My new Caique has abandonment issues

[DocAndAppa]

Hi all! I'm new here as a junior bird owner after newly getting my beautiful five year old Caique, Appa. I bought him from the previous owner, the owner of the local bird shop, who found out she had two male Caiques so she had to sell one. I have about a month of working from home where I am able to be beside him during most of the day, only having some events or arrangements during the evening when I assume (hope) he is asleep anyway.

Appa's in many ways the joyous, loving bird that I wanted him to be. He loves attention and sitting on my shoulder getting scritches, and is a very sweet bird. However, since getting him yesterday his clinginess has led to some pretty frustrating abandonment issues. To start when I leave the room he generally immediately started screeching, even when I just go to the bathroom. I've learned that to discourage this I need to simply wait until he's quiet or makes a different sound before I return, which he learned very very quickly. Now when I leave he (generally) just beeps like a squaky toy.

The more pressing issue is that now he has gotten more used to the environment and gotten more confidence navigating it, he has a tendency to fly after me if he's out of his cage. When I went to the bathroom this morning he flew after me and got onto the kitchen cabinets, a place where I generally don't want him to be (or in the kitchen in general). I know bad behaviours need to be punished with ignoring him, but if he's around kitchen appliances and cords it feels hard to. The same thing happens when he goes to my pc and starts pulling the keys off my keyboard (in the future I will have to put it away if he's out of his cage). I want to interrupt the behaviour, but at the same time, I don't want to reinforce this behaviour by giving him attention.

I also worry that, should I leave for errands such as groceries or, more worryingly, work or evening activities of several hours, he will just start screaming all throughout the day.

Another smaller issue is his usage of the cage. I've bought him a beautiful Venus Strong cage that is spacious and filled with toys, but all he does the entire day is sit at the top and stare at me, occasionally whistling. For the first day he wouldn't even go down for food, though that seems to be slowly changing. When I put on music he seems to be slightly less obsessed with me. Now it's primarily a routine of sitting around and occasionally climbing down for food. He's not touched any of the toys and hasn't even explored half of the cage available to him, and it feels like it's primarily this way because he doesn't want to move further away from me towards the far side of the cage.

My question is just essentially how to best deal with this. I'm anxious and afraid to leave the home at this point because he might become very noisy, which in an apartment might lead to issues with neighbors. Do I just simply need to leave for a few hours so he can get used to being alone? Or can I in some way build up to it? Also, how do I stop him flying after me, and how do teach him to play with toys or have fun on his own? Is it even possible for a bird who is otherwise used to having other birds around?

 

[DocAndAppa]

As an aside, after eating he tends to do a headbanging-like motion with his mouth open. It seems like he's trying to clear his throat or something of the sort though no sound comes out, and he does this generally regardless of which food he ate. Could these be digestion issues that I need to worry about, or is this just part of the normal digestion process?

 

[DocAndAppa]

The only real way I can get him to explore his cage is by playing caique sounds on speaker, which makes him get very active and explorative in a way that I feel almost comes across as sad, looking for his mates. I find it unsettles me to see him like this, although it does distract him from seeking my attention.

 

[orphansparrow]

My guy has "separation anxiety" when I leave as well. This began after the death of his flock mate. He screams the whole time I'm gone, or so I'm told. If I call my partner during the day, there Duckie is screaming in the background.
I switch his toys out often, put on "Bird TV" - basically any YouTube video of bird sounds or jungle sounds or whatever...
I don't know if there's an easy solution. Birds are flock animals and need their "people." Someone else might have better insight than I do. I'm actively looking on adding a flock mate right now for this very reason. I don't think - in general - people can give parrots everything they need without a bird friend.
You could possibly ask a friend or someone you trust to go hang out with him for an hour or so in the middle of the day or if you're gone for some period of time.

As for cords and household hazards I think we just need to bird proof as well as we can. You're right, you can't ignore them when they're in the middle of a dangerous situation. You can just try to prevent it as well as you can. When I'm cooking in the kitchen with the burners on, Duckie can't be with me. He gets so interested in what's cooking, he'd like to fly right in the middle of the frying pan to check it out.

Maybe someone else will have tips for you..