going to strangle my RTB *updated*

[piercedsoul]

Zara who i've had for 3 months just wont stop squeeking. whenever she sees you she squeeks, whenever you're near her she squeeks, whenever she's on your lap and you're giving her a cuddle/scratch she squeeks. when she's eating she'll take a bite of soemthing and then squeek, when she's playing she'll bite/chew her toy and squeek. it's constant, seriously i have her inside at night (out of her cage) and she can go for 3 hours without more than a minute break.

she usually squeeks every 3-5 seconds. i've tried ignoring her and she'll kepp doing it, i've tried giving her attention and she'll keep doing it, nothing stops her. what gets me is that even when she's playing a toy she'll keep doing it.

it's driving me nuts and my partners getting quiet angry with her (doesnt yell at her or anything, just says stuff to me like 'maybe you need to get rid of her').

i really have no idea what to do. i know the theory about not reinforcing the behaviour, i knwo the theory about rewarding other birds with attention for their good behaviour so she can see that but none of this has worked.

HELP!!!!!!!!!
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Update May 5th
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After taking on board your suggestions and thoughts as well as perusing the links given i tried changing a few things.

Firstly i started giving her more food and more almonds to play with.

Secondly even though she already had a lot of toys i made sure she had access to them in her outside cage more and made sure any of the ones she destroyed were replaced with new things to destroy

Thirdly when she was inside and repetitively squeaking i would give her different things to play with till she was occupied. sometimes it was an almond, sometimes a plastic toy, sometimes a branch

i tried a few diff things (which probably arent good from a behaviourists point of view) like getting her onto my arm at the front of her cage and giving her a little cuddle for a minute or so in the mornings or when she was carrying on cos i was outside. Now this can be seen as reinforcing the behaviour but what i found is that after her giving that little cuddle she'd settle down and stop making noise. it's like she's been just asking for a cuddle and when she got it she was content and happy.

i also got an old cardboard box and put it on top of the cage in the garage and put a bunch of toys and sticks and almonds into it, so when she's in the garage she just forages through that and that seems to keep her quite busy

so the short of it, is she's a lot better than she was, i no longer want to strangle her and its a lot less noisy!!!

thanks for all the help and support

[avinet]

I'm afraid I can't really answer this one - I have had no experience with Black Cockatoos to draw on. However similar behaviour with Corellas has taught me that there is nothing that can be done except wait for them to grow out of it.

Just some questions that might help others to reply.

How old is Zara?

Is she weaned and at what age did she wean?

What is her diet and does she have a good appetite?

Has she been seen by an avian vet?

Does she squeak when your partner is around and you are not?

Does your partner give her much attention?

Basically the more information you can give us the more likely it is that someone can come up with practical suggestions.

I have just read back to your early March post, got the answers to some of the questions, and see that she is 12 months old, and that she lives in the garage and just comes out in the evening. When you initially brought her home did she squeak, or did it start after a few days?

I'm afraid to me that is not the way to keep a social animal like a Black Cockatoo. They should live where the people live, or live with other Black Cockatoos. Basically she is in solitary confinement for 21 hours of the day, able to hear people but not see or interact with people, and since you and your partner are her flock, she will be stressed by this. I suspect the squeaking is a psychological effect from this separation.

I am a strong believer that a pet bird, especially a solitary pet bird, needs to be kept where the people are - a family room for instance.

cheers,

Mike

[Robyn]

I have also just read your past posts on Zara. And adding to what Mike has already mentioned.

I think you have been negatively reinforcing her behavior. Unintentional of course. RTB can be very clingy birds & take forever to wean & become dependant on their human carer very quickly.

I feel her diet can be improved I don't think she has enough variety & she is possibility hungry most of the time. Please read the link i have posted you'll get a lot of infomation on what to feed & also enrich her environment.

nswfmpa.org/Husbandry%20Manuals/Published%20Manuals/Aves/Red%20Tailed%20Black%20Cockatoo%20%28Bennett%29.pdf

[avinet]

Apr 12, 2011 12:58:47 GMT 10 Robyn said:

I feel her diet can be improved I don't think she has enough variety & she is possibility hungry most of the time. Please read the link i have posted you'll get a lot of infomation on what to feed & also enrich her environment.

nswfmpa.org/Husbandry%20Manuals/Published%20Manuals/Aves/Red%20Tailed%20Black%20Cockatoo%20%28Bennett%29.pdf

That is quite a document Robyn - very comprehensive and one to bookmark. Interesting they give quite a bit of Sunflower in the diets.

cheers,

Mike

[piercedsoul]

HI thanks for the link, i've had a look at that before and added more sprouted stripped sunflower to her diet about a month ago. there's a book on black cockatoos which also states balck cockatoos can tolerate a fattier diet of stripped sunflower as well.

to answer some of avinet's q's:
her appetite seems alright, but i will say given food or toys she likes her toys. she always eats the seed i give her and loves almonds, part for the playing aprt for the nut.

I have tried to get her onto fruits and veges without much success. in the shop they were giving her a bowl of thawed frozen corn and a bowl of stripped sunflower as well as another seed mix. She has ignored corn no matter how i've given it to her (thawed, in water, on the cob) so i doubt she ate it in the shop. I've given her apples in diff ways too, on the kabob, in little diced pices, in slices etc but she won't touch that.

in the past month she's been sharing one half of a double macaw cage (outside) with my sulphur crested (with a barrier between). Rocky (sulpher) doesnt like her but aside from some initial tail grabbing between the bars he largely ignores her. he doesnt try and get at her through the bars and often they'll sit next to each other on either side of the cage.

they come in at night and spend time with me in the lounge room and garage (these are conncected rooms) along with my rainbow lorie. zara and the lorie (squirt) ahve a weird sort of relationship, squirt thinks he's a big bird and wants to haneg out with the big birds but they dont always want him around. sometimes him and zara will just happily sit next to each other on a perch and other times they'll squabble. now i know you'll warn me about this and i watch them pretty closely and i've noticed that zara will "beak" her but not actually "bite her, rocky on the other tries to bite.... squirt actually gets upset if he and zara arent in the same room and starts calling to her and getting jumpy. when they're outside their cages are enxt to each other.

she was seen by an avian vet vet when i first got her who reported she was in good health, she was tested for beak and feather and came back negative

she will squeak when my partner is aorund, well she squeaks when anyones around really, from an evolutionary point of view she'd give ehr position away to every predator in the neighbourhood. their cage is outside the kitchen and if she hears you in there even if she cant see you she'll squeak. my partner doesnt give her much attention and chooses to walk away cos zara drives her nuts

her squeaking started after a few days, well the "high" squeaks did. she also does this weird raspy sound which she made when she first got here, my friend said it sounded like what they imagien dinosaurs sounded like, it's like a raspy coo-ing noise.

so currently, whats diff to my march post is that she now live soutside with other birds aorund her, i've bumped up the food in her diet but perhaps will increase that further, she now steps up well and is used to being handled (this is actually why she was initially in a cage in a garage, i wanted her learning this behaviour in a safe enviro and not flying out of my yard)

i'm not convinced its just about food as there have been times i've given her a dish of sunflower (which she lieks) when she's carrying on but she'll ignore it and wnat to play with a toy. i'm not convicned its purely about attention cos i'll pick her up and give her a scratch and she'll be the one to fly off onto a perch.

i should also sya that i go home for lunch and spend time sittiing out enar where the cages are and i do this after work before i bring them ionside as well, so they do see me and i do interact and givem them treats but there doesnt seem to eb any clear link i've found between why she squeeks so much.

[piercedsoul]

here's a vid of her making the weird dinosaur noise

here's a vid of her squeaking

[Phill]

I have to say that I know pretty much nothing in regards to RTB, but it seem's like she is wanting formula? I've been to some breeders house's and if I recal correctly, there RTB babies were making that noise when they wanted some formula.

[Lewis]

She is definatly not a wenaed bird she is wanting to still be fed through a syrienge

i think you have been sold a unwened bird so the breeder can make a quick buck
red tails can take up 12 months to full wean, A mate of mine rearers all his and his yellow tail chcik he is still feeding since this time last year when it hatched not every day but every few days it asks for a feed which is is slowly slowing down and this bird is out in a 60ft aviary with heaps of adult birds

[avinet]

Your dinosaur sound seems to be one of the natural sounds of Blacks, although a baby version of it.. The squeak is a baby sound - can be either give me food, or give me love and attention. Sometimes when baby parrots move to a new home they regress back to an earlier stage of development, and it can take a while to grow out of it again.

That squeak is nowhere near as bad as I have heard - Little Corellas do this stuff quite often, and are far louder and are continuous, with a different sound on the intake of breath to the outwards breath. That really gets on your nerves. Alexes can also be bad occasionally and again are far worse. She will grow out of it - I don't think there is too much you can do except be patient.

How is her weight going - is she gaining or losing weight?

I have recollections of an article in Australian Birdkeeper a while ago which looked at this problem of regression - I will have a look for it over the weekend and let you know which issue it was in - back copies should be available.

cheers,

Mike

[alemap]

My red tail blacks were eating mainly sunflower when i got them, im sure this was fed to wean them quicker, i have given them a mixed bowl of food consisting of various seeds and different fruit,veg and nuts for over a year now and they have started to eat a few of the other bits i give them. I have found palm nuts to be a favourite but they also eat carrot, apple and celery. I also feed sprouted seeds and pulses. Although ive never hand fed my hen i did hear her making these squeaking noises in the first few months i had them.

[Robyn]

I think i would be asking the previous owner about this bird. I don't think it has anything to do with regressing at all i think it is a learned behavior myself. At 12 months she should be weaned although from memory when i bought my first black he was 10 weeks old & i was still feeding him a sooky feed at night until he was 12 months old or older. He had a night cage inside that he slept in & his huge day cage for the day. I didn't have any problems with crying while he was young that came later.

I have only returned the last little RTB i reared to it's owner a few weeks ago & that bird was about 9 months old. Eating on its own but still requiring a sooky feed for bed. They don't need much & it doesn't have to be formula, you can buy the jars of baby foods & warm a few spoons for her. I must admit he/she was starting to get noisy whenever he heard me talk but usually when i let him out he was quiet.

I also wonder if she is getting enough sleep at night. I think birds do better when their sleep patterns mimic nature. Like rise when the sun comes up & settle down at dusk. But i do understand everyones motives for having their birds up at night. You might have to try a few things to get some peace.

Do you offer her some gum branches & nuts to chew on, pine cones are another good thing to amuse her also foxtail palm nuts. They are all a source of food for her to try. Also try her on a warm mash at dinner time maybe around the same time you eat yourself. Harley my RTB used to have meals with us.

I am sure she is just a wee bit more needy than most & would have to have something to do with the early stages of her hand raising. You have only had her 3 months & she was already making that sound when you got her it just hasn't stopped.

The reason i don't have Harley anymore was because when he matured at 4 years old he started that same crying as Zara. All day everyday & I wasn't allowed to get a hen for him so he now lives at the same Animal Park i hand rear for. He is now in a big flock and is so much more happier & has stopped the crying although he is yet to produce any offspring yet. To human imprinted i think.

The next step would be to contact a Bird Behaviourist, they will be more experienced with this sort of behaviour. It's better to find out now what went wrong than to leave it & not have the problem fixed & then passing the bird on to someone else that doesn't have any idea either.

[carlsandclan]

A neighbour of mine has a RTB - Sparky. Jo bred and raised him herself, and yeah, they are not the easiest babies from what she's told me. Even the adult RTB pair they have are highly strung - no strangers can go near the aviary when they are in their log.

As beautiful as they are, I could never have one as a companion bird.

I hope you can get through this time with Zara. She really is stunning.

(as I write, I can hear a baby YTB crying for food - they sure are persistent! lol)

[piercedsoul]

Apr 14, 2011 21:03:03 GMT 10 Lewis said:

She is definatly not a wenaed bird she is wanting to still be fed through a syrienge

i think you have been sold a unwened bird so the breeder can make a quick buck

she was bought from a bird shop. if she's unweaned, what do i do to wean her?

[piercedsoul]

Mike, she's gaining weight, i dont ahve an accurate log of her weight but i put her onto the scale snad its gone up since i weighed her months ago. she also feels heavier on my arm (unscientific i know)

alemap: where do you get palm nuts from? she eats almonds and destroys peanuts (without actually eating the peanut) but i'd love to get ehr onto other things.

Robyn: the weird thing about the behaviour (well weird to me), is that she'll only make it when someones around. if she cant see you she'll happily play in her cage, as soon as she sees you she starts carrying on. the fact that she'll squeak when you're patting ehr confuses me too, cos i thought if she was making nosie for attention she'd be doing it when we're not around, not when she's in contact with me.

she gets gumnuts and branches to chew, as well as the commercially sold wood toys (which she loves destroying). she always has soemthing to chew and destroy and also loves ripping up plastic bird foot toys

when she was in the shop i spent a fair bit of time sticking my finegrs through the cage and patting ehr as well as visiting the other birds there. she didnt actually make these noises in there (which is why i thought she was a quiet bird!!) another RTB there would squawk at you as you went enar it.

one thing i've noticed with her, and im not sure if this is just her or whetehr all RTB's are like this is that she seems pretty unccordinated. she'll be playing with a nut or something, drop it accidentallly and look at it forlornly and squeak at it. it happens a lot. when i compare her foot skills to the sulphur crested its massively behind, again i dont know if all rtbs are like this or whetehr she never got given stuff to play with.

i really don't wnat to give her away, and despite being close to strangling her i'm not at the stage of getting rid of her. I've made a commitment to look afetr the bird and i'll give it every possibility of working before i get to the stage of getting rid of her. right now she's got a better chance of being choked than given away /joke

[jusdeb]

Can relate . The behavior sounds like that of a toddlers , uncoordinated , sooky and demanding .

The one thing I have noticed with our Corella is she loved her syringe feed , it was like a bonding time between her and my partner .

The Parrot Rescue centre have bird behaviour experts if you need somewhere to start .

[just4birds]

You can contact Jim McKendry at PBEC ... www.pbec.com.au

But you have to take a step back and ask yourself or repeat to yourself "She only does it if she can see you"

And if she can see you "what do you do"?

Animal behaviour is a hard one to work on .. but you need to ask yourself

What the behaviour is (which you already know)

What do you do when she does the behaviour

What she was doing before the behaviour

Then you can work on doing more of what she was doing before the noise to get her to stop ..

Specially if it's just for human attention or a reinforced behaviour ..

There are some great websites out there ...

www.goodbirdinc.com

www.pbec.com.au/downloads/mckendry_antecedentarrangement.pdf

www.pbec.com.au/downloads/friedman_abcs.pdf

And last of all a busy beak is a quiet one

*Lisa*

PS: saying the bird is unweaned without thinking about how old the bird is etc is really misleading and confusing info

[Robyn]

Thanks heaps for that information Lisa. Much appreicated.