Otis&Ford
Moving in
- Joined
- 10/18/20
- Messages
- 5
Hello! I brought home a 9yr old Meyer's parrot called Rambo on Tuesday. He was originally rescued from a home where he was loved but on a very poor diet and absolutely raging with hormones. The rescuer is a bird behaviourist and immediately got his diet converted on to pellets and some veg (he's very picky apparently) and he immediately cooled down and started basic training with her. She's honestly done a great job as when I brought him home he wasn't the least bit nervous - just wanted to be able to see me on the whole drive home and show me his dance moves.
Obviously I have taken her advice on settling him in - we set up his cage, allowed him to move in to it on his own from his travel cage, and then have given him a few days there without letting him out so that he could get used to the room and to our comings and goings.
His preferred treat is walnut, so I have cut teeny tiny pieces of walnut and used these for clicker training in the cage - he can target, dance and wave already (and his rescuer trained him to recall, but I'm going to go ahead and assume that we'll need to build that trust for ourselves at some point).
I thought I was doing really well. I got a little chomp on the finger on the second day because I was handing him a little piece of walnut and he decided to give my finger a squeeze instead, but I figured that was more of a curiosity thing than a real bite. After that I was a little more careful about how I offered the walnut and just carried on with targeting from outside the cage.
He also was very keen to spend time near me - when I sat outside the cage he would shuffle down to be as close to me as possible, and today he was asking for scratches and I was able to do that without any hint of biting.
Soooooo... I decided to let him out of his cage (which I think was fine) BUT I didn't really have a good plan of how to handle that first interaction, so the I opened the door and he came straight out on to my arm (rescuer had mentioned he wasn't keen on hands and I didn't want to test that.).
...and then from there he climbed up my arm on to my shoulder and I realised I had done a very silly thing! He seemed very happy and calm, and I think that lulled me in to a false sense of security because I thought I'd just leave him there and let him relax with me for a while. Everything seemed fine, I was speaking to him a lot, then turning my head to speak to my husband, then turning to speak to Rambo again etc etc...
So I got a massive shock when I turned, through I saw him taking up the position to do a poop and said "Hello! are you going to do a poop?" and he hissed and lunged at my mouth and latched on to my bottom lip.
Oh my word, I felt like such an idiot! I just stayed still whilst he flapped and hissed and at some point he let go of my lip and chomped on my thumb instead and eventually let go of that and just flapped and hiss whilst I slowly pulled my hood over my head for protection. Anyway, I went and got a little piece of walnut and asked him for a step up on to my arm - which he did very sweetly and then stepped him down on to a perch in his cage for a second walnut piece before wobbling off to the bathroom to dab my bleeding lip and have a bit of a think.
I mostly feel like a fool because I went WAAAAAY too fast - spurred on by how sweet and friendly and curious he has been - and because I should have been far better prepared and had a plan in place for interactions.
I'd love to say 'Lesson Learned!' but I'll probably get chomped a few more times along the road as I think he's quite an emotional little man and although he is sweet and curious, he also knows that we are strangers and he can't possibly trust us yet. I have also never owned anything bigger than a cockatiel before, so the punishment for failure has never been this painful!
I feel like a real parrot owner now! LOL. Battle scars and all.
Obviously I have taken her advice on settling him in - we set up his cage, allowed him to move in to it on his own from his travel cage, and then have given him a few days there without letting him out so that he could get used to the room and to our comings and goings.
His preferred treat is walnut, so I have cut teeny tiny pieces of walnut and used these for clicker training in the cage - he can target, dance and wave already (and his rescuer trained him to recall, but I'm going to go ahead and assume that we'll need to build that trust for ourselves at some point).
I thought I was doing really well. I got a little chomp on the finger on the second day because I was handing him a little piece of walnut and he decided to give my finger a squeeze instead, but I figured that was more of a curiosity thing than a real bite. After that I was a little more careful about how I offered the walnut and just carried on with targeting from outside the cage.
He also was very keen to spend time near me - when I sat outside the cage he would shuffle down to be as close to me as possible, and today he was asking for scratches and I was able to do that without any hint of biting.
Soooooo... I decided to let him out of his cage (which I think was fine) BUT I didn't really have a good plan of how to handle that first interaction, so the I opened the door and he came straight out on to my arm (rescuer had mentioned he wasn't keen on hands and I didn't want to test that.).
...and then from there he climbed up my arm on to my shoulder and I realised I had done a very silly thing! He seemed very happy and calm, and I think that lulled me in to a false sense of security because I thought I'd just leave him there and let him relax with me for a while. Everything seemed fine, I was speaking to him a lot, then turning my head to speak to my husband, then turning to speak to Rambo again etc etc...
So I got a massive shock when I turned, through I saw him taking up the position to do a poop and said "Hello! are you going to do a poop?" and he hissed and lunged at my mouth and latched on to my bottom lip.
Oh my word, I felt like such an idiot! I just stayed still whilst he flapped and hissed and at some point he let go of my lip and chomped on my thumb instead and eventually let go of that and just flapped and hiss whilst I slowly pulled my hood over my head for protection. Anyway, I went and got a little piece of walnut and asked him for a step up on to my arm - which he did very sweetly and then stepped him down on to a perch in his cage for a second walnut piece before wobbling off to the bathroom to dab my bleeding lip and have a bit of a think.
I mostly feel like a fool because I went WAAAAAY too fast - spurred on by how sweet and friendly and curious he has been - and because I should have been far better prepared and had a plan in place for interactions.
I'd love to say 'Lesson Learned!' but I'll probably get chomped a few more times along the road as I think he's quite an emotional little man and although he is sweet and curious, he also knows that we are strangers and he can't possibly trust us yet. I have also never owned anything bigger than a cockatiel before, so the punishment for failure has never been this painful!
I feel like a real parrot owner now! LOL. Battle scars and all.
