Reptile & Amphibian Forums

We went to a local pet store today and they take nice care of their birds. But I also think taht they don't socializ ethem like they really should...
They had a green-cheeked conure, a quaker, and a cockatiel. All pretty young birds, the cockatiel was obviously female from the bands on her tail, and obviously young by her size.
The cockatiel and the quaker wouldn't have a thing to do with me, but the conure would. If it involved BITING. I picked him up and he would just bite me, he was obviously familiar with human hands and the concept of sitting on them, but probably associated it with unhappiness.
Maybe it's weird, but I find this so sad. He had so much personality. if someone just took the time to talk to him, to hold him, he wouldn't be like that. i could see it in his eyes when I handed him a toy. He would play with it, drop it, and wait until i picked it up again for him, and if I went to give it to anotehr bird he would kind of glare at me, not stare at the toy as mcuh as me, accusingly like.
And now I've cried my eyes out because I know this bird will probably never get a good home just because he bites. If only I had teh money to get him and urture him liek he needs.

Just a couple of notes, because this situation may not be as bad as you think.
First, all baby cockatiels look like females. If it`s a young cockatiel, if could be either sex.

That aside, green cheek conures are very beaky, nippy, bitey birds. It`s a wonderful game with them. It takes a lot of work to teach them to bite gently, and quite often that`s the best you can hope for. I worked with a pair of black capped conures (close cousins of the green cheeks) who had very mischievous souls. Taz would start nibbling on my fingers, and Pip would immediately follow suit. The gentle nibbles would become increasingly more hard as they watched me for reactions. I could talk them out of it and distract them into doing something else. But I made the mistake of letting someone less experience with birds handle them and she started to get alarmed, unsure how to stop them. Within 30 seconds, egged on by her nervous and frightened reaction, they were delightedly biting her and watching her scream and try to get rid of the little demons on her hand. I can vouch for the delightful, playful, gentle nature of these birds... but man they have a mischievous streak and they loved nibbling on things.
Also: throwing things to the floor and making the human pick it up is a favored game in almost every species of parrot known to man.

Sounds like he was being a typical green cheek to me! They`re great birds. If you c`n handle the mischief and keep a firm hand on the nipping problem, to keep it from growing into a true biting problem.