Lillie

Question
Hi Dianna,
I wrote to you a while back about our baby umbrella cockatoo, which was hand reared for which I helped. I have another question if you don't mind. Lilly is now over 5 months and when she is excited she nips very hard, sometimes drawing blood. Lillie is kept in the family room so she always has company. She has a large cage and we alternate her toys every other day so she doesn't get bored. How do we prevent this as we don't want her to get worse. She comes out at least 3 times a day for upto an hour each time. When she bite's we say no to her firmly and if she persists we put her away for 5 minute's. I know it is recommended to clip their wings but don't really want to do this. Can you suggest anything else. Kind regards Jacqueline

Answer
Hi, Jacqueline,

I picked your question up from the question pool.  Evidently, Dianna couldn't answer it.

One thing about big parrots, you have to watch their body language in order to help determine what is going on with them.  When parrots are "excited," this can be good excited or bad excited.  You can see excitement by watching their eyes.  When their pupils dialate back and forth, this can mean good excited or bad excited.  I prefer to not interact too closely with big parrots when their eyes are dialating like this because chances are you are going to be biten!  Therefore, you are learning the behavior of your Too.  At 5 months of age, your Too is testing you and tryin to learn what you will allow her to get away with and what you won't.  

You are doing good with your training, however, I might add that you can avoid getting into situations like this that require some type of reaction from you by watching the bird's eyes.  When her pupils are flaring, do not attempt to touch the bird.  It's best to avoid the situation than it is to try and correct the bad behavior.

Trimming flight feathers isn't going to stop this type of behavior.  Trimming flight feathers only stops them from gaining altitude when they fly.

Chrys