Introductions and Updates

Well, I must apologise for how long it's taken for me to get back posting here.
For nearly two months I have barely been online due to a very nasty ear infection that due to my medications, health issues and history, I was not able to overcome.
I had surgery a couple of weeks ago to hopefully fix the problem. This means I can now get online without getting nauseous! WOOHOO!

Sooooo here are some updates on the birds and their training... I will admit that training took a back burner when I was sick as I noticed that my observation and reaction skills were poor and I was hampering new behavior training efforts.

Marnie
Marnie has been maintaining her already learned behaviors well and is always ready to offer a wave if there is a pecan in sight.
She's been doing well with learning veterinary behaviors and was recently used as demo bird at a meeting of the Austin Parrot Society which concentrated on avian emergency care.
She has also been getting better about stepping up for other people.


Lucha
Lucha is still the King of the Puffy Dance. Training sessions with him have to be very short as after any more than 5 minutes the feathers start fluffing and the whining starts and within a few seconds I am being displayed at.

We have made some small handling breakthroughs though! Lucha has never allowed me to touch him below the neck without a warning growl followed by a bite. But recently he has been tolerating quick, gentle touches of the back without giving any warnings.

Darwin
Darwin is one hot mess of a bird.
After having weekly seizures of varying severity and lots of testing he has been officially diagnosed as having idiopathic epilepsy. Normal treatment is phenobarbitol, but we are trying to steer clear of that for as long as possible.
Close observation helped me realise that the seizures were normally following a stressful situation like the big birds squabbling, a loud noise or a blood draw. So, I have been trying to maintain a calm, stress free environment in the home to prevent the seizures. So far I have been somewhat successful, although it's hard to do as Darwin can be an instigator of stress a lot of the time.
Training new behaviors has become a challenge. If he gets to that point where he is not sure what you are asking of him and starts throwing out behaviors to see what gets him reinforced, it seems like he overloads his brain and he will have a small seizure. Established behaviors are not an issue and Darwin still recalls like a champ if there is a treat available.

And introducing...

Pip
Pip is a Black Capped Caique that I am fostering for Wings of Love Bird Haven. He came to me because he allegedly hated men... but I have not seen this at all! Infact Pip is one of the most social birds I have ever met. He happily steps up to everyone (male or female) with a cheery "Heeelooo".
Good news is that since being with me he has stopped the over preening and is slowely filling in his feathers.
A typical Caique he is very active and loves to hair surf... he also eats ANYTHING you offer him.
Pip is available for adoption through Bird Haven.

Puff
Puff was originally adopted from Bird Haven to a home in Austin last year. Unfortunately a combination of his fear, some bad advice and health problems in the family meant that he was returned to the Haven.
I picked him up about 6 weeks ago and have been slowly working with him since.
I first met Puff at Barbara Heidenreichs Workshop in Austin last year and he was already avoiding being handled. He responded well to Barbara targeting him around the cage though... so I was confident that he would learn to step up and have more trust in humans.
For the first couple of weeks I let him relax in his new big cage and get used to foraging and toys. Every time I entered the room I would walk over and offer him a treat. I then started leaving the door open so he could climb out... at first every time I came in the room he would run back in the cage, but after a couple of days he would stay on his door to get his treat.
A real breakthrough happened when I moved him into the bird room opposite Marnie... He was FASCINATED! Every interaction with Marnie was closely studied. I soon noticed this and thought here was a chance to use an adapted model/rival technique.
I started by offering them the same foraging toys. I would carefully load up Marnie's toy and then Puff's. He would watch her closely as she got out the treats and then use the same method to get into his own toy.
Normally I don't reinforce Marnie with a treat every time she steps up (because petting and spending time with me is also reinforcing for her), but with Puff watching I consitently cued, bridged and reinforced her (with his fav treat) for stepping up and down, making sure he could see well. I would then go to him and attempt the same. If he gave me his warning double click I would remove my hand and replace it with a perch (he showed no fear to this perch from the start), then repeat the cue. With in a couple of days he was jumping up on the perch on cue and from there we repeated the process onto my arm. He then went to spend the day on the play gym with Marnie and Lucha, carefully watching what Marnie was doing and eating. After about a week I started asking him to step up straight onto my arm from the play gym with immediate sucess.
Then surgery happened and Puff decided I was terrifying again (I did have a bandage around my head).
So for the past two weeks we have been slowely working back to where we were and this week he has been stepping up from the cage.
He's gradually regaining his confidence and I hope to be able to give him scritches in the future

The Loss of a Friend and the Terror of Fingerless Gloves

Well it's been a while since I updated on here (note to self... must get better about that), and a lot has happened. Some good, some bad and some kinda average.

In bad news, Inyoni, the spitfire 1 legged female lovebird has passed on to the rainbow bridge. Her energy and fire will be missed.
Her mate Ndeke was very quiet for a week after her death, but after a cage move around and he realised that he now gets all these awesome things like bird bread and warm mushy foods, and a happy hut because I no longer have to worry about these things triggering a laying session. So he's acting normally now... perhaps even a little more content now she is not demanding feedings and nagging him.
A necropsy was performed (I cannot stress the importance of this for any bird owning home) and no contagious cause of death was found. I had her cremated and am waiting for a nice day to take her ashes out to the greenbelt so she can fly free.

Darwin has been a cause for concern as he had a seizure last week (possibly he had one in January too). I stepped him up to put him in the travel cage to go to the vet for a nail trim (he's squirmy and I have not trained the nail trimming behavior with him yet), as he came out of the cage he just dropped from my hand and was seizing on the floor. I scooped him up and into the travel cage and hit the road to the vet (calling them to let them know I was bringing in an emergency). After about half an hour he came back from the far away gaze and was his normal self.
Gram stains showed nothing and we pulled blood for CBC and Chlamydiosis on Monday... everything came back normal with the slight exception of his Calcium which was on the low end of normal... so we are going to up his calcium intake and retest in a month... hopefully this will be the cause.

I think it important here to share some of the foods I will be adding to his diet (remember, he's on the allergy diet of rice pellets... he just recently started getting an organic allergen free sprout mix).
So, now I am hanging fresh organic dandelion leaves in his cage (he is unimpressed), offering a small bite of cheese every day, and almonds.

I also finally bought full spectrum lighting, after much research about the issue of CRI, Kelvin and flickering. My research identified the minimum CRI and Kelvin and informed me that the issue of flickering was all down to the base. Older bases were not designed to keep the flicker rate down, but that there should not be any problems with flicker with newer bases.
So I bought two full spectrum bulbs from featherbrite and a clamp light with a cage over the bulb (this is found in the reptile section). The stronger watt bulb is in the overhead light in the bird room, and the clamp light shines the other one direct on his cage... I really like how it turned out and am already planning on getting a second clamp light and bulb to brighten up Ndeke's lower cage.

And then there is Marnie.
I recently tried wearing elasticated fingerless gloves to help with my arthritis, and Marnie was not impressed!
Although she would take food from my gloved hand, and allowed me to scritch her with it, she would not step up on it... I'm not sure if it was the look or it or the feel, but she was having none of it.
So desensitization started.
I started by having her on my lap and slowly brought the gloved hand closer and closer, consistently reinforcing calm behavior. Eventually I had my gloved hand right next to her feet and from there I slowly began to touch them with the fabric, and finally I put my gloved hand flat on my leg and used the treat to persuade her to step on to it. Once onto the gloved hand I reinforced her for that and staying on there... and now she steps up onto the gloved hand without hesitation!

Finally, check out the Austin Parrot Society for info on our next meeting, a foraging toy workshop, and let me know if you want to be added to the mailing list!

Training Update 03/08/2009

Time for a training update... it's been long enough!

Lucha is still in his hormonal amazon season and is very difficult to work with. I was lucky to get a few repetitions in of the taking liquid from a syringe behavior the other day before the eyes and tail flashed and the whining started.

Darwin is still working on his recall... he's still a little hesitant, but I am happy to say that with patience and a few repetitions of the request he is coming down from the very top of the playscape every time. I will of course be continuing to work on recall, but would like to add specific areas to cue him to.

Marnie surprised me today. Normally when I attempt to target with her she gives me the "why?" look. So when I decided to start the taking liquid from a syringe behavior with her I was unsure of how well we'd progress.
So I showed her the syringe, she touched it with her beak, I bridged and reinforced. After a couple of slow repetitions I decided to add liquid to the syringe (some lukewarm chamomile tea, one of her favs). Well that turned out to be great for Marnie. The first time she touched the syringe tip with the liquid, she lost all interest in the chopped almonds in my hand and proceeded to drink the whole 1cc of chamomile tea in one go! I refilled with water and got exactly the same reaction :)
Thinking back this should have been obvious, as Marnie often demands a taste of whatever I am drinking and hissy fits are thrown if I am drinking something like coffee and deny her request. So even though the liquid was in a syringe and not a cup, it was still hugely reinforcing for her to get the contents...
... but with sucess comes failure. I asked her for a turnaround and she stared at me...

Marnie giving her patented "Why?" look

Training Update 01/31/2009

Well daily life has been interfering with daily training recently. I got called back to my seasonal position with the IRS (yay money), but I work nights there, so getting back into a night schedule has been hard... that said, I have still been getting some training done with the cutest little greencheek conure in South Austin!

Darwin's recall training has come on leaps and bounds. The past week I have been concentrating on our training sessions being different distances and directions to expose him to all sorts of potential problems. Though he still does hesitate on occasion, he always comes eventually for that smooch and taste of pecan.
Today I decided to introduce new starting locations. Up until today his take off point was always the training T-stand, so today I walked around the house, putting him down on various things (spare play gym, my bed etc) and recalled him before putting him back down on yet another object. The final recall was done from Marnie's cage (Darwin loves to hang out on top of it) to my arm across the bird room and the living room with only one cue of "Darwin come here!". Needless to say he received a jackpot reinforcement of a whole pecan to take back to the cage with him.... But what happened later was even more impressive.
I have posted a picture of my birds playscape a couple of weeks ago. The chain across the top of it is well out of reach for me and Darwin likes to hang out up there... the only problem is when I need him down to put him away to open the door safely. Now since recall training started, I have always at least tried to recall him before going for the step ladder, but despite a lot of posturing and squeaking he's never taken flight... until today. I grabbed a pecan and gave the cue "Darwin come here!" only twice before down he flew! Another jackpot of a whole pecan was welcomed as he went back into his cage... I think the Jackpot from the earlier behavior was well remembered... although I'll have to be careful that he won't expect a whole pecan for every recall!

Interestingly it seems like his aggression problems in and near the cage have calmed a little since starting the recall training. Could it be that by stretching his mind and body with training, it is taking away the angry possessiveness? I'm not sure, but it is certainly positive reinforcement for me to have him a little sweeter around the cage!

Another of Darwin's favorite spots is the curtain rod... and the next place he'll need to recall from

Training Update 01/20/2009

Training has been a little slow the past couple of days, but there are still updates!

Marnie has been learning to target to an acrylic wand. I have been bridging and rewarding her for touching the target and so far she's doing pretty good. She does have a few moments where she fixes me with one eye and stares for a second before touching the target... I think she's just trying to work out why I want her to touch the target. The targeting behavior is going to be step one of teaching her to "Crate Up"

Lucha has also been learning to target. He has learned to target to the syringe for his last medical behavior, but now I have replaced the syringe with the acrylic wand. Lucha really gets into this behavior and will move all along the T-stand to touch the target. Interestingly during the last target session I failed to notice I was holding the pecan (from which I was breaking his reinforcer) in plain view, in the hand with the target wand and within reach of his beak. But Lucha being a good boy who loves to train would glance at the pecan, before reaching out and touching the target anyway. So rather than go straight for the pecan, he preferred to perform the behavior for a smaller reinforcer!
Yesterday I introduced the carrier. Lucha has been in this carrier before to the vet, so is familiar with it. Handily it has a door on the top as well as the end, so I was able to to open that to get a better angle. Lucha was happy to follow the target as far as perching in the open doorway before he showed signs of nervousness in his body language. So a good start from which to build on.

Darwin has been working well on his recall and has recalled from across the room on a number of occasions. I will continue to work on recalling from a variety of locations around the house. Although we may have a problem in the future as I have recently heard Marnie saying "Come Here" in my voice, which is Darwin's recall cue LOL

On a slight aside: Things are still moving forwards for the Austin Parrot Society. We now have a blog set up at http://www.austinparrotsociety.blogspot.com for updates on the planning processes and for information on meetings.

Training Update 01/15/09

Things have been going well on the training front in my flock :)

Marnie has had two sessions learning "Shake" and had gotten the hang of it quickly.
I started off by offering my right index finger pointed at her left leg at a 45 degree angle and gave the cue "Shake". I bridged and rewarded her first for lifting the leg
Then for touching her foot to my finger
Then for touching the base of her foot on top of my finger
Then for touching it a little longer
Then wrapping her toes around it slightly
Then for wrapping them all the way around.
The last approximation we worked on today was holding onto my finger for 10 seconds.
Tomorrow I plan to work on holding on to my finger while I move it up and down.

Lucha is now willing to drink almost a whole 1 cc of water before looking for his reinforcer. Tomorrow I plan to start on training him to crate up. While he is okay with me putting him into the crate. It would be great to be able to train him to walk in on his own.

Darwin was in a very friendly mood today and stepped up from his door perch quickly so I decided to start recall training with huge success. I put him on the training T-stand and used chopped pecans as his reinforcer (my birds are really into pecans at the moment). The closest approximation he already new was step up.
I first held my finger a few inches from him, about an inch above his feet, held the pecan behind my hand and gave the cue "come here". He stepped up immediately and I bridged and reinforced him. I repeated the same distance and cue, and again immediately bridged and reinforced him.
I then moved my finger another inch away and each time he stretched out on the cue "come here". I increased the distance slowly till I was 6 inches away and then the big test came. He could no longer reach out with a foot or beak to get to me. He would have to fly. For extra encouragement I showed him the whole pecan and he ran up and down the T-stand a few times, squeeking as he does when he wants something, he also bobbed up and down and opened his wings slightly. After a minute of trying to work it out he flew to my wrist, I bridged and gave him a jackpot of a big bite out of the pecan and returned him to the T-stand. Again I offered my finger and the cue "Come here", this time there was less hesitation and again he landed on my wrist. From this I deduced that he preferred my arm as a landing spot, maybe because it's a broader platform? So I stopped offering the finger and offered my arm again.
I continued approximations of moving my arm slightly further away from the T-stand each repetition. The final repetition was made with my arm two feet away from the perch.
On the whole I am very happy with his progress today both in his behavior around the cage and in his recall training. Tomorrow I hope to continue the recall training with further approximations regarding distance. I also hope to continue to work on his aggression around the cage.
It occurs to me that the recall training may be of aid to this as I can give him the recal cue "Come here" when he is being aggressive around his cage and I need to get in it for house keeping purposes, to remove him from the cage, without triggering an aggressive act.

Darwin hanging around

Training Update 01/13/2009

I am continuing to work on getting Marnie to pay closer attention to the specific behavior I am asking for as opposed to just offering the first one she thinks of.
Doing two 10 minute sessions a day she is improving greatly, and getting the correct behavior 90% of the time. She seems to be favoring the Wave behavior at the moment, and will occasionally shift her weight as if to start the Wave, before turning.
I plan a few more days of this sharpening of skills before moving on to a new behavior.

Darwin is going through an increase in aggressive behavior around his cage at the moment, although he is still very sweet out of the cage. This increase in aggressive body language and behavior means I am going back to basics with him and working on targeting around the cage. Although I am not sure exactly why he has changed his behavior, I am determined to work through this by using positive reinforcement, at the same time as examining his environment for any differences which could have set him back. I am giving him 3 short sessions a day of targeting around the cage at the moment.

Lucha is still a little on the hormonal lovey side. In an effort to get by this I returned to working on the Taking Liquid from a Syringe behavior, which he already knows fairly well, to see if he would focus better on this than the new behavior (the Turaround).
Lucha is pretty good at this behavior and quickly targets the tip of the syringe when he sees it. However, I had gotten poor results when water was added to the syringe. So this time I thought a little more about setting him up for success. Because Lucha consumes more water than the average bird, I decided to remove water from his play gym a few hours before the planned session. Sure enough as soon as he realised that water was in the syringe he started drinking it from the tip and in essence receiving reinforcement from the water as well as the verbal and pecans. Next time I plan on doing the same, but take the water away an hour before training, with the end view of not needing to remove the water at all in a few more sessions as I will be able reinforce when he takes the water now.
I have also been thinking more about his difficulty with the Turnaround. I am wondering if part of the reason why he's slow in picking up this behavior, is that he really does not want to do it because his balance is poor. He has been a little unsteady since I have had him, and often walks using his beak first or has problems maintaining balance while climbing... and here I am asking him to turn in a circle on a perch. This hardly seems like setting him up for success.
So I think maybe the best option with Lucha is to examine the behavior from his point of view before deciding whether or not to teach it to him, and to work on something that is more focused on improving his daily life.


Lucha takes a well deserved post training session nap

This blog is turning out to be a very useful way of working through my thoughts and making sense out of them for the benefit of my birds:)

Meet The Flock: Darwin

Darwin is the Greencheek Conure I am currently rehabbing.


Darwin is three years old now and was bred by Rick Jordan at Hill Country Aviary before ending up in a home that admitted they did not know what they were taking on in a companion parrot. So Darwin was given to me after being advertised for free on Craigslist. I was worried about who would take him, so I contacted the owners to offer advice about finding the right home. After a couple of days chatting about his problems the family asked me to take him to work on his behavioral issues and find him a home.
When I picked him up he was plucking his contour feathers and was aggressive.


The first thing I did was improve his diet from a very poor quality seed mix to a varied diet based on Harrisons pellets, a cage mix, fresh fruit, veggies etc and some cooked foods. Then I filled his cage with toys toys toys!
Much of his aggressive behavior disappeared with the introduction of toys to take out some of his energy and plenty of out of cage time. He still occasionally displays aggression, but through positive reinforcement I hope to reduce it even further.
His plucking is still something I am working on. This last summer he started removing his down feathers in places, so after a trip to the vet to rule out medical issues, Dr Davis and I decided to remove potential allergens from his diet. He was already on a preservative, colour, peanut, pesticide etc free diet, so I removed all wheat, sunflower and soy from his diet as well. The good news is that he seems to have stopped plucking his down feathers, all though he still removes his contours... he's a work in progress.

Darwin is quite the smart bird, and loves to use his moulted feathers as tools to scratch his pin feathers on his head.


He is also one of the cuddliest birds I have ever met and really loves to snuggle up to a human whenever he can.


I hope to find a forever home for Darwin who will love him and work with his plucking and aggression issues. Through positive reinforcement he knows how to step up, allows me to feel him all over, lift his wings and flip him upside down. As he is flighted (and loves to fly around my house) I am getting ready to start recall training with him, in hopes that his future home will make every effort to keep him flighted.
If someone happens to be reading this blog in the Austin, TX area who feels they would be a good match for a forever home for Darwin then please let me know.