I have wanted a Caique for over a year but none were available in my local area. About three months ago, while getting food for my other birds (cockatiel, green cheek, parrotlet) we came across a baby Caique. We bought her, named her Cookie, and we have loved her, but recently especially we have wrestled with our decision.
Reading the good, bad, and ugly was the final determinator.
We have two kids, 7 and 9. They, their friends, and our family are over at our house a lot. We are very social people. We have never had any issues with our current birds, although the green cheek can get a little nippy and is extremely aggressive towards Cookie. Cookie is always out when people are over, and we have friends, family, and kids handle her, giving her treats, asking her to step up, and giving her head rubs to get her used to people, trying to avoid the aggression many of you with Caiques have described.
Cookie is doing really good so far, she surfs on shirts and has put a couple holes in them, which isn't a big deal, and every once in a while her play bite is a little hard, giving little bit too hard of a bite to necks, and cheeks when she gets excited, but we have been working on that and she responds quite well to trainings. She loves being out of the cage, and calls for us if we leave even the immediate area she is in. She learns unbelievably fast, its amazing. She is trained to poo in the toilet when she comes out of the cage, she is trained wear an avian fashions flight suit and she waddles around the house in it with no problems, and she is trained to step up without using her beak first. I would have to say so far she has been absolutely wonderful, and we deeply care about her.
We are unable to keep all of our birds though, and we are adopting out our parrotlets to my sister, and we have to make a decision about either keeping Cookie, and adopting out our green cheek Skittles to a close family friend or returning Cookie and keeping Skittles.
We were all but set with keeping Cookie, and then I read the good the bad, and the ugly and the horror stories in there are absolutely terrifying.
I can't imagine her going through these changes many of you describe and getting aggressive to the point of your descriptions. I cannot risk my daughter having a scar on her face because of a jekyle and hyde bird. It seems like at the two to three year mark a massive change takes place that is so unpredictable and uncontrollable it becomes a safety risk for families with kids.
We will be so sad to see her go, but my children's safety comes first, and I cannot risk keeping a pet that appears to be almost certain to have issues with physical aggression towards humans, and which is so unpredictable. In almost every single post on the good, bad, and ugly there has been a description of very aggressive behaviors. To protect my family, we will unfortunately be returning our Cookie today, which breaks our hearts.
Thank you for listening, and thank you for you blunt honesty describing this species unpredictable and almost certain aggressive nature as it reaches maturity.
Reading the good, bad, and ugly was the final determinator.
We have two kids, 7 and 9. They, their friends, and our family are over at our house a lot. We are very social people. We have never had any issues with our current birds, although the green cheek can get a little nippy and is extremely aggressive towards Cookie. Cookie is always out when people are over, and we have friends, family, and kids handle her, giving her treats, asking her to step up, and giving her head rubs to get her used to people, trying to avoid the aggression many of you with Caiques have described.
Cookie is doing really good so far, she surfs on shirts and has put a couple holes in them, which isn't a big deal, and every once in a while her play bite is a little hard, giving little bit too hard of a bite to necks, and cheeks when she gets excited, but we have been working on that and she responds quite well to trainings. She loves being out of the cage, and calls for us if we leave even the immediate area she is in. She learns unbelievably fast, its amazing. She is trained to poo in the toilet when she comes out of the cage, she is trained wear an avian fashions flight suit and she waddles around the house in it with no problems, and she is trained to step up without using her beak first. I would have to say so far she has been absolutely wonderful, and we deeply care about her.
We are unable to keep all of our birds though, and we are adopting out our parrotlets to my sister, and we have to make a decision about either keeping Cookie, and adopting out our green cheek Skittles to a close family friend or returning Cookie and keeping Skittles.
We were all but set with keeping Cookie, and then I read the good the bad, and the ugly and the horror stories in there are absolutely terrifying.
I can't imagine her going through these changes many of you describe and getting aggressive to the point of your descriptions. I cannot risk my daughter having a scar on her face because of a jekyle and hyde bird. It seems like at the two to three year mark a massive change takes place that is so unpredictable and uncontrollable it becomes a safety risk for families with kids.
We will be so sad to see her go, but my children's safety comes first, and I cannot risk keeping a pet that appears to be almost certain to have issues with physical aggression towards humans, and which is so unpredictable. In almost every single post on the good, bad, and ugly there has been a description of very aggressive behaviors. To protect my family, we will unfortunately be returning our Cookie today, which breaks our hearts.
Thank you for listening, and thank you for you blunt honesty describing this species unpredictable and almost certain aggressive nature as it reaches maturity.
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