Turn Around and The Wave

How to teach your parrot some easy tricks with positive reinforcement. My girl learned the 'Wave' in about 2 minutes, though it took her a couple weeks to become confident in doing the trick every time. About the same for the 'Turn Around'. Its important to have a vocal cue and a physical cue when teaching your bird tricks.

* Make sure you have plenty of treats and praise with you to give to your parrot

1. 'The Wave' - Bring your hand up to your bird like you are going to have her step up on your finger(Use the Vocal Command- WAVE, and With your other hand wave your index finger), but be quick and don't allow your bird to step onto your finger- just lift up its foot. When it lifts its foot to step up, give her a treat and praise her 'Good Girl'.

2. 'Turn Around' - Have your bird follow a treat in your hand around its body a little above its head. Your parrot should follow your hand in a circle, use the 'verbal command TURN AROUND. The physical command is your hand going around the birds body with the treat. After a few tries you can take out the physical command and just ask your bird to turn around like in the video. Don't forget to give a treat each time your bird turns around when asked or waves on command, this will really enhance your birds willingness to learn.

Training time should be something your parrot looks forward to, time to play with its human mom or dad. Birds do have short attention spans so short lessons 2-10 minutes a couple times a day should work better than several hours in a row.

Next lessons to come:

-Potty training your parrot

-Bobbing on command

-Coming when called