Birds are flock animals that need to bond, and need to have a leader. When you adopt a bird be ready to spend time with it so that it can bond with you. Often, people think that clipping a bird’s wings is cruel because it takes away the gift of flight. However, nothing could be further from the truth. If a bird can fly it will not feel as strong a need to bond with you. If it has bonded with you it will be happy just to climb around the cage, play with its toys, sample the many treats you place in the cage and listen to you talk to it. When it wants to, it will cling to a perch and give its wings a furious workout. These small feathered animals love sound the way dogs enjoy scent. You will probably notice that a bird will get animated and noisy even if you have just turned on the kitchen faucet. Some birds even enjoy watching television, and it can be a good idea to leave the TV on to a nature channel when you are not home.
The first step to bonding with the bird is to get it to step up onto your finger. If your bird bites, let it do so. If you jerk your finger away the bird will know that it can use biting against you. If you allow it to bite, it will decide it is not an effective method of communicating and will stop doing it. Put your finger in the cage, in front of the bird’s chest, and tell him to step up. Press your finger against his chest, so that he has to step onto your finger. Reward him with some spray millet. If his wings are clipped you can work with him out of the cage in an enclosed area.
Often times people will see somebody with a parrot on their shoulder and believe the person is trying to draw attention to him or herself. The truth is that the bird wants to be on the shoulder of its master, and in fact, probably thinks that being on the shoulder of its master is a great way for it to draw attention to itself. If you do adopt a bird and leave it in a corner somewhere without giving it any attention, be ready to have a bird that shrieks and picks at its feathers. This is what birds do when they are stressed. They love socializing, being spoken to, and being in the middle of all the activities that go on in the house. These tiny animals have huge personalities that really come out when they have bonded with their owner.
