Bird Body Language 101 | Topics

[@mansishah6579]

I love the new intro animation! It’s so cute!

[@FlockTalk]

Thank you!!

[@incanusolorin2607]

First of all, the new intro is gorgeous! Secondly, Im thrilled that you remade this video. It's one of my flock talks favorites. Very useful

[@little1133]

THANK YOU!! I have been looking for something on parrot body language

[@little1133]

It's almost been a year since I got my baby and this video helped me so much! I now know all her little quirks and individual body language but only because I had this starting point

[@mehere8038]

Can I make another body language suggestion? When I first got my 2 rescues, I really struggled, what helped me was to set up a video to record our interactions & when I got "randomly" bitten, I found if I replayed the video & watched the body language straight before it really closely, I could often see signs I had missed in real time. I found that helped me a lot in learning to see the signals, that were just too subtle for me, as an inexperienced bird handler

[@imMittensKitten]

This (for me) is research for writing and drawing, and this really helped, so thanks! :D

[@mehere8038]

love the new intro :) & great video, VERY helpful. I've been trying to figure out what my boy's doing for ages & I now have, he's lunging, but because I'm too stupid to realise, he's trying it in every way he possibly can to get the message through, while dumb human keeps interacting, trying to figure out what he wants & put the signals together, when actually all the signals are just get tf away from me PLEASE! I didn't realise the beak tapping etc stuff were all part of the lunging. He is such a good boy with not biting, so tollerant of me screwing up. Now I know, I'll have to try some of the training stuff with rewarding by moving away, I just didn't realise all those motions were about "get away from me" & he obviously IS scared of lights, I thought so, but wasn't 100% sure, but that second picture is classic him on seeing the light on the smoke detector, or any other ceiling light on, no matter what type, I've tried switching fluro to led & halogen, he reacts the same way to all of them & to sunlight too & first pic, I totally screwed up, thought it was angry, I think probably cause the only time either of mine do head feathers raised for more than just a shake is if angry, the other pics I got right, but the 2 birds only from what I learnt in this video Learnt a new word too, "fawning", I know that behaviour well from my girl, I'd heard it called "learned helplessness", but never heard fawning before. She will fully submit, then on returning to her cage do extreme swaying, along with crying, shaking & being covered in goosebumps in her plucked areas, at least she used to when I got her, she's much better now & is quite bitty, which I love, boy bites to protect her too, which is also awesome that he loves her like that, even if he can't handle touching or preening from her. Thanks so much for the video though, this is awesome! I'd really love if you could do more on body language too, there's really not enough good info on it out there, for example, when a bird puts it's beak down onto something in front of it & puffs out & shakes it's wings, is that hormones? Or can it be excitement too? Or a mix, or something totally different? I've seen that so often in training videos (although never in yours) & in my boy, but have never actually seen/heard a good explanation for it, you kinda cover the body low in this video, but I think this particular action is a bit different, not sure, anyway, more videos on more body language varieties would be wonderful if you can

[@FlockTalk]

Glad the video was helpful! Low puffing and shaking is most often a hormonal thing, in very young birds it can also be begging for food/ commonly seen when they’re overstimulated. It’ll pop up a lot in mature birds if they’re often handled inappropriately, fed warm liquid foods that mimic feeding formulas, high fat foods, or the foods are too excessively valuable that the excited stimulation triggers the hormonal response! If I were to see that occurring in training often I would drop hormonal triggers and reevaluate my reward values!

[@mehere8038]

@@FlockTalk Thanks :) That makes a LOT of sense :). In my guy I'd say just hormones then (and excitement triggered hormones), given the context of when he does it (not in training). In the training videos where I've seen it I'd say all of what you said, but mostly rewards of too high a value, given I mostly see it with certain trainers, who are charging a lot & trying to get really good outcomes in limited time in those sessions & with people who have made lots of screw ups, so would easily have set up that behaviour previously. I was starting to wonder if maybe it wasn't a problem behaviour though, given how commonly I see it there, so thank you for that, I will continue seeing it as hormones & something to manage not ignore & train though, like happens in those videos (I'm not personally seeing it that much right now, due to my boy having a hormone implant about 8 months ago, but presumably as it wears off I might start seeing it more, so will keep on top of it)

[@lorenzoor3177]

Super, super, super useful! I'd love to have other similar videos like this...

[@malcolmmitchell6529]

So helpful, mostly good language from my boy. Really good info.

[@OG_Jam]

im so glad i watched this video, i have a timneh grey and wanted to learn more about understanding the kinda mood he's in i really loved that mini quiz at the end. would be cool to do a few more i got 2/3, kinda struggled with the first one because the eye wasnt very clear and you couldnt see the rest of the body

[@abouttimebrewing3215]

Thank you, this affirms what I have concluded owning my Parrotlet for 10 years. I have seen all these behaviors and it's good to know I am reading him correctly. Neo has two more behaviors that he does often that are pretty funny. The first is what we call the ninja where he will look away and then turn back and do two to three beak open lunges. The second is he will bow and do three peeps in a perfect ascending pitch (like root-fifth-octave). The ninja is usually when he gets bored sitting on my shoulder. While it seems aggressive, I can put my finger there and he will hop right on and be completely calm. The bow is random. Sometimes when he bites and I say "no bite" and sometimes when he is just wandering around his playground. He has nearly taken himself out several times doing the ninja on my shoulder which just cracks me up. Of course he has learned to mimic my laugh and I laugh even harder. Thank you for all your videos!

[@PanemEtCircensei]

My bird : I will murder everything no matter what my body language is

[@jackfeng2676]

I am happy to share my small but substantial victory working on our bird here, because it is really this video that helps me out. We are recently trying to work with out dear cutest but nippiest green cheeked conure Kinoko. Overtime, we have already reduced tons of nippy behaviour, or at least try our best to dodge the bites, except one thing: when I try to do the dishes, he flies to my shoulder to watch me, and then he bites my neck, which triggers me all the time because my neck is sensitive, and I cannot dodge because I cannot see him! We all thought it was because of boredom, but since it happens all the time, we need to take action. What I try to do is I put my T-stand on the stove and ask Kinoko to stand there watching, so that I can observe and react to his body language. This is the video comes into play: I found him very chill and joyful, and then he gets a bit bored. Then he gets interested to see what I am doing, but then suddenly, he gets really alerted and scared, when I finish a dish and put it away, creating some noise probably scary to him. His body languages are one-to-one copies of the exercises in this video so it's very straightforward to find out. With this we then come to the conclusion that he is not bored but scared while standing on my shoulder watching the dishes, which results in biting my neck. It is really rewarding managing to understand the inner thought of my dear little bird!

[@FlockTalk]

That’s so awesome! I’m really glad the video has been able to help you and your little bird!!

[@PoodlesandParrots]

Great and informative video! ❤

[@kalynnkallweit7940]

I wish there was a LOVE

[@FlockTalk]

Thanks! I’ll try my best. Making body language videos is tricky because it is very very variable by the individual and finding my own reference vids or ones I’m allowed to use in my videos is challenging! I’ll try to keep this is mind though!

[@kalynnkallweit7940]

OH yeah, I bet hey! Maybe you could do a collab vid and share footage?@@FlockTalk

[@mehere8038]

@@kalynnkallweit7940 I like this idea, or rather viewers/subscribers sharing videos they're happy to be used in body language videos. I know I'd be more than happy to share footage of mine for this channel to use without any conditions on use & I'm sure lots of others would feel the same way

[@kalynnkallweit7940]

Me too! @@mehere8038

[@BirdNerdSophie]

Great video :) it definitely take some practice to decipher bird body language!

[@RahAndMe]

Thank you

[@rmarvel169]

Awww the tail fanning 😂 my ringneck does that when carrying around their ball , almost a strut. I never know for certain what it means because everything you read says exactly what you do. But it seems like he or she is happy and playful 🤔 love your channel, so informative!

[@FlockTalk]

Flared tails in that context can definitely just be excitement! It’s definitely something that’s more species variable and often teeters on that aggression/ excitement line!

[@rmarvel169]

​@FlockTalk thank you ! Yes he's def always excited ❤😂

[@connied8507]

Thank you. Also passing along info. One of my budgies turned very aggressive to the other. The victim bird had an injury to it's toe. Toe healed, aggression ended. Birds hide injuries. Though I didn't catch on immediately, I caught on soon enough.

[@mehere8038]

glad it's healed, be careful though, Flock Talk is obviously MUCH more of an expert than me, but from my understanding targetting toes is genuine attacking in bird language. I have my 2 in the same cage (although always with an open door in case one needs to escape the other for some reason) & mine have little pecking order disputes at times, but nothing serious & I like the idea of birds sharing with others of their own species, even though I know many experts advise against it, but I personally would be really concerned about keeping them together unsupervised if one is targetting another's toes. Flock Talk might be able to give you feedback & obviously it will be much better than mine if she can, but I do think you should stay really alert to possible future issues in that situation. My lorikeets tend to just scream at each other really loudly & also do little pecky things at each other at head level, in an identical way to how the wild lorikeets do to each other when having pecking order disputes & eventually one (normally the boy) will show submission with a particular sound while ending up lower down than the dominate bird & then it will end. Toe targetting from my (limited) understanding is different though & genuinely not liking the other bird. I have no idea after it's resolved if that means it's properly over or not, just be careful

[@connied8507]

@@mehere8038 thanks.

[@connied8507]

@@mehere8038 Hi again. It was kind of you to express concern. I wanted to let you know that I have 3 different cages in the bird room and it probably happened during open play time. My budgies have been co-existing with my bonded pair of Quakers for over a year now.(that's why only 3 cages.) This is why it was such a surprise. Though they have different perching areas I did have foraging. I've removed the foraging. They had been showing curiosity over the treats of the other species and that may have sparked food aggression.

[@보라-b9j]

My 2year old lovebird never bit me. But he suddenly started to bite my fingers not in an aggressive way. I can’t figure it out whether he wants to play or he wants something else. It hurts when he bites. 😢

[@hemerocallis463]

She has a video on how to stop biting, maybe you can check it out to see if it helps?

[@Blackmarketyyoo]

😊

[@keggles11]

I give my bird pine nuts whilst training but can i give too many?? Thanknyou for your videos love them

[@FlockTalk]

You can definitely over feed them since they’re such a high fat rich nut! Best to reserve them for jackpots and occasional high value snacks!

[@keggles11]

@@FlockTalk thank you im at a loss as to what to give him as hes young and been treated badly by breeder kept in box and fed seed only hes now on veg chop and trying pellets but struggling - he likes millet but he takes ages to eat lol

[@FlockTalk]

I have a whole video dedicated to treats and rewards which may provide helpful tips for you, if they’re currently on that seed based diet the biggest help will be to ensure the seed you pick as a treat isn’t present in their current diet mix. It can be tricky to find low fat seed options they like when they’re on a seed diet already but some options might be oats, sesame, flax, and safflower!

[@keggles11]

@@FlockTalk thank you so much Syd is on pellets and chop mix now and i offer pine nuts broken up into small pieces forvtraining and millet but he will only really train on pine nuts - ive taken to breaking them with my nail but he definitely doesnt concentratevas much with millet - little monkey