Hurley waves hi!!!

[meijuhua]

I've been working with my Quaker, Hurley for about 1-2 weeks now on waving hello. He's finally mastered it (I am such the proud "mama"!), and here he is, waving to everyone on film. Hopefully he can teach his brother Feo this trick when he comes home.

[CKD]

Please explain to me how you have trained him to do this. I have a 6 month old Quaker named Piper that I would love to teach this too.

[meijuhua]

It's actually quite easy. I learned from DVD's my husband bought from birdtricks.com. You hold a sunflower seed (or other treat) in your thumb and index finger, so the bird can see it. Then with your other 3 fingers, you wave them up and down, just like a normal wave hello. Your hand will look like an "f" in sign language, if that helps explain the visual. (don't wave your hand side to side... I started this at first, and hurley would just get upset, thinking I was teasing him with a treat). As your waving your fingers to them, approach them with your opposite hand, as if you're going to have him step up on your finger. As soon as he picks up his foot, praise him and give him the treat. You have to keep repeating this quite a bit, and eventually he will understand that all you want him to do is pick up his foot.

A few tips... don't reward him unless you give the sign first. Hurley likes to get one step ahead of me and pick up his foot for a treat now. Also, the DVD said to only reward them for picking up the same foot. Hurley is a righty. Enjoy! It's the greatest feeling when you see them start to learn it on their own.

[CKD]

Thank you ! I am going to start training Piper.

[LivingFiction]

This really is the cutest thing. He doesn't do it for me either, at least he hasn't yet. I'm proud of my wife and our baby! So fun!

[♥Bobbi٭sMommy♥]

I taught Bobbi to do this too. However I don't use food as reward so I just picked her foot up a little and moved it around. At the same time I waved my hand (she is sitting on my finger while I do this) and if there is anyone else around they wave too. This all started when I was waving bye bye to my parents. She says "Bye, Bye ~~ See ya" so I figured why not wave too?

When I picked up her foot it was tense at first but the more and more I did it the looser it became. Then she would slightly loosen it off my finger by herself and let me wave it around. Then she lifted it by her self let me wave it around. Then wave it herself. Now that she picks it up herself I don't use a total hand wave now but only bend my fingers at the joint with hand stiff or just use pointing finger to wave.

Shy, she started to wave by pretending she was going to scratch her neck! LOL! What a cookie girl! So now she waves really fast like a little child does not just a lift of the foot but a real big ol back-at-ya wave!

She now knows the command "wave your foot" and will do it even if she has a toy in her foot.

Not only is it totally cool but you will love the process too.

[Franciscus]

Hello Jenny. That is cute. My macaw, Razz will wave on occasion and my timneh, Caillou more regularly. I have met a blue and gold that waves with her wing, it's really neat.

[Tiki]

Jenny, welcome to birdboard! I have the same DVD, it is like 3 video volumes in one. That is cool you taught Hurley, I would like to teach Chaska the same!