Training with 2 Birds?

[Jenna64]

Hi everyone!
Very soon I will be getting two budgies! I've been doing a lot of reading on parrots, especially on training. I was wondering, if you have two birds in a cage would you tame and train them any differently than if you had one? Like would you take one out of the cage, so you could focus on the other? It doesn't seem like a good idea to move a untaimed bird, from its cage. I think that would cause stress for the bird, but with two in one cage would the birds be confused? How will the birds know which one I am talking to, or should I train them both at the same time? Can anyone who has tamed and trained multiple birds in the same cage tell me how they did it? Thanks!

 

[Rain Bow]

@Lady Jane
@finchly

 

[Begone]

As I believe that the cage is my birds private place I never train them in their.
But I do train my birds at same time. They learn and understand that the one you have eye contact/focus on is the one you train. (I use that when I learning them new things)
And I often just teach one of them, the other one will study and learn from the other one.

 

[JoJo&Loki]

Congrats! Budgies are just the sweetest, silliest little souls

I have 2 young budgies, but can’t really answer your question as we got Jojo back in April and didn’t get Loki until June. We already had a good bond with Jo when Loki came so it definitely makes working with Loki easier *but* I will say Loki still prefers hanging with Jo to us. Jojo is still very sociable with us though. I like your plan to get both together so it won’t be one lonely budgie (also you don’t have to quarantine if getting them together- I hated that part!)
I’m interested in what the more experienced folks say- I think the duo will have more confidence since they’re not alone but it may be harder to train individually.

Good luck to you! I’m sure you’ll have a lot of fun with your new babies, and please post pics

 

[Monica]

Feel free to check out these two threads.

An Experiment with Budgies

I used to own 5 adult, flighted budgies. Four females, one male. None tame. The male and two females (given to me as males) were second hand birds, where-as the other two hens had come from a breeder, but both were older birds (perhaps 1+ years old?) March of 2007 (when the flock was...

forums.avianavenue.com

"Self-Tamed" Cockatiels

This thread technically begins from another thread http://forums.avianavenue.com/budgie-boulevard/45246-experiment-budgies.html I can't recall when, but sometime after I had been feeding the budgies by hand, one of my hand-raised but not worked with tiels (at the time) was also interested in...

forums.avianavenue.com

 

[finchly]

I have done both, trained together and separately. When together, I just say that one’s name and step over directly in front of her. I ignore the one I’m not talking to— they catch on pretty quick.

when separate I make sure the other one can see what is being done— watching is a great way to learn! Except whoops I just went back and saw you have budgies, with those I have to work out of sight of the 2nd one. Maybe it’s just my pair.

 

[Jenna64]

Thanks for the replies! They are super helpful! I'll try training them together and see how it goes. But is there a way to seperate them for training that wouldn't cause untamed birds stress?

 

[Gribouille]

I would train them in the cage indistinctly to begin with. One of them will be more courageous than the other and try, get a reward, try again, then the other will be encouraged to try to get a treat too.
I didn't try it myself, since I already had 2 untamed birds when I tried to train the third one. I did try to train him during quarantine, so he wasn't bonded to the others. I took him to the bathroom for training, and did so with all my birds since. Bathroom is a nice, small place to get to know each other, the bird doesn't have many places to escape and it is easy to bird-proof and clean up.
We trained the basics like sitting on my finger, and getting him to feel safe with me. Trained climbing from one finger to the other, tried to teach them to talk (but none of them ever did) and cuddle.
My last bird I trained more than that. He wasn't interested in the other birds so it was easy to get his attention, but I still trained him separately (in the kitchen, where his cage was for quarantine) while the others are in the living room. He is there too now but the kitchen is "his" room, he spends most of his time there so we still train there. The other birds only fly in occasionally.