# Hand shy, but wants out



## DigiSaint (Mar 26, 2013)

Forgive me if this has been asked already, but I've been reading a bit about how to hand train a cockatiel and I've run into an interesting situation. 

We got our little grey cockatiel "Kirby" when he was 3 months old and he has been living with us for a month now. I was told that he was hand-fed and already socialized, but even after a month of settling in he is still very aggressive towards hands in his cage and will hiss and nip at us when we offer him a hand perch.

He seems to have no problem eating things out of our hands and will happily eat his seed mixture from our palms or take sunflower seeds from us when we offer them to him, but a hand without food makes him either angry or slowly retreat to the back of his cage.

The odd situation is, he has started showing me that he REALLY wants to come out of his cage and in the morning I always find him standing at the bottom of his cage pacing back and forth in front of the door and he gets all excited when I approach because he knows I'm going to open it.

When I open the door, I slowly set my hand on the bottom frame of the cage door for him to step onto and use the "step up" command (which seems to obey occasionally when he's outside his cage), but he still runs away. If I remove my hand, he runs to edge of the cage door frame and flutters his way to the ground and takes off running. When he is out he explores my office, heads over to the window and chirps to the birds outside and I feed him sunflower seeds from the floor. He seems to enjoy being out.

*So long story short:*
I want him to know that my hand is a safe place and want to be able to have some measure of control over him when he's out of the cage, so I think it's better that he get used to the idea that he doesn't come out of his cage unless he comes out on a hand - at least until he's more tame. I've had to close the cage and leave him standing behind it looking sad that the past few mornings because he wouldn't step up. 

Is this a bad solution? I don't want to leave him cooped up in the cage if he wants to come out, but I don't want him to get used to just flying out of the cage anytime the door opens either.


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## bjknight93 (Nov 13, 2011)

That is a bad solution. You should not punish your bird for being fearful. Let your bird come out of its cage on its own each day and then work with him on the floor. 

The first thing you need to do is teach him the command 'step up' and take his fear away. Use a perch to train instead of your hand. He will not learn to step up if he is focused on being fearful of your hand. So, use a perch, ask him to step up..and each time he does give hima treat (millet, sunflower seed, whatever he likes). Once he masters this..meaning that he does not ever run away or 'tell' you no..then you may attempt to bring your hand closer and closer to the part of the perch where he is stepping onto. Eventually he will be stepping onto your hand and the perch. At that point you can ditch the perch and use only your hand. 

Only train for a couple minutes at a time..let him play for a while..and try again. If he runs away (out of fear, likely) during training leave him be and try again in a few minutes. Once he does not appear to be fearful of your hand you can begin weaning out the treats.


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## DigiSaint (Mar 26, 2013)

Ok, I'm just worried that if I left him get out without being comfortable with me & my hand that it will cause more trauma when I have to struggle / chase him to put him back in once it's time to go back in his cage.

I just thought that consistently offering a hand when I KNOW he wants to come out would help him slowly get over the fear of it.


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## Cece4 (Mar 14, 2013)

What if they are afraid of the perch? Mine are and hands.But shoulders are okay and will step up on my shoulder if I bend down a bit for them to step on it.

Sorry not hijacking the thread.Just wondering.


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## Seven11 (Feb 25, 2012)

Cece4: one word.....millet its the only way I can get Buddie to step up on a perch or my finger.

Sent from my PG06100 using Tapatalk 2


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