Teaching Parrots to Like New People and Places Making Progress!
Beni and Wrigley are progressing nicely. To keep things moving forward we traveled to another new environment. Travel in the crate would be a bit longer this time as our destination was about 20 miles away. My friend Heather is an animal lover and also manages a hotel. She was happy to have us visit.
I had a feeling based on our last excursion that the baby parrots would do fine. So I came prepared to videotape their reaction to the new environment. As the video shows, to them it was just another fun place to be. There were no flights in which the parrots seemed confused or unsure of where to go. They simply headed to their perches, to me or Heather, however Beni did discover that the luggage cart was quite fun. He ended up sliding down the sides like a fireman. Who knew enrichment was so easy?
Both parrots responded well to Heather. One factor that could have been a distraction for them was that Heather was wearing dark nail polish. I have not worn nail polish around the parrots, so this would be a new experience. I had Heather offer a few treats slowly at first. Fortunately neither parrot reacted to the nail polish. They did however really want to work on the buttons on Heather�s shirt. A few treats, toys and head scratches for staying on the hand or a perch seemed to get their minds off of buttons.
As in our past excursions, both parrots started playing with toys. Beni sat calmly while I put the harness on him. And both parrots were recalling like champs in the new space. After about 45 minutes of training and fun, Wrigley starting grinding his beak as if he was ready to take a little snooze. I decided it was time to return to the crate. As usual Wrigley was a dream. Beni hesitated, but went in. Back at home they both went in and out of the crates freely for goodies and toys before they returned to their cages for an afternoon nap.
Our next goal is to find a larger space and add a few more people to the mix.
Barbara Heidenreich
www.GoodBirdInc.com
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