How to Stop Your Parrot From Biting

Biting is quite common in parrots, and nearly all pet birds may bite at some point. This doesn't mean all birds are aggressive, but it is a caution for anyone considering a parrot or any pet bird. Sooner or later, you will likely experience a painful bite.

Why Do Parrots Bite?

A bird biting you doesn't necessarily mean it is mean, aggressive, or not bonded to you. Parrots, as hookbills, use their beaks for various functions, including preening, eating, climbing, and playing. Parrots often use their beaks as hands to grab toys, food, perches, and sometimes their owners. If your bird is typically good-natured, consider whether it's truly biting or simply using its beak in a normal way.

Fear

Your bird may bite out of fear. Parrots hand-fed as babies can still fear humans if not consistently socialized. Adult birds may have encountered factors causing fear biting. Even well-socialized birds can impulsively bite if frightened. Gaining your bird's trust can alleviate its fears and protect you from bites.

Aggression

If your parrot is not playing, climbing, preening, or afraid, aggression may be the cause of biting. Aggression in parrots is problematic, affecting both birds and owners. Aggression can stem from territoriality, hormonal changes during adolescence or breeding, stress, lack of mental stimulation, and dominance issues.

Take steps to eliminate obvious factors contributing to your bird's aggression.

• Check the bird's environment for discomfort sources. Is the cage near a drafty window?
• Do you need to adjust your cage cleaning schedule so that your bird's home stays clean and comfortable?
• Could other pets in the home be causing your bird stress?

Make necessary adjustments and monitor your bird's response. Identifying aggressive biting causes can be challenging, so consider scheduling an appointment with an avian veterinarian to rule out health issues that may contribute to undesirable behavior.

How to Stop the Biting

Owning a parrot that bites out of fear or aggression is no fun. Not only are bites physically dangerous due to the power of a parrot's beak, but they are a sign that the bird itself is unhappy with some aspect of its situation. Every pet bird owner wants to make sure their feathered friends are happy. When problem behaviors such as biting rear their head, it's important to act quickly to remedy the problem before long-term patterns of these behaviors set in. You can help calm your biting parrot and establish a better bird/owner relationship by:

• Handling and taming aggressive parrots: Not every parrot owner is a natural-born bird trainer, but just about anybody can bribe a bird into being handleable with patience and effort. Move to a neutral location, avoid yelling, build trust, focus on repetition, and come with treats.
• Correcting bad behavior in birds: Birds are very sensitive creatures that interpret our actions differently than more traditional pets like cats and dogs. This can lead to frustration and miscommunication between the bird and owner, which often only exacerbates existing behavior problems. Successfully rehabilitating a bird with behavior problems requires some knowledge of avian psychology, as well as a calm, expressive voice that provides consistent messaging.

Next Steps

If you want a pet bird that you can handle and interact with, you will eventually get bitten at some point. The key to dealing with bites is to monitor your bird's behavior patterns and provide consistent training to pinpoint the cause of the undesirable behavior and fix it.

Even in temporary bouts of biting behavior such as the "bluffing" phenomenon, it's important to stick to a set training schedule so that you can disrupt the potential onset of a pattern of behavioral issues. Failure to do so could cost you your relationship with your bird.

Take Caution

While you're managing your biting bird, be cautious. Bites aren't only painful, but they can also be severe. While rare, parrot owners have lost eyes, fingers, and toes to their pet birds, while others have sustained traumatic injuries to their lips, ears, and noses.

Large parrots have very powerful beaks, and owners must realize that even sweet, tame pets can cause these sorts of severe injuries in the blink of an eye if they get frightened or otherwise upset. These situations can be particularly tragic if kids are involved, so bird lovers with little ones at home should be particularly careful about choosing a parrot species that will make a good pet bird for children.