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My bird loves chewing my shirts but not her toys

1/2MoonMom

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So I am stuck. My half moon conure easily gets fixated on fabric that is on me but won't chew on her toys. She doesn't destroy my clothes and I don't mind her chewing on my pants drawstring or something while I read, but even when I have cut fabric off of the clothes she likes to chew she still won't touch it if it's not on me! I have tried clicker training her and rewarding for interactions with toys outside of the cage, (anytime she throws, bites, or goes up to a toy on her own) but this isn't translating too well to when she is in the cage. She basically will peck at the toy once and if there's no easily accessible treat it's back to pacing and calling. Sometimes, after an hour or two she will settle down and I notice that some of the toys have been chewed. I feel like the issue is that I can't seem to get from the step of her simply touching or pecking a toy for a treat to fully chewing something up for a treat. I have tried withholding the treat until I get longer interactions, even showing her what to do (ripping, throwing, crumpling etc,) but she doesn't get it. She will immediately get bored and fly to my shoulder or some other iffy behavior (biting).

I am concerned that my bird is becoming more bored now that I am going back to work in my office in person, and have noticed that she has been extremely nippy with me lately, which seems to be either hormones and weather or her increased boredom.

The one toy I have success with always is putting nutiberries in the stick ball toys, but because of her hormonal behaviors, I am hoping to figure out a way to have her start enjoying shredding things without needing a big treat involved. I KNOW she likes to chew because she does it with my clothes. I just can't figure out how to get her interested in doing this to toys.....

...so I am wondering if there is anything I can do to encourage the love of tearing toys apart for the heck of it! I think it will help her aggressive behaviors ...

How do I get to the next step?

Thanks :)


P.S. for anyone wondering what kind of toys I have tried, I have wood blocks (she sometimes chews on them), bird kabobs, little boxes with paper shreds in them (she won't touch them), and the stick balls you can put treats in. I also have some preening toys made of straws and other kinds of shredded papers/wood pieces as well as rope and block toys that hang. No plastics. She likes to chew up veggies when she is out of the cage with me, but doesn't seem to touch them inside the cage.
 

Mizzely

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Have you tried having toy parts or foot toys next to you to offer her instead of your clothes? When she chews the fabric, redirect her with something preferable.

What all materials have you tried? Sometimes if something is too hard they will give up easily. Balsa, yucca, cork, etc are good starting places!

And, lots of birds only want to play if there is food involved! For them, try to incorporate their pellets or a small amount of seeds into their toys. You can tuck them inbetween toy parts, or you can get dedicated foraging toys that you can refill.
 

FeatheredM

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You know, sometimes there a toy in their cage I just leave in there. And they won't touch it for months, then out of a sudden, it like one of their favorite toy. So don't give up. birbs ARE weird
 

1/2MoonMom

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Have you tried having toy parts or foot toys next to you to offer her instead of your clothes? When she chews the fabric, redirect her with something preferable.

What all materials have you tried? Sometimes if something is too hard they will give up easily. Balsa, yucca, cork, etc are good starting places!

And, lots of birds only want to play if there is food involved! For them, try to incorporate their pellets or a small amount of seeds into their toys. You can tuck them inbetween toy parts, or you can get dedicated foraging toys that you can refill.
Thanks for these tips! She loves chewing on straws and paper when I am holding it, it just goes untouched in the cage :/ I'm not sure what the hangup is...

Perhaps if I limit cage out time for the time being just so I can only have her out when I can concentrate on redirecting? Usually when I am working on something on my laptop or reading I can't really attend to her actively. I hate to downgrade to 1 or 2 hours, but perhaps a concentrated 1 hour is better than 4 of her just chewing on my shirt or sitting on my shoulder!
 

Mizzely

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Does she have a place outside of the cage that she can sit besides on you?
 

1/2MoonMom

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Does she have a place outside of the cage that she can sit besides on you?
Yes! I have a window perch that she has slowly grown to become comfortable with, and sometimes flies there to sit without prompting! Sometimes she will sit on the top of the chair while I work, but although we train daily to have her fly to those spots and there's always rewards there, she usually wants to climb back on my shoulder as soon as her available treats are eaten. She's a clingy one! :)
 
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