Getting Martin used to his stand

**Dan** · 11-20-2011, 08:10 AM

So we moved in to the house this weekend and decided that it would be a good idea to have a 'bird room' with the cages, and then stands/gyms for the birds in the living room...both to help with territoriality as well as to give them a change of scenery.

Bailey is fine with it but Martin has always been very attached to his cage (despite being able to switch between them super easily) so he seems to be struggling a bit with not having a cage to go back to (the bird room is upstairs so he can't really fly back to his cage...not yet anyway). His stand has food and toys (not that he uses them much). Normally he flies everywhere and he has already landed in loads of places but has not really taken to going back to his stand yet! He just wants to hang out with us. If we take him there, he will stay without a problem and eat etc, but he won't willingly fly there.

Any ideas on how to get him used to it so he'll fly there himself to eat etc? Or is the entire idea of just having this int he living room (where the birds spend most of their time when they are out of the cage - unless they are following us into other rooms of course!) and not really have them be able to easily reach their cages upstairs a bad idea?

Thanks!

**Marrie** · 11-20-2011, 09:11 AM

Have you tried launching training, with the stand as the target? If he'll stay there and it isn't scary for him, sounds like he just has to realize that the stand is where he should land after a fly around.

**Dan** · 11-20-2011, 11:32 AM

Sometimes he avoids it even if I launch from really close! It's weird since he doesn't mind being on it clearly. He'll go and land next to it on a slippery envelope or whatever it might be!

**Marrie** · 11-20-2011, 11:48 AM

Hmm, weird. Is there a flat part to the stand? Maybe he doesn't like landing on perches, but would prefer a flat shelf?

**Dan** · 11-20-2011, 03:31 PM

No flat part, no, but normally he doesn't have an issue! Going to try to spruce it up a bit by attaching a rope perch to the normal wooden perch, see if that helps (since he is quite fond of those perches).

Hopefully he will get used to being over there a bit more because it is meaning that all of his poos are going elsewhere.

**Dan** · 12-02-2011, 12:54 AM

We ended up giving in and just bought Martin a small cage for the living room, where he can hang out and eat.

**Marrie** · 12-02-2011, 09:22 AM

Hehe silly Martin, guess he really likes his cages.

**Dan** · 12-02-2011, 10:57 AM

He really does... he was already climbing all over it as it was being built! Bless him. Hopefully this will help him settle in the living room anyway, when he's there