Talkative Cockatiel

Question
I have a 3-month old pied grey cockatiel that is thought to be male who talks to himself all of the time.  He does scream when he can hear someone who's not in sight or when we come up the stairs and he can hear us, but that's not his typical talking noise.  when we're here in the room and he's in his cage, he makes this constant chatter seemingly to himself.  He makes every noise I've ever heard a cockatiel make, and then a few more, with chirps, twerps, static-noise, and several other noises I can't describe.  Often it's not loud, but sometimes it does escalate to nearly ear splitting.  He's completely silent when out of the cage and near humans, and even when I just walk up beside the cage. We're both students and sometimes need to study in the room and can't supervise him out of the cage while we're doing it, and the talking is just too much.  I've been trying to ignore him while he's talking and reward him when he's quiet like I would with a screamer, but he doesn't seem to understand and it doesn't seem like he's screaming for attention.  He's on a diet of a seed/pellet mix, and we're trying to get him back onto more vegetables, he's a little wary of them now.

On a seemingly unrelated note, he also just in the last couple of days started running away from my hands when he's out of the cage and on the floor or bed.  He knows the step up command, and was pretty good at it, and still will step up from finger to finger, just not from anywhere else to a finger.  We've never ad to grab him or anything, and he still comes right to a hand when in or near the cage.  I've also been feeding him a treat directly from my hand as a reward for stepping up and doing other good things.

So, my question is, is there anything that we can do about the constant talking, and should I be concerned about the running away from hands?  Thank you for your reply.

Casey

Answer
Hi, Casey.  Thanks for posting!

There isn't much you can do about the talking I'm afraid.  This behavior might change as your bird gets older.  Your new bird is perfectly normal and just trying to express himself!  Your bird would probably do just fine while out of his cage if you provided a play stand for him/her.  S/he wouldn't require that much supervision while out and when you have to study.  The only other options you have would be to put the bird in another room when you have to study or cover the cage during this period of time (making the inside of the cage dark usually results in a bird keeping quiet as if it were bedtime).  If you could arrange your study time around the time(s) when your bird is napping during the day or after s/he goes to bed at night, this could be a win-win situation for all of you.  Your bird needs 12 hours of sleep each night, so putting s/he to bed early would allow both of you time for study.  

Since it sounds like your tiel is tame, when s/he runs from your hands it most likely means s/he thinks you are going to put s/he in its cage, so s/he is running from your hands to avoid being put away.  You don't want your bird to fear your hands/fingers, but you need for your bird to do what you ask, so be insistent but not aggressive or threatening toward your bird when you need for the bird to step up.

Come back with any additional questions.

Chrys