# Birds that are (or used to be) scared of hands



## moonchild (Jul 29, 2012)

Astrid used to be afraid of me, but recently she has begun showing that she wants to be friends. However, she is still wary, and only taking baby steps. She only approaches me when I'm sitting down at my desk, for one thing. She likes to sit on the back of my chair and preen my hair, and she has climbed on my shoulder if I'm wearing a t-shirt, but she doesn't like touching my skin. And she doesn't want my hands anywhere near her. I think she was grabbed in her previous home, and I don't think she was a hand-fed baby.

I know she may never like hands, and I don't intend to force anything on her. In the beginning, I tried to stick train her and it just ended up stressing her out badly. So I took a totally hands-off approach, figuring if she ever wanted to make friends she would let me know. I half-expected her to remain a wild bird forever, so her recent friendliness caught me by surprise, but I'm obviously thrilled. I've still been giving her lots of millet by hand, and I also give the other birds scritches while she is nearby (she watches intently). If she ever hops onto my desk, I hold my hand very still and let her explore around it. I can see her watching out of the corner of her eye, ready to scram if the hand were to get too close.

Just wondering, for those with birds who have overcome (or mostly overcome) a fear of hands: what was/were the "breakthrough" moments? Did you actively do anything train them, or did they just get more comfortable and trusting of hands over time? This hands-off approach of letting her call the shots seems to be working well, so I'm inclined to continue with it, but I'm just curious. I'm guessing the next thing she will do when she works up the courage is start flying to my shoulder and my head.


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## Kiwi (May 12, 2013)

I spent every waking moment of the week with Kiwi when I got him. He hated hands because of the way he had been chased by towels at the pet shop. He associated hands with words like 'catching' and 'chasing' and 'bad'. When my family saw him they said I should return him because of behavioral problems (lots of biting and hissing), I told them he was just misunderstood and scared. I just spent lots of time with him, gave him lots of treats for being a good boy after, and let him roam around when he flew off me. I kept him out of trouble and let him walk around until he was ready to come to me. I think letting him come to me was really the first breakthrough moment of trust.
Then the second moment was when instead of flying away from me or nipping my finger... Kiwi gently let me pet his head a few times. He glared at me the whole time and hissed afterwards. But the next day he lowered his head for scritches and cooed. In two weeks he became the most loving snuggle-buns ever. :3
I think letting them call the shots is the best thing to do. And as they get more trusting and see you as a source of comfort instead of 'hands in the face!!' they will open up to you more. Just lots of slow movements, shoulder, and face time will make it go faster.


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## catalinadee (Jan 1, 2011)

A lot of the time I have training breakthrough moments, moments where they understand what I am asking for them. Then on occasions I get moments where the bird is happy to just come over to me 

My orange winged Amazon parrot, Clyde, is a good example of this. I had not done really any training with him except getting him to take a treat from a bowl, baby steps! I then had him flying across the room to other cages to get one of his treats but it was rare he did this and the only reason I wanted him to do it was because he was/is one fat parrot. When I walked into the room last week, we had one of those completely random breakthrough moments. The 3 big greens (him and my two Alexandrines) have out of cage time all day in the room as it is completely bird safe and I was putting some plates out on top of the cages so they could tuck in. I had my back to him while he was on the cage top playstand and next thing I know I'm feeling a very heavy weight on my shoulder...



Keep in mind that he is one fearful bird!


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## Vickitiel (Oct 10, 2012)

That's gorgeous, I love Amazons.


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

With Snowball, there wasn't one moment in particular that stood out. He slowly just started inching closer to coming out of the cage on his own. Then sitting near me, then moving closer to get millet from me. Once I could get him to step up it made things a lot easier. Actually getting to pet him took more time, but he really warmed up after he got over his initial fear. It helped that I had three other birds who loved to spend time with me whether I had millet or not. I prefer the hands on approach too, it allows them to come to you on their own terms, they are in control of how far they go. Less biting that way.


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## bjknight93 (Nov 13, 2011)

Taz was and still is scared of me. However, things have been made easier because I've recently done step-up training with ALL my birds...but I mainly started it with him in mind. Poor Allie was so desperate to get on my hand to receive the millet that she was interfering with everyone else's training! Anyways I've only done one day of training and already seen wonders of improvement with Taz. 

P.S. Everyone already knew to step up before but I had not paired it with a word or reward effectively.


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## moonchild (Jul 29, 2012)

Thanks for the responses, guys! Sorry for the lack of reply. I think it's just going to take a lot of time with Astrid. She'll make a breakthrough, then regress and seem scared of me for no reason. I guess it's just her way of processing things. She did step on a perch I was holding for millet the other day, which was kind of big for her. She'll come right up to my hands for millet usually, but if I hold the millet so that she has to touch the hand, she immediately gets my intent and gets nervous. Even if I don't move toward her at all, she's like "Yeah, I'm not falling for that" (she is a very sharp one).


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