# how to get my parents cockatiels to stop biting and chewing



## maryam83 (Sep 19, 2009)

hi

my parents have a mixture of some cockatiels and parakeets. Two of the cockatiels are big biters and love to bite and chew items. They don't bite people... but they love to come out of their cage. They bite EVERYTHING. They will shred any papers they find. They love to fly on top of doors and bite the door. They will literally bite until bits of the door are coming off. They fly on the bookshelves and bite the books. I could go on............

Other than that...they are very sweet and loving birds. Does anyone have any tips or advice? Confining them to their cages isnt an option..because they love to come out of their cages. 

thanks!


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## Mythara (Apr 9, 2009)

Firstly, when you take them out, take any paper things you don't want chewed up away, books, paper, everything. It's just too tempting for them to resist, lol. Try to block off the places they chew - closing the door so they can't get up there, puting ornaments or soft toys on the bookcase, etc. Sometimes if they're afraid of something you can use it as a deterant - I've heard of someone whose bird was afraid of mirrors, so they put them in places where they didn't want her to chew.

Next get lots of chew toys for them to play with. We have foot toys everywhere to distract our birds. Munch balls, lolly sticks, paper sticks, blocks of wood - balsa is a favourite in our house, seagrass, their own supply of paper, etc. Some of these things you can get from parrot shops online pretty cheaply, others you can find in craft shops, and best of all, are all the pet shops that sell small chew toys for rodents, especially ones made of willow and vine. Here's my blog post on using toys sold for small furries for your birds, and some examples of what you can buy: http://www.feathersandforage.co.uk/?p=758 There's also ideas for foot toys, which are great for out of the cage play, as well as inside the cage, if you have a look around my blog.

Another thing you can try is foraging. If your birds have never done it before, you might need to teach them how (there's a guide to teaching your birds to forage here: http://www.feathersandforage.co.uk/?page_id=647 ) The ones I find are best for out of the cage are the foraging tray, millet-trap, ice cube tray, paper boxes, snapology ball, pinecones, and the log in this post. None of these need to hang, and can be given to birds anywhere, and for the most part they can be made with things you have lying around at home. Once they've got the idea of how to forage, I haven't heard of a single bird that didn't enjoy it. 

'Tiels will always chew and bite things. It's an integral part of what they are, and you really can't stop them doing it. The best thing to do is divert them to things they can chew on, and destroy. =)


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## tielfan (Aug 31, 2008)

Cockatiels do love to chew - it's their second favorite activity. (Making more cockatiels is their top favorite activity.) Mythara has given you some excellent tips - basically give them things that are OK to chew and keep them away from things that aren't OK to chew. If you have bird-safe trees in your back yard you can give them small branches to gnaw on, those are very popular with my tiels. Be sure to clean the branches well first of course.


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## Bev3801 (Nov 9, 2009)

.

Wow . . . some great ideas on that Feathers & Forage website! My 'tiels are young and not tame so I've been working on teaching them to forage. Now I have some more great ideas!!!

What I've done so far is hang a small wicker basket (that I got on a rabbit site) in their cage and I filled it with tiny popsicle sticks, small pieces of bird-safe leather, a couple of small wicker balls and buried several pieces of millet under the toys. I got home from work at lunch time and the millet was gone and several of the toys were on the floor of the cage.

They're learning!:clap:


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## Mythara (Apr 9, 2009)

Bev3801 said:


> .
> 
> Wow . . . some great ideas on that Feathers & Forage website!


Thank you.  I'm glad it's helping you out. It gets hard to keep coming up with new ideas, but I think I've come up with a couple of new ones to try out on the birds this weekend. =)


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## Bev3801 (Nov 9, 2009)

.
And I forgot to say that the rest of your blog looks great! I did notice some terrific toy ideas and I can't wait to check out the rest of it when I have time this weekend.


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