Budgie's behavioral problems

[Nicci]

I got a budgie from PetsMart about four months ago. I love Bonnie dearly, but I feel so bad because I don't know why she's acting the way she does...well, I think I know, but I'm not sure how to go about helping her.

She was completely unsocialized while at the petstore. They SAID they gave her veggies, and they told me what she got on a day-to-day basis. She has yet to eat any of those veggies since I brought her home. She seems to need a VERY stable routine, and it takes her forever to adjust to new situations. Any change throws her off. It took her 3 1/2 months to realize her fruit block wasn't going to hurt her. She screams at her vegetables and ignores pellets. I'm having a really hard time getting her off a seed diet (what she was on at the pet store). She only recently started nibbling at the fruite block. That was 3 1/2 months of it ALWAYS being in her cage...she gets new toys all the time and she tears them to pieces, but for some reason she hated her fruit block. we were doing very well up until about a week ago. She was eating out of my hand, I could scratch her on the neck...now, when I get too close to her cage, she lunges at me and tries to bite me. I can't even put my hand in her cage without her drawing blood. I had to work a sixteen hour day ONCE. Ever since then, she's been acting like this. That was about a week or so ago. It took me months to get her to where she was before, and I'm starting to worry that she's always going to hate people. I want her to be happy, and I don't see how spending her life by herself getting upset everytime someone comes into the living room would be a happy life for her. What should I do? I'll probably just start all over trying to tame her. Any advice or words of encouragement would be very welcome.

 

[Norrisk]

When I searched to see what a budgie looked like I found this site, it may help you. It's got some links on their health and training methods. budgies.org/info/resinfo.html

 

[Dagna]

You pretty much have the right idea, you need to work on retaming her. Unfortunately, Petsmart isn't the best place to get birds. They feed a seed diet (very bad for budgies) and I have yet to see any fruit in with their birds. You may also consider getting a second bird to go with her, but I would only do that if you really can't tame her since it's next to impossible to train two birds at the same time. She would then have at least another of her species to play with.

I would also suggest finding a reputable bird only store. They should be more than happy to give you advice on taming and working with her. Other people to talk to would be a bird-only vet (if you can find one) and also experienced budgie owners/breeders.