Potty Training

[sunnyshine]

I'd read before that you could possibly potty train your bird, but I didn't think I could actually do it... Well, today as I walked around the house with Sunny on my shoulder, I realized it had been a while and he probably was going to go on me any minute. So I put him down on a piece of newspaper and said "go potty"... he just looked at me funny so I picked him up, and guess what was under him! Then a while later I had the feeling he probably had to go again so I did the same thing and he went again, and another time after that. I must sound crazy all excited about this, but I just was so surprised and proud. It's going to be real handy to be able to have him go whenever and not worry about him making a mess when he comes out. I never thought you could really potty train a bird! Has anyone else potty trained their birds?

[tielmama]

I haven't tried it, but it sounds like you and Sunny are well on your way!

[kathleen]

I did it the same way. I waited until I thought Pumpkin needed to poop. Then, I would put him on his cage and say,"Do you need to poop? Come on, let me see." He would squat down and if something came out I would scoop him up and tell him how wonderful he was and then gave him tons of kisses. After a little while, I would put him down again and ask the same question. If he didn't need to poop he would still squat as if to show me he didn't and then I would pick him up and kiss him and tell him that it was ok. Then, when I put him down again but in a shorter time and he pooped I would tell how wonderful he was again. He's pretty good at it because sometimes he'll be on the cage and want to be picked up so he'll do a little dance to get my attention and then when I look over he squats and then puts a foot up. I run over hug and kiss him and pick him up. Sometimes he messes up and poops on me and tell him that it's not nice to poop on mommy but he snuggles up to me as if to say sorry and all is good.

[Monica]

My cockatiel Casey was potty trained with her mother (i.e. handraiser) but would always poop on her daddy! With me, she is not potty trained, and I haven't tried to do so. None of my birds are potty trained, but I should probably potty train Charlie since he tends to have such HUGE droppings!

Some birds are just naturally potty trained, never going on their owners, while others you need to train them.

[jriley]

Molly, my umbrella 'too, is already potty trained at 7 months old. I did it by always pausing a moment after I picked her up and saying "do you need to poop?" and staying there until I got a result. She learned that she didn't get to go somewhere fun unless she cleared out the pipes first. The only thing we still need to work on is training me to have somewhere handy for her to go in other rooms. If I'm holding her for a half hour, as soon as I lift her away from me so as to head back to her cage she will let loose on the floor. She hasn't pooped on a person in over a month, but she needs a way to go or I need to not keep her out so long when we're in another room.

Our two smaller birds, the Quaker and the Sun Conure, really aren't good about it at all. I think the smaller birds have a faster metabolism and have a harder time holding it, but that's just a guess on my part.

Julie

[jenseits]

Back when my family had a cockatoo, he managed to potty train himself - we thought he was the smartest bird ever!

Because he was a large bird, it was really easy to read the signals that he was going to go, so whenever he crouched down and took a step backwards, we scooped him up and quickly brought him to his cage. Our goal was just to keep him from pooping on the carpet, we never intended to train him; but soon enough he got tired of being unceremoniously dumped on his cage in the middle of doing his business and he started going back to his perch by himself! As soon as he was done, he'd climb back down, waddle across the living room and resume whatever he was doing with us.

But the smaller the bird, the more often they need to go and the harder it seems to be to read the signs.

I've actually read that some birds can be so eager to please by going on command that they'll hurt themselves "holding it in", so I'd be worried about potty training that way. Having the bird go back to his cage on his own, whenever he's ready, really seems like the ideal solution rather than having them wait until we ask them to go.

[Busguy]

I was able to train my GCC pretty much as Kathleen described and would always telll her to "go potty" as soon as I put her on the perch even if she was already squatting. Then. when I would tell her "go potty" she also would squat to show me she is trying even if she didn't need to most times but since we have had Pepper, and he seems much less concerned about where he is when he needs to go, it has been hard to keep Sage in the habit.

Overall, both of them seem to prefer going on their perch given the other options (my shoulder for example) but mistakes happen. I attribute that mostly to my lack of follow-through though.

One thing I was always surprised by is the fact that neither of them ever went in or on my bed even when they slept with me through the night. Maybe they thought of it as their nest? On days when I didn't have to get up at 5am to go to work one or the other would literally hop up onto my head to wake me up so I would take them to their cage for their morning necessities.