🎯 Target training with a stick
The one skill that makes every other one cheaper. A bird that follows a target can be moved onto a scale, into a carrier or off your shoulder without a hand ever touching it — which is also how most biting stops being necessary.
Do this one first. This module assumes Trust and step-up, days 1–14 is already working. Carry on regardless if your bird is further along than the order suggests.
Training advice, not veterinary advice. A sudden change in behaviour can have a medical cause, and no protocol here addresses one — when in doubt, an avian vet. Why this matters more than it sounds.
The steps, in order
Work a step until the bird does it reliably — not until it works once.
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Charge the marker first
Say "yes" — or click — and immediately give a reward, about ten times, asking for no behaviour at all. You are teaching one thing: that sound means food is coming. Until the sound means something, marking the right moment does nothing.
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The first touch
Hold a plain wooden stick near, but not against, the beak. Most birds bite it out of curiosity within a few seconds. The instant the beak makes contact, mark and pay. Do not move the stick towards the bird — that turns a target into something to be avoided.
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Add one step of distance
Present the tip a couple of centimetres further away, so touching it needs one step. Mark and pay. Increase in small increments; if two attempts in a row fail, you went too far too fast and the fix is to go back, not to wait.
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Use it for something real
Target the bird along a perch, onto a scale, into and out of a carrier, off a shoulder. This is the point of the whole exercise: a routine that would otherwise need catching becomes something the bird does voluntarily.
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Fade the stick
Once the movement is reliable, start presenting an open hand in the same position and mark the same movement. The stick stays useful for anything new or frightening — you are adding a cue, not retiring one.
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Three to five minutes, twice a day
Short sessions, ended while the bird is still keen, beat one long session every time. A parrot that gets bored during training learns that training is boring, and that is far harder to undo than a slow start.
You will know it worked when
Your bird moves the length of a perch to touch the stick, and stops when the stick is taken away.
Sources used
Every claim in this module is supportable from these. Where they disagree, the module follows the more cautious one.
What this one opens up
The other modules
The same modules, with your place saved
The LunarKiri app carries these protocols with a tick against every step, saved per bird and shared with your family, and works with no network.