cant train

Question
hi!
i have 5 parakeets and one of the parakeets i seperated him to another cage because the others are mating. since then, i wanted to train him but i didnt cut his wings so he always flys away from me. how can i make him stop? i really want to finger train him.

Answer
Hi again, Katelyn.

You can't make the bird stop flying away from you unless his wing flight feathers are clipped properly.  With clipped flight feathers, your bird won't be able to gain altitude and will be at your mercy to get from point A to point B.  This is the first thing you need to do when trying to finger tame this bird.  Otherwise, the bird will always fly away from you because he isn't tame.  

Once his flight feathers are properly clipped, one way of trying to tame this bird is to take the bird into a room in your home where the bird can't see or get to his cage.  If the bird can see his cage, he will always try to get to it because it represents security for him.  Once in the room, just put the bird down and start talking to him and interacting with him.  At first, the bird will be scared and wanting to search around in the room, and that's OK...let the bird do this.  Then put the bird back in it's cage until another taming session later in the day.  Each time you work with this bird, you'll need to get and keep his attention because once you lose his attention, you'll need to end the session.  Keep your sessions with this bird short...3-4 minutes at first and then add time as long as you can keep the bird's attention.  Have several taming sessions with your bird per day if your schedule allows.  

Another method you could try would be to place this bird's cage near where you spend time in the evening, such as watching TV, playing video games, sewing or whatever it is you do in the evenings or during the day and just allow this bird to be a part of this.  Just open the cage door (flight feathers would have to be clipped) and let the bird come out on his own.  Go about your business and see what happens.  Keets are curious and as long as this bird can't see or get to the other pairs of birds (you'll need to keep them where this bird can't see/hear them), his curiosity will get the best of him and he'll come out and investigate what you are doing.  It may take him weeks to come out on his own, but he'll eventually come out.  Don't force him to do anything at first...let him get used to all this new stuff and take one step at a time.

It isn't easy to tame and untame bird.  It takes much time and lots of patience and knowledge of bird behavior.

There's more information about this on my website...I know I gave you the web address.  Another good site...www.birdchannel.com.

Chrys