Guest Monique Posted July 6, 2007 Share Posted July 6, 2007 My birds "punishment" is generally to be removed from the situation in which he was being naughty. For biting I generally do a little wobble with my hand, I don't have a lot of problem with it ... at the moment anyway . When it comes to birds I do not believe in very assertive correction, but rather you must try to mold the correct behavior. We are raising a wild bird, not domesticated. We will never be, and should never be their "Masters" but rather their trusted friends who will keep them safe, healthy and as happy as possible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CeasarsDad Posted July 6, 2007 Share Posted July 6, 2007 dblhelix wrote: I certainly reconize there are negative behaviors that need to be dealt with through mild punishment. Punishment that presents in averse consequences to the parrot should not be used as they will back fire on your goal in the long run. Some recommended techniques to deal with unwnated behaviors are: -evaluate the problem to decide on best action -ask why is the bird doing this? -consider changing the behavior a positive challenge -realize there is often not a "quick fix" -remove the bird for a short time -ignore behavior -divert birds attention when unwanted behavior is presented -minimize your reaction to unwanted behaviors -identify a positive alternative. That is, find something for your bird to do more, not less. There are many more. The main goal is to ensure that even when intervening on a "bad" behavior, make the ratio of positive to negative interactions high. An environment rich with praise, attention and trust will build a better relationship for you both over the long run. Birds generally do not respond well to bullying. Is it just me or is this guy brillant? :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Talon Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 He's very good! We are lucky to have him in our family!! Excellent Advice!! {Communicate-0002011B} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Lidia Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 Monique wrote: We are raising a wild bird, not domesticated. We will never be, and should never be their "Masters" but rather their trusted friends who will keep them safe, healthy and as happy as possible. Absolutely spot on, dblhelix IS brilliant, but so is Monique! Kudos (and karma to Monique). {Love-0002011D} Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
judygram Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 At least we have one brilliant man on the forum, glad he is part of our family. Karma coming your way.:kiss: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dblhelix Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 aww, thanks everyone! :blush: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CeasarsDad Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 judygram wrote: At least we have one brilliant man on the forum, glad he is part of our family. Karma coming your way.:kiss: Ouch.... that hurt.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
judygram Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 Just a joke CD, just a joke, you know me better than that I hope.:unsure: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hveusnthbrige Posted July 7, 2007 Author Share Posted July 7, 2007 Yes I agree, dblhelix knows how to have an intelligent debate on a touchy subject. I am enjoying the ideas so far people are providing, its a good topic that anyone can improve on and refine constantly. I had forgotten to mention the wobble "earthquake" trick for when a bite occurs to distract the bird by making it unbalanced. This method did not work with my male tiel though; he absolutely hated it and would bite again almost immediately. That's when I tried ignoring him after he bit me but then he figured out that biting got me to put him back in his cage so his signal to put me away was bite me. Then I tried laddering and bam! problem solved almost immediately. I thought about it today while at work and tried to dissolve behaviours down to the core cause. I came up with the bird is trying to convey its message to you! Well obviously! Looking through his eyes and um, standing on his perch..?? I think of the parrots vocabulary, his repertoire of body language and his current request. -"How can I use those 2 communication methods to tell Daddy that I want to be left alone and have a nap. Hmm, I know, I'll put my foot up and tuck my head down, if that doesnt work and he comes at me I'll growl at him, and if he tries to pick me up, I'll bite him. I think he should understand that well enough. Seems simple and obvious to me!" So really this is what I think it boils down to is getting that communication across. The same goes for us.. How can I get the bird to understand me? Well if he screams I'll put him back in his cage and ignore him.. but then everytime he wants back in his cage he'll use the commonly understood screaming. The parrot doesnt scream because he's being bad, he thinks screaming means 'put me away'. So instead screaming is fixed with a time out cage, in my mind, this makes me feel like the bird has been appropriately communicated the effects of screaming(could be anything though, screaming is just 1 example used here) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CeasarsDad Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 Well folks.. looks like we have another Genius.. Good post Geoff.. :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hveusnthbrige Posted July 7, 2007 Author Share Posted July 7, 2007 I feel the need to reach the level of genius.. I want to excel and having sound, solid debates is the way to do it! Sorry to those who enjoy cute, silly conversations.. I'm a big fan of getting dirty and poking the controversial stuff. :evil: =========================================== Oh Edit!: I was going to share my advice I gave a friend on dealing with her brothers' Blue & Gold. Stewie has a gender preference toward males because women typically fail his "lunge test". Jen visits her brothers house every few months. Stewie is a very sweet bird when in the company of his Daddy and never bites him or causes any trouble. For those that don't know of the Macaw lunge test, it's where the parrot waits for you to come a little closer then holds its wings out a tad and fluffs out all its feathers and abruptly jerks its body at you to see your reaction. If you jump back away from it, it knows it's above you in the hierarchy. If you stay still and dont even blink, it knows not to mess with you. Anyway, Jen failed the lunge test on many occasions in the past. Stewie had zero respect for her and would hiss and bite and lunge at her all the time. Well one day she had to care for him so she msn'd me asking what she could do when he had to be picked up and moved as Stewie has no cage an has free reign of their house. First I told her you need to speak it's language.. lunge back! So she walked over, stood in front of Stewie and then lunged forward at him pointing her finger at him and warned him in a nasty voice some idle threats. To her suprise, he responded to her lunge by leaning back and cowering down. Next I told her, you need to speak in a military voice and demand and a step up in a way that makes the parrot think if he doesnt do it, he will never see Daddy ever again. So she issued the step up command from a distance to begin and then put her arm up to him and demanded him to step up. Stewie got on her arm without one slice of hesitation and waited calmly for his next instruction just as he's trained. Shortly after they sat on the couch together and Stewie was throwing out all his words at Jen in every effort to impress her. All she had to do was be the boss.<br><br>Post edited by: hveusnthbrige, at: 2007/07/07 04:42 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Talon Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 That's a cute story! Thanks for sharing it with us.:lol: :lol: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
judygram Posted July 7, 2007 Share Posted July 7, 2007 Thats some sound advice there Geoff, some of those ideas I am going to put to use. You seem to know what you are talking about and that is what we need is good advice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CeasarsDad Posted July 8, 2007 Share Posted July 8, 2007 hveusnthbrige wrote: Sorry to those who enjoy cute, silly conversations.. I'm a big fan of getting dirty and poking the controversial stuff. :evil: Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.. Cute and silly conversations are still allowed here.. :P :P Cd<br><br>Post edited by: CeasarsDad, at: 2007/07/08 01:24 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danmcq Posted July 8, 2007 Share Posted July 8, 2007 Excellent information dblhelix and Geoff! These are being stored in my Biting repository!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hveusnthbrige Posted July 8, 2007 Author Share Posted July 8, 2007 CD you're a big softie!:blush: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greylover Posted July 8, 2007 Share Posted July 8, 2007 Also my punishment is taking his treats out and give him pellets and no seeds then he has learnt his lesson and keep on dong that adn for me it is working!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hveusnthbrige Posted July 10, 2007 Author Share Posted July 10, 2007 Another thing I do with my tiels is to separate them if 1 is being bad. While they fight and nip over who eats when, or who sleeps where, or who plays with what toy, if they arent together the world might as well be coming to an end. So if they start doing something like screaming or fighting... one gets taken out of the room. That makes them scream more, but when put back together they get really quiet and thankful for the companions' return. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CeasarsDad Posted July 10, 2007 Share Posted July 10, 2007 hveusnthbrige wrote: CD you're a big softie!:blush: Oh you have no idea just how soft I can be.. BUT.. there is an evil side of me few people ever see, and that's a good thing.. A side of me that even I hate. :evil: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hveusnthbrige Posted July 10, 2007 Author Share Posted July 10, 2007 Hmm, whats next on the list of 'birdy spankings'... Ahh yes, putting a screaming bird in a dark room/closet. This in my opinion is horribly useless. The problem I see with it is confusion on the part of the bird. The dark room or closet to us represents a simple time out area. To the bird it might be on par with a dungeon, at least thats what comes to mind for me. Dungeons don't teach anything except torture. It can't escape, no amount of screaming results in rescue and it can't see. A prey animal that can't see will instinctively panic. Panic is the most powerful barrier to training. Therefore the bird will not learn. On the other hand.. a prison does generally successfully teach a person a lesson; or at the bare minimum to spend more time and thought on how not to get caught haha.. Wait a minute, how come that last sentence makes sooooo much sense to me when thinking about my birds... hmmmm:whistle: A timeout cage, like a prison is not dark, it has water to drink and it is also familiar.. at least to disobedient birds:lol: . It causes bordem and from my teachings the three most effective, core training tools are amusement, effort and bordem. Amusement causes reward, effort causes frustration and well, bordem speaks for itself. Like a child standing in the corner or being grounded for a week. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Talon Posted July 10, 2007 Share Posted July 10, 2007 Interesting thought to ponder............:huh: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Lidia Posted July 10, 2007 Share Posted July 10, 2007 Geoff, I don't know if you're joking or teasing, or what. If neither, then I think what you're propounding is basically cruel. I don't care for it and by extension, if I'm reading you right, you. Lidia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hveusnthbrige Posted July 11, 2007 Author Share Posted July 11, 2007 Lidia, I'm not joking or teasing. If you decide not to discipline your pet thats up to you. But a 4 year old child without guidance might aswell be the offspring of the devil. Both my dogs are extremely obedient and they didn't become that way all by random chance. Guests in our home consistently comment on how amazing our pets are and how they wished their animals were similar. I always tell them, animals do not educate themselves to the behaviours we prefer. They must be taught and you must teach them to enjoy these behaviours. I see a need to punish poor behaviour. It's how I was raised and looking back now and comparing how some other people act at my age or younger; I'm glad my parents did what they did. Yet birds are different from people in that they do not understand punishment like I mentioned in my first post on this topic. So I arrive at the purpose of this entire topic: 1, to share peoples methods on how they punish or discipline and 2, to attempt to educate on-lookers that practice the poor methods into trying less invasive methods. Nowhere would the purpose ever be cruelty nor is it implied. But I guess as they say, that it's all in the eye of the beholder.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Lidia Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Geoff, My grey is well behaved, and has boundaries he must observe. I do not punish him. He is not a child. He is a bird. He does not understand abstract concepts such as 'punishment'. However much you wish to anthropomorphise him, he does not understand what you are doing. Your methods are cruel and ill-judged and not suited to the raising of intelligent animals who think like animals, not like human children. This is not a personal attack on you. This is definitely an attack on your ill-conceived and cruel methodologies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dblhelix Posted July 11, 2007 Share Posted July 11, 2007 Maybe we are caught up in the word "punishment" here. It seems in general people are looking for ways to condition behavior for the result they would like to acheive and/or mitigate bad behavior. To that end this discussion can be useful. Regarding the concept of actual "punishment", I have to agree with Lidia's remarks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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