totally disinterested budgie

[aronya31]

My budgie is about 5 months old, I socialise with him every day, talk to him, sing along, but he does nothing but sit there on his perch. He eats his seeds, drinks his water, has a mad hour chirping away and that's it. He doesn't play with his toys, never eats any treat bars (honey/seeds) I've put in his cage, never flies out of his cage when the doors open in a safe small room and has suddenly not wanted me to put my arm in anymore. He used to tolerate this and not be fearful but not anymore. So I just talk to him. He doesn't like me touching him anymore. Even his breeder said it was a bit strange to not have a bit of a nibble on the honey bars or vegetable slivers I put in his cage. He eats his millet and that's it, Does anyone else have a budgie that shows no interest in anyone or anything?

[Deleted]

Ok read this through, I am afraid you will have to start the training all over again from the beginning, the bird does not have anything to excite it when you are near.
How long have you owned the bird?

Right as soon as possible get rid of the millet, buy a good mixed food or pellets, put some greens at the bottom of his cage (he gets hungry he will eat) Millet is not really good as the only source of food, keep the millet as a treat only from now on,
A new young bird can not associate honey sticks, bells with food, they will use these as toys to bop about until they actually get a bite, but with tasty and very fattening millet in his cage he won't touch other foods.

Your bird needs to be motivated, it does not associate you with something good, something he wants, all you are at the moment is a thing that makes a noise and puts this big thing (your hand) into his cage.

He stays in the cage as he knows the cage is his domain, outside the cage is your domain so he will not enter it.
So for now,, millet out, when you place your hand in the cage give him a nibble of millet, with lots of praise, and lots of positive actions.

Go on YouTube there are lots of videos on click and target training (BirdTricks,,,actual bird behaviorists) is an excellent YouTube member,,, yes mainly for parrots but the principal is the same for all birds.

You have to get a bit of motivation back into your bird, get him interested in you, instead of you only being a thing that shares the same space as him.
With treats, step up commands etc your bird will change quicker than you think.
Shewy

[Marianne Marlow]

I just want to add something. I have a very fussy hen. She has been on hunger strike several time when I have swapped her food for a different one. So the old adage "they'll eat when they're hungry" does not always work.
I only noticed she was not eating because we weigh our birds weekly.

[Deleted]

Yes Marianne is correct all birds are not the same, but placing a mixture of different foods )seeds, pellets, greens the bird will have some of a choice, I should have explained better, don't just take away the millet in one go, but you must stop it being the only food the bird receives.

If you have a video camera, put it facing the cage and record the bird when you are out, I think I would win a bet in saying he will play with his toys and act totally differently than when you are with him.

If possible keep the bird in one room, moving them from room to room can stop them from wanting out in a strange place, they find it harder to acclimatise.

[aronya31]

Dec 20, 2015 23:00:48 GMT @shewbert said:

Yes Marianne is correct all birds are not the same, but placing a mixture of different foods )seeds, pellets, greens the bird will have some of a choice, I should have explained better, don't just take away the millet in one go, but you must stop it being the only food the bird receives.

If you have a video camera, put it facing the cage and record the bird when you are out, I think I would win a bet in saying he will play with his toys and act totally differently than when you are with him.

If possible keep the bird in one room, moving them from room to room can stop them from wanting out in a strange place, they find it harder to acclimatise.

My budgie eats his seeds ok, not JUST millet!! -- he has proper bird seed in a dish on the side of his cage. I'm a bit hurt actually when you say he doesn't associate me with something good, I've given him so much of my time - even made a tape recording of songs to listen to when I'm out. He's always been a bit wary/timid but for some unknown reason he's now acting like he wants nothing to do with me and as I said he wont tolerate me even coming a little bit near him. He just scarpers to the other side of his cage. Then, when I walk away, he returns to where he was. It's very disheartening and a bit hurtful actually. All of you on here have got a good rapport with your birds. I've failed and I don't know why....

near him

[Deleted]

Let me rephrase he is not associating you with a positive action i.e. food rewards, make things positive for him.
He at the moment sees you as an intruder in his area, so you have to change his thinking to this hand is good, this person is good, it gives me treats and praise.
Please look on YouTube and look up target training for birds, try to avoid the ones with silly promises like your bird trained in 3 days etc.
Target training for your bird will show a remarkable change in your bird.
Basically you are training your bird to touch a target (unpointed stick ,chopstick etc) everytime the bird touches the stick with his beak he gets a treat and say target, honestly this part does not really take that long even for the skittiest of birds, once the bird touches the stick a few times he will willingly do it for the treat,

 if for instance you want the bird on your hand, target between the bird and your hand, go closer do the same until you are next to your hand, then the hand is in between the bird and stick pont with stick part way over your hand target further over your hand until the bird has to stand on your hand or even just touch your hand ,,,he will want the treat so will eventually stand on your hand to target and receive the treat.

So what is happening, the bird does not notice that he is on your hand he just wants to get his treat, the standing on your hand has been done without the bird realising that he has gone on their.
This is a lot easier than placing your finger and expecting the bird to jump on, yes he may do it eventually but take 5 times longer.
I am in the process of making a video called click and target training, I will post it when it's done.

P.S. If he  is happily eating other seeds just take the millet away and use this as a perfect training treat

[Deleted]

Please do not get disheartened with your bird, a bit of patience and a few small changes will honestly work wonders, Something that you may never find out has upset him, he just needs his confidence boosted

[Hezz]

What do you have for him in the way of toys? Most budgies like swings, bells and mirrors. I think Shewbert misunderstood that your bird is eating his seed fine, and thought he was only eating his millet. As he is a millet-junky, you can use the millet to make his time with you a positive experience. By using the millet firstly as a reason for coming to you, and secondly as a reward for doing what you want him to do as in interacting with you, you are re-affirming to him that you and your hands are good things to have around, not just something to be ignored. Have millet with you when you go to the cage, rather than have the millet available all the time; he will start looking forward to your visits; sure, to start with it will be for millet, but with time and positive interactions he will come to look forward to you for more than just the bringer-of-millet. Most importantly don't lose hope, don't despair - some birds do take longer to catch on to how easily we can be won over by some cute budgie ways, but even after 12 months or more your relationship will still be developing. Chin up and keep trying, stay positive.

[OP]

I will apologise now as this may turn into a longish post and may not agree with all that has been said.
As the regulars know I have now got three budgies of differing ages and tameness.
Joey is the youngest as far as I know, and he was the first budgie I had owned since I was knee high to a grasshopper. He is also the longest resident at over 2 years and he is about 3 years old. He is very shy and is quite similar to what aronya31 is describing, in nature. He is a bit more advanced in that he will step up and come out of the cage, but he will go to the other side of the cage when I approach. He would rather starve than eat millet from my hand. I have never done anything to him to give him reason not to trust me. It took me quite a long time to coax him to sit on my finger for any length of time in the begining. However, he did and we would have a great chat together.
Things changed when I adopted Whiskers, who after a short time became very tame and is somewhat like Archie, though not quite as tame. Joey began to revert to the quiet reserved budgie that he was a few months back. He now has a best buddy in Whiskers and dotes on him, Whiskers returns that friendship. But Whiskers can share that friendship with me, Joey cannot as it would seem.
I could go on and on but I would like to close this post with reference to aronya31,s position. Maybe she has a budgie of similar disposition to Joey. If so than as Shebert *Shewbert says going back to the beginning and training from scratch may be the way forward. What I am trying to say is you are not on your own with this sort of dilemma, don;t give up and take it slow as this budgie seems to need time.

*sherbert is something in tube that is sucked through a spanish type straw.

[Deleted]

Thank you everyone for explaining things a bit clearer than I did.
Honestly it is sometimes better to start training all over again than attempting to repair something that you might never find the cause for.
This is not a reflection on anything the owner has done, it just happens from time to time.
We had a cage in the van that fell over, the bird was a highly trained Amazon, just this one incident undone 4 years hard work, he had to be retrained again as if it was a newly owned bird.

You could spend months, sometimes years attempting to repair some behavioral problems,,, don't repair, do it properly and retrain
Shewy

[Marianne Marlow]

Also, aronya31, not everyone on here has a good rapport with their birds. Plenty of us have birds that will not step up or come to us and show no interest in us.

One of my birds will not step up on to my finger and only 3 of them come to me voluntarily and it's when it suits them, not when I ask!

But I am fine with that. Their happiness is what is most important.

[aronya31]

Thank you so much everyone - your explanatory replies mean a lot to me. I got Muffin from a breeder. He was about 2 months old. He was very nervous for quite a while but just starting to allow me to put my hand in and sometimes he would allow me to stroke his breast with my finger. His breast seemed to tremble - is this normal? I just assumed he was trembling because he was a little nervous....I used to talk to him lovingly and then take my arm away and close the cage door.

Two weeks ago I decided to give him more freedom, he was cooped up in his cage day after day. But he flew to the top of my curtain rail in the bedroom and I just couldn't get him back in his cage. I used a long bamboo stick to try and coax him onto it but he flapped in fear and flew off to the other side of the room and wherever he flew it was too high up for me to get anywhere near him. In the end the only way I could get him back was to tire him out and then, by a miracle, he came onto the stick and from there into his cage again. I didn't like this method of tiring him out to get him back, it seemed very cruel.

A friend of mine who had a pet shop years ago and kept parrots said he would clip muffin's wings so that he could still fly around but not so high up. This was done last week and obviously Muffin was scared. He was held correctly whilst it was done and then put onto a low table and left to walk around. When I next went into the room Muffin had flown back into his cage. So he knew he could get out and back in in whenever the door was left open. Since then he's not wanted me anywhere near him. 

 I've never had birds before so sorry if what's happened is obviously the answer to Muffin's turn of behaviour to all of you on here, I just assumed, perhaps stupidly, that once he had settled down again he would revert to his old self but this hasn't happened. His environment is quiet, just me living here, so nothing else could be bothering him.

Sorry for such a long post - I just want to "get the love back"

[Marianne Marlow]

Let me just state that Wing Clipping is a very contentious subject, the majority here do not agree with it.

It's the birds health and well-being here that is important and not arguing about something that has already been done.

Now that I have said that, I hope that people can move on and give some practical responses so that you can create a bond with your bird.

Perhaps @shewbert can give some behavioural advice.

[OP]

There is only one key ingredient here and that is time and lots of patience. What's done is done. Apart from the wing clipping, he has been chased around with a stick until he was out of energy. All these things have to be gotten over. We can see why he is afraid. Most budgies, or so it seems, do not like to be stroked or touched. So I would be inclined to not do that. I would simply stand by the cage and talk to the budgie, winking and blinking. Yes winking and blinking so as to show that one is not a predator.
Over to Shewbert, Hezz and the others experienced in this field.

[Brigitte]

Going to make this short and sweet and a fact:

All birds like all animals, have different personalities.

Some love to receive human attention after getting to know you, and some just rather be left alone with it's mirror.

(That is if there is a mirror) ---LOL
 Above is just a fact. Not saying there is a mirror...LOL