Hey people! I'm new here, and was just wondering if I could ask for some advice/help.
I've got two cockatiels, a male and a female. Which my family got out of a pet store roughly 18 months ago, they were about 6 months old. They spent the first few months in a big cage and started getting used to my family and were doing ok.
After a while my mother found a really big aviary for them and from then on they lived in the garden for close to a year. Whilst they absolutely loved it and had made plenty of friends with the local birds who would come and sit next to the aviary and chat away with them, they didn't get as much human contact and so got a bit feral. I have moved out now, and they can unfortunately no longer stay at my parent's house so I have taken them with me. So... I want to get them trained up.
They already seem quite keen as the male whistles at me a lot and makes kissing noises. Especially when I'm doing the washing up. On a good day, they will eat millet out of my hand and don't seem hugely phased by my hands. And on a bad day my hands are the devil even if I have millet in them (I'm sure a side effect of being pet shop birds). If someone could help me with a training schedule that would be super helpful. I often get the "just do stuff" response from people, but there are so many questions. How long should each session be? How many sessions a day? If they are being skittish should I just come back another time/day? Where do I progress to next after they consistently take millet from me?
If someone could do an absolute knowledge dump on me with some instruction on what each step of the process looks like, I would be so grateful.
I've got two cockatiels, a male and a female. Which my family got out of a pet store roughly 18 months ago, they were about 6 months old. They spent the first few months in a big cage and started getting used to my family and were doing ok.
After a while my mother found a really big aviary for them and from then on they lived in the garden for close to a year. Whilst they absolutely loved it and had made plenty of friends with the local birds who would come and sit next to the aviary and chat away with them, they didn't get as much human contact and so got a bit feral. I have moved out now, and they can unfortunately no longer stay at my parent's house so I have taken them with me. So... I want to get them trained up.
They already seem quite keen as the male whistles at me a lot and makes kissing noises. Especially when I'm doing the washing up. On a good day, they will eat millet out of my hand and don't seem hugely phased by my hands. And on a bad day my hands are the devil even if I have millet in them (I'm sure a side effect of being pet shop birds). If someone could help me with a training schedule that would be super helpful. I often get the "just do stuff" response from people, but there are so many questions. How long should each session be? How many sessions a day? If they are being skittish should I just come back another time/day? Where do I progress to next after they consistently take millet from me?
If someone could do an absolute knowledge dump on me with some instruction on what each step of the process looks like, I would be so grateful.