Does your parrot have a fear of anything, small children, fear of another animal, fear of a person of someone living in the home that doesnt like him, fear of the dark, fear of new toys ??
If your parrot is living in constant fear, he will probable exhibit behaviors like plucking, or screaming, but worse than that it affects their immune system, so they dont have a natural ability to fight disease!
You know even in the wild — birds eating on the ground have a fear of birds of prey, that is why there is always 1 sentinel in a tree as look out, so he can give the signal that there is danger.
Birds have a flight or fight nature, this is where the step – up- training is so impotant, if your bird is doing something wrong or is close to danger you can move him away from it quickly and easily, I talked about step up training in one of last months blogs.
If you have a fearful parrot, use your eyes, your body language and soft voice to help with the problem. Let me explain, use your eyes, look at your parrot with one eye with your head tilted, as your parrot will do if you offer new food! Use your body language, stoop down, try and be smaller or shorter that the parrot, this will make him think he is in charge of the situation, in control and always use a soft lilting voice that is calming and soothing.
African Greys and Cockatoos are the most fearful birds but dont forget the cockatiel who we all know has night frights when they actually fall from their perches in the dark.I have learnt that a night light is very important for nervous, fearful birds, and at the home of the happy parrot a night is always left on so the fearful birds in my care do not stress, a lot of feather plucking done at night is just simply scared of the dark.
No bird should be stressed to the point of fear! Birds are here for our pleasure and we should do everything possible to keep our birds happy and healthy. If your bird is showing signs of fearfulness, backing away from people, flying to the safety of his cage when dogs bark or small children scream,staying away from certain people, pluck or chew feathers or scream then look at everything in your behaviour that may be causing it, always start with YOU, then look at the birds environment, what is happening in the birds environment?? can you change it??I hasten to add here that throwing the towel in should not be an option unless the situation is absolutely un solvable.
If you know your birds behaviour, as you should, you will pick up the signs early — fix it as soon as you see it.
If you have a fearful parrot start fixing it, THIS WEEKEND!!
Till next time — have a good weekend!
Regards
Beryl