Wednesday, September 8, 2010

It's me, not the bird

So, when I saw how well behaved Maui was compared with Manzi, of course I assumed that it had nothing to do with the owner and instead was purely genetics and age :) ! Manzi isn't really badly behaved, he is just very energetic, while Maui just stood in one spot most of the day. Now things have changed dramatically. Maui is getting more and more active every day. Today, she was in and out of her cage all day long, frequently going to her nest site to put it in order.
I opened the doors to her nest site (the bottom shelf of kitchen cabinets) so I could see inside. Now the rest of the egg carton is completely shredded and Maui has gone to work on the back of the cabinet. She has somehow gotten a hold of it and is chewing through the back (which unfortunately is getting in the way of her nest site's Feng Shui). Luckily the cabinet did not come with the apartment and I plan on tossing it when I leave.

Also, as I was quietly working, Maui was making quite a bit of noise. I looked over and she managed to get most of the water from her dish out onto the floor surrounding her cage in a weak attempt at taking a bath. The only part of her that ended up wet were her feet. I have heard of Greys doing this, but Manzi gets regular baths and has never tried to take any in his water dish. Anyway so it isn't genetics and something I am doing is making these birds highly energetic. Actually, I switched Maui to a healthier diet of pellets and fresh food so that might have something to do with it.

On a more positive note, they seem to be dealing with each other more effectively. I now leave them both out all day. They don't interact, but they do a good job of avoiding each other. I also did a training session and put them each on a chair 6" apart. Manzi did not threaten her even once and stayed very focused on me the entire time. After that, I put Manzi back and worked on target training Maui. She already figured it out, but is much slower at moving than Manzi so it takes her a lot longer to get over to the target.

I forgot to mention, Maui has now taken three flights all by herself. She is getting very confident at flying and will readily fly to her cage from my hand across the room. The flights she took by herself were only about 1-2 feet, but that is still a huge improvement over nothing. She is obviously realizing that she can fly and is now learning control.

Lastly, I will not be going to France and instead will go to Minnesota in late November. I'm not sure how I will bring Manzi out there (maybe we'll fly), but I'll decide soon enough.

1 comments:

Michael, Kili, Truman said...

I pity Maui's owner... What have you done to his bird??? He won't be able to tell which one is Maui and which is Manzi the runt :p

blogger templates | Make Money Online