Ten fantastically successful tried-and-tested tips for training your pet parrot! How i trained my bitey little monster african grey into a playful sweetie. A frantic mom's hilarious, but tough-talking truth about how she tamed her mother's bird.
What to teach your african grey to say
Category: African Grey Forum, African Grey Information
African greys are not meant to be clowns that will make party guests laugh. Â They are as smart as dolphins and chimpanzees! Â Don’t just teach them gibberish. Â They can actually understand what you are teaching them if you take the time to use the word/short sentence in the proper context. Â I am teaching my bird these things so that we can actually communicate with one another.
Step up
Go back
Stay here
Go potty
Want out
Name the food you are giving him or her… nut (don’t be too specific they won’t be able to go into types of nuts)
Want water
Pet (allow him to get pets when he wants to…when I say ‘pet pet’ my grey puts his head down for a scratch if he wants one and only when he wants one)
See you soon! Â (If I’m leaving so he knows that means that I will be coming back)
Come here!
What are you doing? Â or What’s up?
I love you!
Hello!
If you teach him to say his own name it isn’t very useful because he isn’t likely to understand that you are referring to him…
Use the short phrases in the proper context and don’t dilute them with irrelevant words so that he will soon begin to understand that he is not just imitating but actually communicating with you. Â If you have not heard of Dr. Irene Pepperberg from MIT she has studied Alex, a grey and proven that this can be done.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6KvPN_Wt8I
If you must teach him cutesy things to make people laugh…be careful not to teach him ridiculous things…obscene or obnoxious things…they will repeat them over and over…and if you end up rehoming the bird in 20 or 30 years (they live to be 80)  it could make it harder for him or her to get  a decent home.
And think about it: Â If you were meant for the wild, and had a brilliant mind but the people keeping you in captivity never bothered to teach you to your full potential and you spent your life uttering gibberish just to get peanuts when all the while you had the capacity to actually communicate with your captors then it is really sad. Â And then imagine that your captors only want to make you act foolish to laugh at you.
Would you do this to your best friend? Â Just my two cents.
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