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Grumpy bird

Allysanne Lord

Sitting on the front steps
Joined
3/18/19
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16
Real Name
Allysanne
Hello, I have a 30 year old orange winged Amazon and he doesnt play with any of his toys... he has tons and of course the only one he touches is his treat toy. Is there anything I can do to entice him to maybe be more playful?

Thank you
 

Lady Jane

Ripping up the road
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Maryland
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Dianne
Is he getting a quality sleep? Usually when a bird is grumpy that can be the cause. Quality sleep has no sounds and a night light for about 12 hours. Like in the wild - roosting at dusk and waking at dawn.
 

Karen

Biking along the boulevard
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I had to teach my bird how to play by playing with the toys myself and I had to start small, very small. The first thing he agreed to touch with his beak was a twisted piece of paper and a straw.

If he likes his treat toy I would try adding to it.
 

Lynn L.

Meeting neighbors
Joined
4/8/19
Messages
60
Location
MN
Real Name
Lynn
Any other thoughts on how to encourage/teach a bird to play? I have a rescue CAG. He's starting to settle in and seems bored sometimes. He's learned to forage and I'm upping the difficulty there but he doesn't have any interest in toys. He does like to chew up a soft rubber mat I have in front of my kitchen sink. Could I use toys that are like stress balls for him to chew up?
 

Fuzzy

Rollerblading along the road
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Agree with teaching him to play. I had to teach my Orange-wing, Ollie, to play. Started off with really small toys that were easy to destroy... I strung things like natural coloured balsa wood, wooden beads, leather triangles, bitty bagels, woven finger traps, etc on strips of leather and tied them to the side of the cage so they didn't move too much. As he caught on, I swapped the balsa wood for natural pine, then gradually made them bigger, began to introduce colour and gradually hung bigger toys from the roof of his cage. Throughout this progression, I began to reinforce his playing with attention. I would copy his body language and pretend to creep up on him zig zagging. Anything to get him excited, responding and playing. Here is an early pic of him playing with a small toy on the side of his cage reinforced by my OTT reactions to him. He was still cage bound at this time...



Progressed to these toys (still cage bound)...

 

Lynn L.

Meeting neighbors
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60
Location
MN
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Lynn
Where do you get the strips of leather?
 
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