{"id":71679,"date":"2018-08-02T17:42:15","date_gmt":"2018-08-02T22:42:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/windycityparrot.com\/blog\/?p=9574"},"modified":"2018-08-02T17:42:15","modified_gmt":"2018-08-02T22:42:15","slug":"i-have-an-8-yr-old-white-bellied-caique-that-chews-everything","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/?p=71679","title":{"rendered":"How Do I Stop an 8 Yr. Old White-bellied Caique From Chewing Everything?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hello,<\/span><\/p>\n

I love your birdie brunch and read it first thing every Sunday. Thank you!<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I hope you can help me.<\/span><\/p>\n

I have an 8 yr. old white-bellied Caique. <\/span><\/p>\n

Conrad has owned me since he was 3 months old. <\/span><\/p>\n

I am also a strong proponent of flighted birds (seems to me they were made that way), so Conrad is fully-flighted. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

He’s delightful and we are strongly bonded. He’s really a great bird and good company. HOWEVER, I don’t seem to be able to stop him from chewing on everything in sight. <\/span><\/p>\n

He has numerous toys of varying types and textures in all his houses (currently 3, not including travel), <\/span><\/p>\n

but when he’s out he chews on furniture, window sills, molding, electric cords, shoes, to name a few. <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I’ve tried rewarding him with cuddles and praise when he stops chewing when I tell him to, and giving him “time-outs” when he doesn’t stop, but either he doesn’t get the message or he doesn’t give a darn. <\/span><\/p>\n

I’m on the East Coast (CT), do you know of any bird whisperers in this area? <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He’d be so much better company and have more out time if I could get him to stop the destructive chewing.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Thanks for any help.<\/span><\/p>\n

Maeve Lucey<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Maeve – Maeve – Maeve<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The chewing birds do is called foraging. You’re treating it as bad behavior but it’s an instinctual behavior much like reading and making bird noises.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Your Caique has no idea why you are trying to change his behavior through behavior modification.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He has toys in all of his cages which he chews.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It is opaque to me why you are expecting his behavior to change while not in the cage.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A bird has no idea that there’s a difference between a bird toy with buttons and bells and a remote control.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A live electrical lamp cord is as attractive to him as a strand of leather hanging from a toy.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He’s not being a bad bird he’s being a bird.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Your problem is not a behavioral problem it’s an environmental problem.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You’ll not change the behavior of the bird but you can change the environment. <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You mentioned he has lots of cages but I am not seeing the words bird stands.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In our house there are 1 to 3 bird stands in every room in the house.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Whenever we put Peaches our Senegal, down – it’s on a stand that she can do anything she wants on it.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Some are fancy some are not but most have a cup for food or at least some treats.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

When possible I add toys to give her something to do other than eating furniture and household accessories.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Here is a 20-year-old stand we still use.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I’ve added a ladder that leads down to a foraging area on the stand base you cannot see but the video illustrates how I’ve re-purposed a toy that normally hangs and made it vertical.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I place Peaches on the top.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After a while she’ll get bored climb down the ladder for exercise and have some treats then climb back up.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

If I see she has that needy look in her eyes I will grab and pet her for a while then move her to another stand with another ladder, toys and treats.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I cannot keep her from going on our human furniture but I can offer her alternatives which provide comfort zones.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Birds are unable to make the distinction between $100 birds stand and $6000 armoires – they’re both wood.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I pride myself on being creative, a couple of years ago, I sprained my leg and was relegated to bed.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Senegal<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Not wanting to keep Peaches stuck in her cage she stayed on the swing I had hung from a reading lamp (note vet wrap for grip at the top) previously.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The swing I chose has enough shapes and sizes that she can climb the swing to get to the top of the lamp.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I brought in her \u201cdad\u2019s desk stand\u201d in the background as a secondary place for her to perch. Newspaper covers the nightstand (and the floor next to it) She has a heavy ceramic crock (won\u2019t tip) for food. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A drawer full of Lafeber’s Nutriberries and she gets water from my plastic drinking mug that I offer her throughout the day.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It stays covered so she can’t try to help herself, fall in and drown.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Simply put – you’ll never get your bird to stop chewing destructively. You can get your bird to destroy <\/span>appropriate objects<\/span><\/i> though.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Check out our free and do-it-yourself bird toy category\u00a0\u00a0<\/a><\/span><\/span>to see lots of household ideas and then stake out areas in your home on the surface of tables or uncrowded areas on the floor.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Then give Conrad lots of fun toys and treats to play with within those designated birdie areas.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You will be babysitting for a while but I think you’ll find Conrad will appreciate having his own little sandboxes outside of his many cages.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Hope that helps<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Caveat: getting tens of thousands of words into a usable format that hundreds of thousands of readers can get on any sized screen requires an armada of computers. Enough to intimidate the last Comcast guy when he was here.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Popcorn our cockatiel was enchanted with small wires and it didn’t take much to render the wires from a mouse or some headphones worthless in a single chomp. She was flighted but liked to explore things on foot and the three desktop computers were very attractive to her. <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This was my solution<\/span><\/p>\n

\"computer<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Six feet of wet vac holds – she never went near the wires again.<\/span><\/p>\n

Written by Mitch Rezman
\nApproved by Catherine Tobsing<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hello, I love your birdie brunch and read it first thing every Sunday. Thank you!   I hope you can help me. I have an 8 yr. old white-bellied Caique. Conrad has owned me since he was 3 months old. I am also a strong proponent of flighted birds (seems to me they were made […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":124535,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_eb_attr":"","_mo_disable_npp":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[195,196,188,197,256],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bird-parrot-care","category-bird-behavior","category-bird-cage-info","category-bird-enviornments","category-caique"],"acf":[],"featured_image_src":{"landsacpe":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/caique-white-bellied-7.jpg?resize=600%2C445&ssl=1",600,445,true],"list":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/caique-white-bellied-7.jpg?resize=463%2C348&ssl=1",463,348,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/caique-white-bellied-7.jpg?fit=300%2C300&ssl=1",300,300,true],"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/caique-white-bellied-7.jpg?fit=600%2C600&ssl=1",600,600,false]},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/caique-white-bellied-7.jpg?fit=600%2C600&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/phcfkq-iE7","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=71679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/124535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=71679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=71679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.windycityparrot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=71679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}