] pebbles or pistachio shells to the food dishes so he has to sort through them to get to the food. Try covering the dishes with a paper towel so he has to tear it to get to the food. Always make these activities *easy* at first for him to accomplish and as he learns to forage, you can increase the difficulty so he has to work harder for food.

You may also want to look into changing up his diet. Maybe less seeds? More fresh foods? Or?

I do not recommend free-flying birds, but exercise can be a great way to help get rid of that pent up energy! So target train him, then have him fly around your home for exercise. Reward, reward, reward desired behaviors.

Use your words: Conditioning Sam to a new environment | Learning Parrots

Does he talk? Can you reward him for talking? Making any kind of conure sounds?

Or what about rewarding him for playing with toys?


It's better to try to prevent the behavior rather than to "allow" it to occur. By putting him in the bathroom and ignoring him, you may inadvertently be teaching him to scream. If I scream for 10 minutes and stop, my human will come in and 'rescue' me! So he screams for at least 10 minutes... and when you don't come, maybe he needs to scream for 15 minutes instead? Next time it could be 30 minutes or more.
 

HolliDaze

Rollerblading along the road
Celebirdy of the Month
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
8/3/17
Messages
1,776
Location
DFW area
Real Name
Machelle
@Monica is right. a busy bird is a quiet bird!

I also wanted to suggest covering part of his cage. Not the whole thing, just a side or two so that he feels safer.
 

Kuzey

Meeting neighbors
Joined
6/16/19
Messages
22
Location
New York City
Real Name
Kuzey
Thank you all so much for your kind replies, and sorry for the delayed reply. I could not access the website yesterday.

Just to clarify, the bathroom is the conures’ safe space. I don't have a cage for them. They are out all the time. So when I say “bathroom” that means go to your cage. In the bathroom, they have multiple branches, foraging toys, an air purifier, a water bowl, avian light bulbs, and a their travel cage which I hang toys and stuff on. I rotate their foraging toys so they don’t get bored with it. As @Monica suggested, I hide treats in dixie cups and stuff one cup in another one. The harder I make it, the higher the value of the snack gets. For example, to get a whole almond they need to rip thru 3 dixie cups, 2 for sunflower seeds and 1 for millet or milk thistle seed, etc. They need to work for seeds and nuts, no freebies! First thing in the morning, I offer kale, broccoli, butternut squash, string beans, and seasonal greens I buy from Chinatown. I don't know what they are called in English or Mandarin, but they are tasty, I eat some myself. I used to chop all of these but they get used to the taste, so I dont have to anymore. They have access to pellets all day. I feed Zupreem fruit blend and Harrison High Potency.

@BrianB I play music when they are in the bathroom and I am doing something in my apartment so that they don't scream for every bit of noise. This might be influenced by my choice but they like Nicki Minaj the best. Not so much Nikki but my GCC Misshy throws some dance moves when Nicki comes on. They spend so little time in the bathroom, I don't think being in there bothers them at all. They hate being away from me though that's for sure tho. I only leave them in there when I am not home, so they don't harras my cockatoos or my cats. Before I leave them in there I always make sure the air purifier and the camera is on, and the foraging toys are full. Nikki is much more interested in me than any treats or foraging toys. As long as I am available, he is satisfied. I feel like he'd rather munch on my hair than his favorite treat :) When I leave them in there even with their favorite treat, Nikki contact calls few times then goes back to foraging. I check it on my cam; they are quiet until they hear some noise, often someone coming in or out of the building. Then they start their contact call until I get home. Unlike my neighbors, I have no problem with that. Birds are loud, and they scream, that's given, and NYC is loud so we all have to deal with that.

@Fuzzy @SgtNikola Every morning when everybody wakes up, there is a screamfest in my apartment. The only way to survive that is to join them, so I do scream with them every day. I scream things like "baba, haha, tata, chacha" hoping they pick up on that. During those screaming episodes, my baby cockatoos dominate everybody. They are even louder than Nikki. When they are quiet, I worry that there is something wrong or they are chewing something they are not supposed to.

My cockatoos' and my problem is Nikki's alarm calls. I think Nikki thinks he is the head of the flock, so he alarms everybody for perceived threats. When he does it because a big scary loud truck drives by or he sees a big bird flying by the window (Misshy does that when she sees seagulls flying by), I understand and appreciate that, but when he does it for every little thing, it becomes problematic for everybody, even for him. he gets wound up for meaningless stuff. Headphones or earplugs don't fix that because the cockatoos still get alarmed. My GCC doesn't care much, so maybe she learned that those calls are fake but rest of us, mostly the toos get pretty agitated. Seeing them in defensive perching position bothers me. They shouldn't suffer that much, that's all I care. I hope they become desensitized to it too and stop caring about it soon.

@Fuzzy I would like to know why you would not recommend free-flying? I started the free-flight training recently. I took them all out for their first outdoor flight last month. It was great seeing them fly in an open sky then coming back to me. Seeing raptors soaring above was little unnerving, but overall it was a great experience for all of us. My apartment is pretty small, so free-flying is the best way to get them the proper exercise. They fly back and forth in my apartment all day, but I don't think that's enough for them. That's like ten wing flaps per lap. I also leave tree logs, branches, old test prep books, and 2' x 4' wood/pieces everywhere, so they stay active and have things to chew on, instead of chewing the walls, especially the cockatoos.

I think my first message came across as I don't want Nikki to scream, but that's not what I meant. I don't want Nikki to do false alarm calls so my other birds don't get worried. @Monica I think I somehow reinforced that behavior. You are right, every time he alarms us, he does get my full attention and everybody else get noting, which is what he wants!
 

Fuzzy

Rollerblading along the road
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
10/30/10
Messages
4,331
Location
Jersey, Channel Islands
Real Name
Roz
@Kuzey Thank you for your reply. :)

I think you have mixed Monica and me up - I didn't say anything about free flying. I just think that over time, you have reinforced the behaviour with your attention. ;)
 

Kuzey

Meeting neighbors
Joined
6/16/19
Messages
22
Location
New York City
Real Name
Kuzey
@Fuzzy Ah I did. Sorry about that!! And yes I agree again. I reinforced that and I need to figure out a way to fix it.

@Monica you are absolutely right. It’s very dangerous to attempt to free-fly without the training.. I took a course on free-flight few months back.
 

Fuzzy

Rollerblading along the road
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
10/30/10
Messages
4,331
Location
Jersey, Channel Islands
Real Name
Roz
Fixing it will take time. You need to stop reinforcing it if you can. I say, if you can, because it is very difficult to ignore a noise that is driving you crazy. Even the slightest glance or frown or hunched body language may well reinforce the sound, but do your best to ignore it. More importantly you need to highly reinforce some other behaviour he can do instead. Is there anything else Nikki can say? Words? A whistle? Some other sound that you can put on cue? If you whistle or say something, can he copy it? Something vocal would be doubly helpful as he won't be able to scream at the same time he is whistling/speaking. Then before he is expected to scream, cue the whistle/word and HIGHLY reinforce! If he has already started screaming, wait for a gap and then cue and highly reinforce. An animal will choose to do the behaviour that gains most reinforcement which is why the new behaviour has to be HEAVILY reinforced especially in the beginning.

I'll give you an example with Kobe my Blue-headed Pionus. He has taken to making a HORRIBLE noise when I am uncovering the other birds in the morning - it started with an impersonation of the sheets coming off and descended into an awful grating squawking. History tells me that Kobe does anything and everything "good" or "bad" to get my attention. So I am careful to turn my back to him so I don't catch his eye which would make the whole thing even worse (I might even freeze for a while). I wait for a gap in the squawking and that's when I jump in to cue another sound. Kobe can say, "Oh.... BOY!" So I jump in with a loud "Ohhhhhhh?" and he finishes it with "BOYYYYYY!" I immediately turn round and give him my full attention and we continue to shout "Ohhhh BOY!" together (highly reinforcing for Kobe). The awful squawking has been forgotten because he is getting way more attention for shouting, "Oh Boy".

Also do other things with Nikki. Play with him, teach him things like targeting... the reinforcement that comes with doing these activities will make life more fun for the both of you and will show him there are other ways to gain even more attention from you.

Working on the above will take time and patience but it will be worth it in the end.
 

Kuzey

Meeting neighbors
Joined
6/16/19
Messages
22
Location
New York City
Real Name
Kuzey
@Fuzzy Nikki doesn't talk yet but we are working on it. I have been trying to teach him to whistle, make kiss sound and say Nikki. Once he learns I will definitely try your suggestion.

I have been thinking about what I have been doing differently since he became like this. I realized that I stopped snuggling with him in the mornings because one time I was almost going to crush him between my legs. I am not a heavy sleeper but I did not notice he was there. Yesterday I let him stay in bed with me and he was much calmer. No incident at all! I am wondering if that might be the reason why he has been so agitated?
 

Fuzzy

Rollerblading along the road
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Joined
10/30/10
Messages
4,331
Location
Jersey, Channel Islands
Real Name
Roz
@Fuzzy Nikki doesn't talk yet but we are working on it. I have been trying to teach him to whistle, make kiss sound and say Nikki. Once he learns I will definitely try your suggestion.

I have been thinking about what I have been doing differently since he became like this. I realized that I stopped snuggling with him in the mornings because one time I was almost going to crush him between my legs. I am not a heavy sleeper but I did not notice he was there. Yesterday I let him stay in bed with me and he was much calmer. No incident at all! I am wondering if that might be the reason why he has been so agitated?
That’s great to hear! :dance4: The whole problem might be just less and less attention from you. He’s had to find other more annoying ways to get that attention… because it works!! “Bad” attention is better than no attention!

Excellent move on your part...
a) He’s now getting attention for snuggling not screaming.
b) You engaged him in the snuggling before he even thought of screaming.
c) This attention is highly reinforcing… we know snuggling is MORE reinforcing than the screaming – because he’s choosing to snuggle and not scream.

See what other peaceful activities you can engage him with through the day. These alternative activities (eg. snuggling, target training, general hanging out with you, plus loads of others) will work just as well as the incompatible activities (ie. cuing a sound/whistle/word). I just suggested incompatible activities as he cannot do both at the same time so they, in theory, are doubly effective.

The behaviour has been learned, and you can’t unlearn what you already know, so be prepared for some screaming again. But you know now not to reinforce it, and instead engage him in something else which he finds highly reinforcing. This will be time consuming in the beginning.
 
Top