Bonding, Taming, and Training
So you’ve brought your little one home and are ready to start the bonding experience. You’ve read online articles about bonding, you’ve watched YouTube videos on training and taming, and you’re ready to get started, but there’s something you need to know first. Not all birds will bond with you right away, and some may never bond with you. You also need to know that it takes great patience to develop this bond, it will not happen overnight. It could take days, weeks, months, and even years. This is why it’s important to buy from a breeder rather than a pet store, because most good breeders will spend the first few months of their lives working on bonding and training. It’s also very important to talk to them in a soft voice your first few days with them. They have been plucked from their homes and now are in a new environment with new sights, smells, and sounds.
Imagine if someone plucked you up from your home and placed you in the middle of a rainforest. You’d be seriously scared your first few days and nights there. You would hear all of these new animal sounds that might scare you, you’d have to find your way around your new environment, try to find food and water, and a place to sleep. You wouldn’t know what animal was friend or foe, so you’d likely run from everything. This is what it is like for a bird in a new home. Their family and friends are gone and they don’t know who you are or if they should trust you. They will have to explore their new surroundings and find food and water, and should you come upon them while they’re eating, they might get spooked and fly off thinking it’s not safe. This is why I let my birds settle in for a few days to a week, and hang plenty of millet on their cage for their first few days in it, because they will expend a lot of energy learning their new environment, and millet is a high energy food that will sustain them until they learn where their food bowl is and feel trusting enough to eat out of it.
I’ve gotten birds from other people who thought their birds were so mean and bit them so they stopped handling them. My girl Arya, for example. I was told that she was mean and the people got bit every time they went into her cage. So when I got her I let her adapt for a couple of days and then started the bonding process. When I first pulled her out, she bit me like crazy. And I let her. It doesn’t hurt that bad. But I let her bite and then I used positive reinforcement by saying gentle beak or soft beak and gently tapping her on the beak. It took about a day but she stopped biting. Then I worked on step up training with a stick and within a matter of three days I was able to get her to come and land on the stick from across the room. She still didn’t much like hands, but over the next two to three months she was slowly getting used to them. She had no problem getting on my shoulder and our bond grew very close over the first few weeks, but she still didn’t trust hands. After about two to three months I was using millet in my hands to entice her to come to them and she started trusting my hands more and more, and now when I go near her cage she’s ready to step up onto my fingers. She no longer fears hands and rarely bites me unless she’s going through a molt and that is normal behavior for molting.
Not all birds are that easy. My parakeet, Marley, came from a home that their thought of hand taming was grabbing him and holding him with a tight grip to keep him from flying off. That’s not bonding, nor is it hand taming. I have worked with him for over a year and he still is afraid of hands and will likely never be hand tamed. I have trained him to step up onto a stick and he doesn’t fly around and jump back from me when I come near his cage, but he still doesn’t trust my hands. He likely never will, and I have accepted that, although I will keep trying to earn his trust.
Every bird is different and should be approached differently depending on their previous experiences. Sometimes one technique that works for one bird won’t work for the next. That is why you need to learn several different techniques and create some on the fly. I was having a hard time bonding with one of my females so I used what one breeder said, and it’s worked like a charm, but it won’t work for birds like Marley.
There are many videos out there on YouTube with several different techniques. If you visit my Links page you can see a few resources, but below I’ll go over some of the techniques that I have used in bonding, taming, and training.
Also don’t fall for the line that only hand-fed babies will be tamed. I have heard stories from other people who have gotten hand-fed babies only to take a year or more to bond with. I have talked with several breeders and prefer to let the parents raise the babies for the health of the babies and work on taming afterwards. I would rather have a healthy bird that will live longer and take a little longer to tame than have an unhealthy bird that won’t get to a proper weight but on the off chance might be tamed. I believe it is just a gimmick people use to try and get more money by saying they are hand-fed tamed babies. If you are persistent about bonding and training, then it will pay off. If you just leave the bird in the cage and don’t interact with it, then they will revert to their wilder instincts and can resort to biting and more aggressive behaviors. But if you are not willing to put the time and effort in, then why bother getting a bird at all? They are not tinker toys that you can play with when you see fit, they are amazing living creatures that have such capabilities and are amazingly smart animals and need daily interactions to maintain their bond. But just remember, these aren’t domesticated animals like dogs, they are inherently wild and rely upon instinct. There is no guarantee how tame they will be, and even tamed ones can go through hormonal stages that kick in and their temperament completely changes. They can also be previously tamed from the breeder and change once they get to their new home. Nothing is guaranteed in life except for death and taxes, so keep that in mind when bringing a budgie home. They might not live up to your expectations, so your expectations might need to change.
Bonding/Taming:
One of my bonding techniques was told to me by a breeder that I trust. They said to get the bird in a hand towel and hold the bird up to your chest with the towel covering them. Slowly let the bird settle down. It might try to bite at first, or wriggle out of your grasp, but just keep the towel over them and they won’t go anywhere because they won’t fly where they can’t see. Go to a dark room where they can’t see their cage and just sit there with them on your chest and breathe. If they can see their cage, their instinct will be to fly right back to it for safety. It could take five to ten minutes before they calm down, and they will probably bite the towel during this process. It’s ok, let them. Just keep breathing slowly and talk softly to them. Let them get used to your scent, your sound, the feel of your chest going up and down as you breathe calmly. They will realize that you mean them no harm. Then slowly put your hand in there. They might try to nibble or bite it at first, but cup your hand over them. They will eventually cuddle up in your hand as they realize it is a safe space. I’ve even moved my hand away and they inch closer to it to cuddle in it. After several minutes of this you can slowly uncover the towel. You are still in the dark room so they shouldn’t fly off, but if they do, use the towel to get them again and repeat the process. Once they are staying still on your chest with the towel off you can work on getting them to step up onto your finger. but I’ll go more into step up training in the training section below. But prior to starting step up training, do this for several days to a week, two to three times a day. Just let them get used to you.
There are other bonding techniques you can use with this as well. When they are in their cage, slowly walk up to the cage. If you see them tense up or move away from you, stop. Stand still and let them calm down. Once they are calmed step away. A little bit later do the same thing. Keep repeating this until you can get closer to the cage without them flying or climbing away from you. Once you get to this point then you can start putting your hands on the cage. Do the same thing as before, if they pull away, stop and let them settle down then pull back. Keep doing this until you can place your hand anywhere on the cage without them moving away from you in fear.
Millet is your best friend during the taming process. Start by hanging some on the outside of the cage where they can reach and nibble on. It is like candy to them. Once they are eating it consistently, put some in your hand and hold it on the outside of the cage and keep real still. It might take some time, but eventually they should come up to you. Do this for a few days to a week and at various spots on the outside of the cage. Then you can open the door and hold it inside the cage and let them come to you. Also talk to them in a soft voice throughout this entire process. Let them get used to your voice. Use positive reinforcement and tell them they are a good boy/girl and use their name. For example “Good girl, Arya!” Once you get them consistently eating out of your hand, you can work on step up training, which will be discussed below in the training section. When they eat out of your hands that shows a definite sign of trust and is huge in the bonding process.
Some people say that you can trim/clip their wings during the bonding process to keep them from flying off. I prefer not to. That is my personal choice. You will have to do the research and see if clipping the wings is better for you. However I do not recommend clipping a baby’s wings, as they need to learn to fly and clipping their wings too early inhibits them from learning to fly correctly.
You will need to do these things daily to interact with your parrotlet so that you can grow this bond. I know some people say to open the cage doors and let them come to you, but I honestly have not had luck with doing that. Some people say to put your hand in the cage and let them come to you. I would literally sit with my hand in the cage until it went numb, and they never came to me, so that is why I used the above techniques instead. And remember, each bird is different. What works for one might not work for another, so do the research and find out what works best for your little birdie. The above worked for me, but there are dozens of techniques that you can use and try. Maybe your bird is one of those that will come to you as soon as you open the cage doors. If so, consider yourself lucky.
Some tips to help the bonding experience along: Some birds like to be rocked, so sit with them in a rocking chair and gently rock with them on your finger or sitting on your shoulder. Birds love to play with long hair. My girl Arya loves to groom my hair. It's been an incredible bonding experience for us both. They also love to hide in the hair or in your clothes. This is a great way to teach them peekaboo. Some do not mind beak rubs. At first they might bite you, not knowing what you are doing, but as long as you are gentle and move slowly, they'll figure it out. Some love to be pet all around the neck and will contort their neck in ways you didn't know they could when being scritched there. Remember, the neck is the only safe spot to pet, as petting elsewhere can lead to hormonal behaviors. Watching bird videos on your phone is also a great way to bond with your bird. They love to hear other birds and get excited to watch the videos.
Correcting Bad Behaviors: Some people use a time-out cage for correcting bad behaviors. The time-out cage should not be a travel cage or look like their normal cage. It should be plain with just a single perch and a water bowl and placed in a secluded spot. Just like putting a child in the corner, it should be some place that they don't want to be, which is normally away from you. Just like you would with a toddler, when the bird starts doing something like biting, correct the biting by using the "Gentle Beak" command and gently touching their beak. If they continue, say "Do you want to go into time-out?" If they still persist in biting, tell them they are going into time-out and put them in their time-out cage. A few minutes later pull them out. Don't leave them in it for more than a few minutes. This will usually fix the behavior. This can work with other bad behaviors as well, like when they go into places they shouldn't go or mess with things they have been told not to mess with. They may just be birds, but they are very smart and very ornery, just like a toddler going through the terrible twos.
Why Birds Bite: It's not a matter of if, but when, and how often. Some birds tend to bite more than others, and especially if they are molting or hormonal. They can bite out of fear. If your hand approaches them too fast, they might react with a bite. They also do not like being approached from above. They can become cage aggressive and bite to protect their territory. They use their beaks to climb, so they will bite at your finger to climb up onto it. They will also nibble while they preen themselves or even you. If they're sitting on your shoulder, don't fear if they start nibbling on your neck or hair, this is a great bonding experience. If they nibble too hard then use the gentle beak command and they should lighten up. Sometimes their bond with you will be so great that they feel they need to protect you from others in the household, so they may bite others to "protect" you. And just like a toddler going through a temper tantrum, they may just decide to bite out of rebelliousness. Regardless of why they bite, these are natural behaviors in their world. They are wild animals, not domesticated. Sometimes you can fix these behaviors with training, but it all depends on the bird, but with persistence and training the bad biting behaviors should be able to be corrected. Even so, they can occasionally crop up and you need to correct them immediately when they happen. This is why it is important to interact with your bird every single day.
Training:
Once you have worked on your bonding for several days to weeks, you can work on training. I start off with step up training. There are many other things you can teach your bird, and plenty of video resources to help you out. I suggest watching them and joining some online groups to get ideas of what you want to train. I am only going to go over Step Up Training below. If you’d like to learn more techniques about teaching them to talk and more, I suggest heading over to my Links page and looking up some of the videos by Flock Talk.
Step Up: Step up is the most important and first training technique you should teach, in my opinion. Because if you have a wild child that doesn’t want to go back into their cage or likes to fly around, if you can get them stepping up onto a stick or a finger, you can get them back into their cage with ease. For my babies I started step up training after my towel technique. Once they were comfortable on my chest I would gently put my finger below their stomach and gently push towards them saying “Step up”. They would lose their balance and instinctively step up onto my finger. Each time they do, I say “Good job” and their name. I also will give them kisses or scritches/pets on their head. Then I would use my other hand and repeat the process. They might fly off, they might get confused, but each time I put them right back onto my finger and repeat the process. Rotating finger after finger with the step up command until they are doing it consistently, and each time praising them and kissing them or petting them. You always want to use positive reinforcement and not negative. They can sense your emotions before you even realize you’re showing them, so it’s best to do this when you are calm and collected. If you get frustrated easily, your birds will pick up on this and go into fight or flight, so you MUST remain calm.
Step Up from a Stick/Dowel: With Marley being so afraid of hands I started training Step Up from a stick. First I would insert the stick into the cage with the door closed between the wires so that he would get used to it. Slowly I would get it closer and closer to him. At first they will run from it and fly away from it, so take it slow, and remember, don’t get discouraged. Just keep trying several times a day using the “Step Up” command and when they start jumping on it make sure to praise them using their name. At first when they step up they might jump off. That’s ok, be consistent and persistent, and eventually they will stay on it longer and longer. You can use millet or food that they like as a treat to reward them. The longer they stay on the stick the better. Once you consistently get them stepping up without jumping off, you can open the cage door and get them to step up and pull them out of the cage on the stick. Their instinct will be to fly around the room, and that is fine. But it’s imperative that you go straight to them with the stick and get them to step up immediately. Again, they will resist and jump off because now they have the enticement of freedom to fly to get away from you, but you must be persistent and keep telling them to step up. Once you get them back on the stick try and put them in their cage. It might take a few times, as again, the enticement of freedom to fly around is strong. But after some persistence you should be able to teach them that they only get out of the cage time when they “Step Up” onto the stick.
Once you are getting them in and out of the cage using the step up command with the stick, you can switch to fingers. Put your hand in the cage holding millet and repeat the step up command. Don’t chase after them, just put the hand nearby and repeat over and over to step up. They will be stubborn, and this step could take days to weeks to teach. Sometimes, in cases like Marley, it might never work. But he took to the stick right away so that’s why I start with the stick in new birds. Once they are coming to your hand inside the cage, slowly pull back towards the door and let them come to you until they are stepping up right at the cage door. Slowly wean off the millet and just use the step up command and once they step up then give them millet to reward them. Pretty soon they will be stepping up without the need for rewarding. Again, be patient and don’t show any negative or exasperated emotions. This is not only a learning experience for them, but it’s a way to teach you patience with them as well.