Carly Lu’s Flight Blog

This is an excerpt from a post I made to the Good Bird group this week:

Carly started barbering (snipping feather tips) last February when she was 3 years old. It coincided with the first instances of nesting- or mating-type behaviors (shredding paper, cardboard, wood, when she had never chewed at all before, and becoming obsessed with seeking out men at the beach to the point where she was uncontrollable.) She snipped her lower belly and the top of her wings, and it subsided in late spring.

This year her chewing started in December, along with some new behaviors such as incessantly seeking out small dark places (in bookcases, cupboards) and doing the squat-and-grunt routine (this has even occurred during a target training session). I have been doing extensive training with her to remedy her flying to strangers, and so far that has not been a problem; we’re just about back to normal flying routines, though I am very cautious to look for signs of distraction.

This year those behaviors are accompanied by even worse snipping of feather tips, all the way up her chest, further down her wings, and repeated snipping to the point where she now has patches of skin showing along her keel.

I took Carly out flying this afternoon at the beach and she did great. It’s starting to be fun again! Afterwards, in the office, she and Piper were playing with toys and preening. And as she was preening, she snipped, snipped, snipped. This is when she normally does it, during her usual preening. Preens gently down the feather shaft, then at the end, snip!

She’s getting daily baths, lots of foraging toys, twice daily training sessions, socializing, and flying
every few days. Today she had all of that, came home and ate dinner, then started relaxed preening alongside Piper. Within 10 minutes she had snipped off 20 feathers.

Carly is rarely caged, and since learning from Susan F and others a few years ago I make a concerted effort to “empower through choice” as much as possible in all of our daily routines.

I know it is an unpopular diagnosis, but this seems related to the onset of sexual maturity. Whether it is an excess of hormones, sexual frustration, or what, I don’t know. But as this is still early in the season, I am seriously considering something like Lupron injections. Just very frustrating. I am taking her in to my very good avian vet next week for a consult and exam to check other possible causes.

But maybe this puts to rest the idea that birds who are flighted, go outdoors, and have lots of enrichment don’t engage in FDB?

I know, it’s hardly spring by any measure, but Carly is into nesting mode again. She spends much time shredding paper and crawling into small spaces like the nooks in bookcases. I can hardly open a cupboard without her trying to fly into it. I have to leave stacks of newspapers on top of her favorite places so she doesn’t shred books and files. I packed my Christmas presents with the piles of finely shredded newspaper she had created.

I have decided to start training some new tricks. It’s been a long time since we have done anything new, and I hope it will give her some more mental stimulation in a good direction, as well as more opportunities for positive reinforcement in general.

A strange thing happened last night when we started one of our new tricks. Part of it involves incorporating a turn-around and when she would get to that part instead of turning around she began to crouch low, hold her wings out from her body slightly, and make low grunting noises. Never seen this before. It looked a lot like a mating type behavior. sigh

When she was heavily into her nesting behaviors last year, she went through a phase of snipping the feather tips on her belly. (I’ve heard this called a “brood patch” that some birds make where their body will be in contacts eggs when sitting.) It went on for a few months last spring, and she has started that again too. I’m hoping some more bathing and getting a humidifier in here will help a bit. Oddly, it’s not something she does when she’s alone or not getting attention. It’s often when she is doing her regular preening, while hanging out in the evening on her perch or my laptop. Very distressing to see a beautiful fresh feather tip land on my keyboard.

Wendy calls her “one of those oversexed young girls.” Ah, adolescence….

Just came across an excellent blog post that got me thinking about the huge humidity swings we are having in southern California this year. One week we are having cold rain and fog, the next a warm and extremely dry Santa Ana wind. We’re having the latter this week, and I’ve noticed much more vigorous preening going on with Carly and Piper. It was actually on my mind in the wee hours tonight before I just happened on this post by Jamie in Austin.

Importance of Humidity for Companion Parrots

For background see Carly’s Super-Generalizing Recall Training.

Bad weather last weekend so we did some outings to indoor locations for socializing (and acclimation of Piper). We’ve been continuing to practice regularly before meals indoors, including some “emergency recalls” using a whistle and super-treats. We took a beach outing Saturday afternoon.

Set-up: she was barely below at-lib weight (458 g / at-lib 460) and we went out about 1-2 hrs after her normal first meal time. It was very warm and sunny, with a strong breeze from a Santa Ana wind. Used a variety of treats: butter toffee peanuts (super-treat), sunflower seeds (average), and peanut-butter cracker (jackpot, end of session).

Behavior: She did very energetic medium distance flights, dived over the waters, got some seagulls to chase her. We were approached by people a couple times. The second time there were 4 people who wanted to talk a lot, including a red-haired guy. She wanted to fly to him so I cued her to to go to his arm and back to me. That worked fine and she did quite a few of those back and forth between me and all four visitors. Didn’t get over-excited by the RHG. When we moved along she didn’t try to fly back. She did a very long flight but came right back to me at the end and made no stops along the way. Called it a day then with some jackpot treats as we headed back in.

Other notes:
Very good day. Carly got to experience many reinforcers: flying in wind, flying with gulls, and flying to and from other people, including a RHG. Kept her focus well.

Took Piper out on harness by himself afterwards.

For background see Carly’s Super-Generalizing Recall Training.

After a week or so of outings (on-leash) to public places for socializing, we took a trip to the beach yesterday.

Set-up: Her weight was 451 (at lib is 460). It was early afternoon, a little past when she normally gets her first meal, so she was due for that. There were more people than I expected on a foggy winter day, but it was a holiday. So we had a few distractions, including people approaching us which is always risky. We used super-treats for everything (butter toffee peanuts).

Behavior: Recall was very tight. But she did a lot of small to medium size flies, out and looping directly back in. This weight/meal timing is more than sufficient. I had to run alongside and encourage her to take some of the longer flights. I brought along a jackpot for the last flight of the day, walking back in (peanut butter ritz bits). We also did a few A-B recalls to someone we met at the beach, and it did not distract her from further flying as it sometimes has in the past. I’ll probably keep this weight and set up for a few sessions or more.

Other notes:
One thing I used to do at the beach that I’ve started up again is having Carly fly to someone she’s interested in, then call her back to me for a favorite treat, repeat… (I’ve seen her do this for over half an hour before!) That way she gets the socializing and also is reinforced for coming back. We did this a bit yesterday. It worked fine and she didn’t become obsessed and try to keep flying back when we moved on.

Continuing education of the parrot kind.

Background. About a year into Carly’s outdoor freeflying she developed a problem: wanting to fly to other people and socialize. Certain people were especially favored (the infamous Red-Haired Guys). The occurred at the same time she was displaying many nesting behaviors at home. Other changes that I identified in retrospect were that we spent much less time at social events once she became well-flighted; most opportunities for socializing were during our freeflying outings. I had also stopped doing routine A-B recall training; almost all her flying was outdoors in a very free form manner.

As long the person was nearby and I could immediately retrieve her the problem with going to strangers was not critical, though it was far from ideal. But on a couple occasions she flew behind a building and landed on someone out of my sight. Both times we were very fortunate that her choice was someone who was honest and attempted to locate Carly’s owner. But I did not find who had her for several hours (6 hrs the first time, 3 hrs the second) and after much searching. Both times it was an ad placed immediately online in a local lost-and-found listing that reunited us relatively quickly. But not quickly enough to save me many hours of worry that she might have been taken by someone with no intention of returning her. I do not want to risk that any more, so we are attempting to “Super-duperize” the generalization for freeflight recall so that she is not distracted by opportunities to make new friends.

Observations. Some things I noted that might be relevant to this training:

• There appear to be different kinds of environmental distractions for her. Things that would often spook a parrot affect her very little. However there are also distractions that are not negative, but provide some type of reinforcement of their own. For her one of these is socializing. A rough ranking of what appears to be the value of some of her reinforcers is:
  1. Flying with gulls (chasing them, being chased)
  2. Flying in a strong breeze
  3. Food rewards (variable, depending on weight, hunger, how favored the food is)
  4. Socializing with certain people, including strangers, and especially red-haired men.
  5. Sitting/playing in trees (hanging upside down, climbing, singing)
• The beach seems to provide a better flying environment not because there are fewer people (unless it’s summer, there are about the same number there as at the park) but because the flying itself is more reinforcing and it takes some time before she has satiated this and becomes interested in socializing.

With these and Carly’s training history in mind, it’s time for…

The plan. After discussing the situation with some professional trainers to help define what was occurring and what could be done to help, I formulated a plan to “super-duper generalize” her recall outdoors and make it socialization-resistant. I’m employing several strategies: 1) increase the value of reinforcers for recall, 2) decrease the value of reinforcement from socializing, 3) use socializing itself as reinforcement for recall, and 4) increase the consistency of our routine.

• Resume a very firm routine of A-B recall practice indoors and outdoors. (This part I had started before the second event above, but it was not enough for less interesting flying environments.)
• Start with weight at the lower end of her normal range, and fly before her first meal of the day. Her at-lib weight is 455-465 grams. For the first phase I will fly outdoors when she is no more than 450-455. Any lower than that and she is too focused on the food if she has not had her first meal yet. From previous experience, timing of meals can be very effective with her and weight does not have to be dropped very long or very much. But we’re starting out safe.
• Initially fly only at the beach, in the winter, on the end with fewest people. This gives much more lead time for watching body language before she becomes interested in flying to other people to socialize with.
• Incorporate A-B recall games with other people on our outings. If someone approaches us and Carly takes interest, allow her to fly to the person on cue, and then call her back with a favored reward. (This is a game she will sometimes continue for quite some time.)
• Use extremely favored treats initially when outdoors, then intersperse with others. (For example, toffee peanuts, popcorn, peanut butter. Normal treats are walnuts, almonds, sunflower seeds.)
• Increase the value of the end-of-session bonus treat. I typically provide a whole almond or two at the end of a flying session, as we are walking back. Initially this will be increased to a small cracker with peanut butter, then varied.
• Add outings to our schedule that are exclusively for socializing, not flying. The goal is to increase opportunities to get this reinforcement in a safe environment, and decrease the value of it when we’re flying outdoors.
• Practice the “emergency recall” indoors with a special cue (metal whistle) and extra special treats. This has been described by Barbara Heidenreich in her Good Bird Magazine, Summer 2008 issue.
• UPDATE: Carly’s normal meal items are very reinforcing indoors (she will train with things such as sprouted sunflower or pumpkin seeds). To increase the value of reinforcers, I’m switching to a base pellet diet with vegetables, using sprouts, berries, and fruit for rewards as well as the usual nuts. There are a few diets like Lafebre’s that both she and Piper like, but I’m going to try putting all the really favored foods into the training routine. That also provides a lot more variety in rewards, which has worked well with her in the past. It also allows for longer training sessions.

Progress. Blog entries from our training sessions will be linked here.

Log 1: Beach Outing, 12 Jan 2009

Log 2: Beach Outing, 11 Jan 2009

Log 3. Generalizing Recall Update, 1 Feb 2009

1-year update: Partnership not Possession

For more in-depth account of my training as a trainer, see:
Freeflight for Companion Parrots: Beyond the How-to, 9 July 2009

Thanks to Barbara Heidenreich and Sid Price for their helpful advice and observations, and also to my friend and fellow trainer trainee Cynthia Schutte for asking many difficult questions! And to my most important mentor, Dr. Susan Friedman, for providing me with the tools — and practice — to help think through behavioral questions.