Michael learned what he knows from Bird Tricks. Bird Tricks learned what they know from out-dated sources and information online and construed and twisted that information. Bird Tricks are sales people. They are not actual behaviorists/trainers - although I will admit that they have gotten *BETTER*! I remember when BT was advertising a video... "barreling over cliffs, swimming with sharks!" Oooooh! So dangerous! One, they were in a helicopter. Sorry, not impressed! Two, they were swimming with blacktip reef sharks.... they might as well have been swimming with nurse sharks... neither species pose a large risk to humans. The reason Bird Tricks was started? From what I could see, it was so that one of them could buy an expensive ring. It was all a marketing scheme that he bought from some other company. He then took terms that are used within the training community and gave them new names... target training? He calls it "stick training". Because he renamed these terms, he then says that the experts are "hiding these secrets" from you so you have to buy into their products but here, you spend more money from me and I'll teach you everything I know - and you can't find the "so called secrets" because he's using the incorrect terminology! If you search around, you can find where at least *THREE* other trainers talk about how BT was starving their birds into training.... (if those pages are still up...) and they even had one bird die potentially due to starvation... not to mention that they were taught free-flight for free, then turn around and charge their customers $8K or more? (when the original trainer doesn't even charge that much! and they were doing it wrong, even when they were taught the correct way to do it!)
And then here we have poor gullible Michael... who bought into BT... and followed BT... and in his book, he even recommends starving birds! Now, he doesn't call it starvation... but when a true behaviorist looked at one of his videos.... that trainer could tell that the poor bird was starving! An adult bird had reverted to baby behaviors. It's one thing for an adult bird to act like a baby because that behavior was encouraged... it's another when they aren't getting fed enough food and show other behaviors of starving. You do not need to underweight in order to be starving, either! There's weight management and food management. Weight management is basically using a bird's weight to determine their ability to train - then teaching the bird to train over that weight limit. This is a technique that is used a lot in falconry. Food management on the other hand is basically, instead of free-feeding a bird you change to 2 or 3 feedings a day, or maybe the bird has to forage for their food, or they work for their food through. They are not being starved and they enjoy the way they are fed. Two quotes below may better define what they are.
The goal is to maintain the highest weight possible and provide the greatest amount of food while maintaining the desired behavioral response. This practice is referred to as “weight management.”
Food management is defined by The International Association of Avian Trainers and Educators as managing when and how food is delivered, what food items are offered, and the ratio of food items offered to create desire to present behaviors for food reinforcers. (17) Micromanaging weights and diets for these species is typically not necessary and can put companion animals at risk due to improper guidance
Michael uses these two terms interchangeably and then uses weight management incorrectly.... rather than training *above* the desired weight, he trains below... because parrots are naturally slim in the wild.... because they fly a lot and food isn't so readily available. Keep in mind that starvation does not equate out to being underweight. Michael says that his birds are not underweight and they have been checked by a vet (who is not a behaviorist!) as healthy, so therefore they are not starving.
Take any overweight person who has plenty of body fat and not feed them for 48 hours!!!!!! You can't tell me that person is not starving simply because they are fat! If that person normally consumes, say, 6,000 calories a day (when the norm should be about 2,000 for an average, healthy adult) and put them on a strict diet and only allow them 800 calories a day, again, you can't tell me they aren't starving when their body is used to consuming more!
I don't think Michael recommends free-flight training anymore... not since he lost Truman, his cape parrot... he now uses harnesses!
It's better to keep a thread like this open, IMO, so people can learn who the *REAL* experts are out there! The ones who have a true understanding of behavior and training. The ones who have taken the classes and continue to expand their knowledge. BT and PW are not experts. They have an understanding of it, but have not yet truly grasped the entire concept. I also do not consider myself an expert by any means! I still have a lot to learn myself and would love to someday take the hands on training classes!
