Kermit and the Empty Paper Towel Roller
All parrots are well equipped with their chewing and shredding capabilities, and my dear Kermit is no exceptional from the rest. I often named my two lovely, Kiki and Kermit as the “Incredible Shredders”.
I doesn’t have to get a paper shredder in my home office, to shred sensitive documents or mails. I can easily turn to my lovely angels and get them into serious “shredding business”. They simply love the task given with no complaints at all.
I’m sure the appropriate chewing or shredding activities will keep them busy and happy, at least for sure I know they won’t be bored.
Both my lovely angels have their own favorite toys. Like Kiki, she enjoys playing cottons twines and surprisingly she absolutely good in untying the thumb knots on the twines.
As Kermit, he’s seems to set his love for thick cardboards and papers. Especially empty paper towel rollers seem to be the most irresistible toys to Kermit.
Last Sunday afternoon, I was able to capture Kermit doing his stupid stint with an empty paper towel roller. He’s totally into the “shredding” game, once he was offered the empty paper towel roller. Seeing him burrowing in within the towel roller lying on his back busily shredding it away.
I can hardly resist laughing on the stupid yet funny stint he did, but it so fun watching him doing it. He sure does brought lots of laughter to family with his silly acts.
Young African Parrots’ Eccentric Habit
I wonder any of the parrot owners owning african parrots like African Grey or Poicephalus like Senegal Parrot, notice an eccentric behavior that the parrots have when they are young. Perhaps owners that only taken in the parrot at the age of one or two might not have notice it before.
Usually young African Parrots in their juvenile age, tends to build up a habit of scratching vigorously on the cage floor or kicking madly (similar like what you see a hamster does, kicking off the bedding). It may sound a little abnormal for a parrot to behave in this manner. My Senegal Parrot had this behavior for quite sometime, he started since young (even when he’s a baby in the brooder, he did that almost everyday and make a mess with all the beddings) but until recently he stopped.
» Read More…
Earlier on I allowed Kermit to shred and play with his paper box, but soon he stopped the activity when he saw me taking out my gadget. Kermit gets really excited when he saw me taking out my Nokia N95 capturing this video. He’s just so happy and excited, roaming around, making all the funny mumbling noise and whistle, surprisingly he did the “Peek-a-Boo” again at video time 0:40.
To us a phone is just another daily necessity item, but to parrots it’s seem like a new toy. Perhaps it’s the recording red LED light emitted that drew Kermit’s attention. Just like kids, CURIOSITY, all they want is to investigate and try playing with it!
Lately I managed to capture a short sound clip of Kermit’s contact calls. In the following sound clips, you will hear Kermit starts to make the annoying contact calls when I sounded “Be Right Back” and left the room.
Sound Clip of Kermit’s Contact Calls
It still a normal and acceptable vocalizing by Kermit, but just imagine and multiply the volume by 3 times. It can be quite piercing to human ears. Definitely you are bound to get complaints from neighbors. Luckily, I haven’t got to hear Kermit lunging at that volume for quite some time. I’ve yet to capture the sound clip of the notorious scream. Hope I never had the chance for that!
Related Posts:
Curb that Kermit Scream
Many behavior problems start to float out when young parrots in the developmental stage start to mature. It’s the greatest fear to see turning from a nice cuddly baby into a notorious monster once after sexual maturity. No doubt, my Kermit, the Senegal Parrot is also no different from any other parrot. He starts to pick up screaming whenever I disappear from his sight, from this he’s more likely to become a “one person” bird very soon.
Among all behavior problem, parrot screaming is always the primary issue among all parrot owners. Owners usually ended feeling upset and angry over the unwanted loud vocalization.
» Read More…
Tags: Positive Reinforcement
Clicker & Target Training for Kermit
Kermit is now 5 months old now and it has been a difficult task in training him up. I’ve tried just using positive reinforcement training as soon as he was fully weaned, but the results weren’t that satisfying. Kermit is totally different from my talented lovebird, Kiki. I’m forced to adapt a different way of training from the usual method executed on Kiki.
I have great luck in training Kiki just only with the use of positive reinforcement training. Kiki can easily pick up the new tricks and behaviors through the training. Kiki is truly talented, a Smart Alec that I will use to describe her as.
Based on my daily observations on Kiki and Kermit during their training sessions, here are some of the findings of the 2 comparisons:
Kiki during a 15 minutes training session
Kermit during a 15 minutes training session
You can see the vast differences among the two species. It’s never surprise to see Kiki mastering a new behavior or tricks in less than 10 minutes. She’s more of the hyperactive and more enthusiastic participant as compared to Kermit. Kermit has a much shorter attention span as compared to Kiki.
I’m able get Kiki to perform all the behaviors and tricks that she learned over 20- 30 minutes continuously, and after 30 minutes (although not recommended as it can easily possible leads to fustration if the parrot failed to perform the correct act) she still has the attention on me. As for Kermit, his mind start to wander of after 8-10minutes. I will say it’s definitely difficult to maintain the attention from a Senegal Parrot as compared to a African Lovebird. Furthermore, the slightest sound or motion of an object (including a fly flying around the vicinity) will instil fear in Kermit, diverting his attention and disrupting the whole training session.
There are a few factors that contributed to the unacceptable results in Kermit’s Training session. I have to admit the failure of shaping the new behavior, partly the fault lies on me. At certain part of the training, when Kermit suddenly performed the right behavior, I wasn’t able to reinforce and treat immediately at that moment.
Next, there’s also disadvantages of using positive reinforcement training with treats, you have to offer the treat immediately when the parrot performed the right behavior at that very moment. By doing so, the parrot will then understand and link the right behavior with the treat. Thus the parrot will know that everytime he/she performed that behavior he/she gets the treats. But many times during Kermit’s training session, I committed the mistake of not offering the treat immediately at the split second when the right behavior is performed. Any time later than that, Kermit will not be able to link the right behavior with the treat. It’s definitely one stressful task!
Two weeks ago, I started introducing Clicker and Target Training along with positive reinforcement. The results were really amazing, and Kermit was able to perform the his first trick, the Turn-a-Round trick after the 3rd day of Click and Target Training. Kermit had learned to associate the clicking sound with food. With this great advantage, I’m able to sound the clicker at the very right moment when Kermit performed the behavior that I want him to do.
I’m truly amazed, the clicker training does enhance the training experience. I’ve yet to explore more on the clicker training and unveil the power of clicker training for new tricks and behavior training. Hopefully I will be able to get my brother to capture a full motion clip on Kermit performing his first ever trick, the Turn-a-Round trick. So do stay tune!
Introducing Kermit, The Senegal Parrot
Howdy, Everyone! I’m back again bringing more updates again about my angels. Lately, I haven’t got the chance to come online to share Kiki’s progress of the new trick. Thank you everyone for your support and concern for Kiki. She’s doing perfectly well, but rather nippy this days! Last Christmas, I brought home a new little guy, Kermit, a Senegal Parrot. He’s the primary reason for my inactivity on the weblog for these couple of weeks (or to be exact that’s almost a month ago! Oh gosh that’s long!).
Kermit then was only 7-8 weeks old when I got him home and he is yet to be full weaned. He barely has any feathers on his body accept for some grey furs and blood feathers on his wings. Honestly, I’m never keen nor supportive about bringing home an unweaned baby because of the possible risk and can be time consuming too. Any mistake and mishandling can cost this little feathered friend to lose his life.
Due to certain constrains, the local pet store was unable to wean Kermit for me (seriously that really upset me alittle about store selling unwean babies, do they ever thought of the consequences like selling to an unexperienced or new parrot owner who possibly may end the fragile lives of these babies with their inexperiences and even carelessness?), I’m really hesitating to bring home Kermit when I heard I had to wean him myself. After identifying the obstacles ahead and considering the possible adjustments I can make to my work and lifestyle, I decided to bring home Kermit right away.
I’ve placed him in a brooder since Day 1 to ensure that he has ample warmth, before shifting him to a weaning cage when he has reasonable amount of feathers to maintain and regular his body temperature. During the initial stage, handfeeding procedure for Kermit was really taxing. As I had to stick to 4 feedings daily, ensuring he has enough nutrients for growth and ensure he progressively reaching his peak weight. I had to plan the handfeeding schedules and work schedules to ensure that both doesn’t clash. I had to wake up early morning for a feeding at 6.30am, rushing back home during lunch to feed another time at 12pm, and feedings during the evening and night respectively. It’s definitely lots of time and efforts. But i’m really glad to see Kermit growing well and gain and maintaining a reasonably amount of weight.
Now Kermit has finally turned 12 weeks old and his daily feedings have now cut down to 2, one in the morning and the other during the night before going to bed. I can clearly identify that he’s struggling to be fully weaned. Kermit is starting to refuse the yummy formula most of time, preferring to consume the adult food himself. He’s already eating adult food like millets, seeds like sunflower and safflower, peanuts, veggies like corns, cabbage, carrot and brocolli, almonds, hazelnuts, fruits like apple and grapes and even dried red hot peppers. He sure does like to go for some hot spicy thrills in his daily meals!
He’s almost fully feathered now. He started his maiden flight 2 weeks ago on the 16th January 2008. That’s the day I never forget when he started to flap his wings and fly over to me for his dinner. I’m really happy that he’s growing up and getting stronger day after day.
Hope that one day, Kermit will be performing his very own stunts and trick on YouTube! Wish me and Kermit best of luck!