aggressive bird. massive guilt. help.
hello!
i have a lot of information to give but i will try to make it as brief as possible. please try to refrain on passing judgement. i simply want advice.
when i was 13 i wanted a bird. my parents gave me a young male galah. i believe he was only 1-2 years old at the time. very young with a very long time left to live.
at the beginning, he was a nice bird. he would sit on my shoulder, he would play with me and even our other pets (we had multiple dogs and multiple cats - we still do).
early on he started to randomly attack people. not just a little nibble, not just a warning. out of nowhere he would latch onto people’s necks and take chunks out. he did it to me once or twice. it got to the point where he couldn’t be trusted on people’s shoulders. it then progresses to him flying at and attacking heads unprovoked. i was young, i didn’t understand how pivotal it was to correct that behaviour right there and then. i was following the lead of my parents and as sad as it made me, he started spending a lot of time in his cage. ultimately, it got to the point where he was constantly locked in his cage.
to this day, it is exactly the same. i am 23 now for context. he spends his entire life in his cage. it isn’t a small cage (it still isn’t big enough for 24 hours a day), he is well taken care of, shows no signs of health issues and is fully feathered. but is in a cage all day. he mimics a few sounds but nothing else if that is relevant. we tried putting him in an aviary outside but he would mimic noises and follow us if we walked past. he was lonely and it was even more saddening. his cage gets wheeled outside everyday for enrichment, he calls to the other galahs and cockatoos and whatever, but with bird flu recently just hitting australia i am getting worried about continuing that.
he enjoys it when we go up to his cage and talk to him. he will allow scratches of his head and his toes through the cage. he dances if we sing to him, or if there’s music playing and we dance. if we go near his cage he immediately walks up to us. he is connected to us and has a lot of personality. this is why it breaks my heart.
i suspect he is extremely territorial over his cage. he used to manage to get out of his cage while he was outside and all he would do is sit on top of it, getting aggressive if you went to touch him. he will get aggressive if hands go inside his cage (getting toys and such inside his cage, cleaning his cage etc. is a two person job). when i have time to catch a galah, i let him out of his cage in our garage. initially he will be fine with just him and myself in there, he will walk around and touch things and taste things. this is usually shortly before he decides he will randomly fly at my head and attack me, while i haven’t even moved or spoken. if my mum or one of the other pets walked in - game over instantly for them. don’t even get me started on trying to get him back in his cage.
a few other behaviours to note:
- he will do weird things with his neck and body. flattening himself out and rolling his head back while on his perch. rolling his head around. he used to do it while sitting on his bell, but of course he destroyed the perch the bell was near. now he just does it.
- if we are making dinner or handling food that he decides he would like a taste of, he will screech. full volume. inside. it is so loud it melts cranial nerve viii. the only way to get him to stop is to give him a treat.
- he will sometimes just accept treats, other times will get aggressive and rip them from your fingers and toss it away. it has nothing to do with the type of treat and everything to do with what mood he is in.
- he will destroy anything he feasibly can that is put inside his cage except for one perch. toys, native tree branches, suets are destroyed quickly.
i don’t know what to do. we are honestly all scared of him and as desperately as i wish to help him, i dont even know where to start. his nickname is literally “devil chicken”. he has been in his cage for years. there are new pets that he has never interacted with (there are 3 dogs and 4 cats in this house total). he is aggressive, to the point of taking chunks out of peoples skin. i was so upset at one point that i approached my mum about potentially rehoming him - she said that was absolutely not an option. as he is her bird on paper, my hands are tied. thing is, as long as he is healthy, he will live after my parents. he is my bird, i asked for him, and i feel an insane amount of guilt for the life he lives. i live in a small town and a bird trainer or behaviourist is not an option. i can’t realistically take care of a bird for decades using workaround solutions. i love him and am desperate and determined to change this.
please help!!! thank you