untame IRN

[heathmcc]

Hi! I've recently rehomed an idian ringneck that is one year old. He came from an owner who had 17 birds. 7 of them were IRNs. She is a good parront, but recently became ill and then needed to reduce her flock. Because of her illness I don't believe he had been handled much recently. He is very skittish around my hands. He tried to fly away so much that he broke a couple of blood feathers that had to be pulled. He also scratched his eye. I'm not sure of the best way to tame him. I'm looking for any ideas.

[tielfan]

I don't have any IRN expertise, but here's some general advice for dealing with a frightened bird. Don't try to force any human contact on him; you'll have to gain his trust and gradually work your way up to any kind of touching.

More specific advice depends on the situation, so please provide more info. What exactly is making him try to escape - is it when you try to touch him, for step up or anything else? When you put your hand in the cage to deliver food? When you come within a certain distance of the cage? Does the mere sight of a human being freak him out?

[fluffy_stitch]

hi,i had almost the same situitation with my ringneck too,she was about a year old when i got her and used to freak when i went near her and ended up breaking a lot of feathers too,i think she was an aviary bird so i dont think she had ever been handled,i had very little success with her until i had her wings clipped because everytime she was out of the cage she would just fly as far away from me as she could get,after she was clipped i got her used to sitting on a perch that i was holding and would take her to another room sitting on the perch and would put raisins or nuts between my fingers and let her take them,then slowly she got used to this and started to step onto my hand and run up to my shoulder but she was still afraid of my hands so i started to hold the raisins tightly between my knuckles so that she couldnt just take them and run and she eventually got confident enough to stay on my hands instead of just running up to my shoulder,this took a couple of months because she was very scared,eventually she got used to me enough that i would just take her out of the cage on the perch and she would step straight onto my hands without too much trouble,i have her for about five months and she is still a bit scared of my hands and doesnt like to be stroked or scritched but is getting better every day,she is still scared of me putting my hands into her cage and only just started letting me take her out of her cage with my hand instead of the perch this week so its taken along time but its worth the effort,i hope this helps a little,let us know how you get on with him! :)

[heathmcc]

Boo was turning his back every time I walked up to his cage. He's getting al ittle better. I can put my hands in his cage to clean or put food in bowls as long as I am far away from him.. I was trying to get him to step up on my hand both in and outside of his cage and that's when he freaked out. The previous owner said that he would step up, but he hadn'tbeen handled for awhile. Thanks for any help!

[fluffy_stitch]

you could try turning your head away from him and not looking at him at all when you are cleaning the cage or feeding him,it should help him to stay a little calmer.

[larrylow]

Hi, I recently acquired a 5 month old lutino IRN. The previous owner had to let it go as he was moving into an apartment. It's a hand-fed but lacked interaction for nearly a month prior to my taking over. It was very skittish initially. When it was calm I placed my hand into the cage to transfer it into its new home. Silly me! I got my fingers pretty chewed up. Taking the pain I placed it into its new cage and left it there for another 3 days to get accustomed to its new surroundings. After the "cool off" period I noticed that it was a little less nervous when i approached its cage. I then proceeded to use a wooden dowel to get it to "step up" and after much coaxing I managed to get it to "step up" onto the dowel long enough to get it out of the cage. Having done so I tried to get it to step up onto my finger and all i got was beak and later blood (mine)!. Taking the pain I calmly placed it back onto the "T-Perch" and proceeded with the "step-Up" with dowel for the next 15 minutes (nursing the pain in silence!). I have been doing this for the past few days and it seems to respond to the step up command pretty well. Yesterday I wrapped my index finger with some flesh coloured bandage and managed to get it to step up unto my finger. The bandage does cushion the bite but at least I get to say "no bite" this time instead of biting my tongue to camouflage the immense pain. I shall keep this up for the next few days until I am almost sure that it will not bite my finger when I attempt a bandage less lift off! I have used this technique with wild Long tailed Parakeets (a close relative with a much bigger beak) with much success. They don't freak out as much with flesh coloured bandage (I use the 3M self adhesive COBan) as compared to using gloves (that is a No No!). The hand still looks pretty natural and from experience once the bird knows that your hand and finger is not an enemy and is quite used to perching on it without fear, it will normally stop biting it. I know what you are going through. I will keep you posted on my progress. best of Luck.