In the human world, questions about the ethics and efficacy of applied behavior analysis (ABA) and linear training methods often arise. Are these approaches inherently cruel, or do they depend on how they're applied? These questions have led to how we look at working with...
In bird training, mastering impulse control and wait cues is invaluable, as it helps ensure birds can engage with their surroundings safely and with patience. Whether it’s teaching a bird to stay calmly on a station or to wait for a cue before moving, these...
This week in Trainer’s Corner, we’re diving into one of the most common challenges parrot owners face - screaming. It’s a problem that can quickly escalate into frustration for both the bird and their humans, leading to strained relationships and daily disruptions. Today’s focus is...
Have you ever seen someone run at a flock of pigeons to make them fly or nudge their dog to move? It’s a pretty natural response. As humans, we often feel the need to prompt animals into action. But here at Avian Behavior International, we take...
There is a very well known debate in psychology as to whether nature or nurture informs our behavior. It turns out, this debate is common among animal behavior scientists as well. It turns out, both nature and nurture, or ethology and learning history, inform the...
Are you tired of seeing animals struggle with outdated training methods? Are ear tags causing more harm than good? Today, I want to talk about the challenges we face when we encounter outdated information about caring for our birds and how we can progress beyond...
What would you do with four to five hours each day to train your birds and problem solve? This is the question our workshop guests get to answer, and answer, they did!...
One of the clunkier and less popular sides of animal behavior science is that it feels less palatable, less attainable to all because of the dense scientific language that we use. When I frame a behavioral interaction as a “negative reinforcement contingency”, I lose a...
In this age of the ever-expanding human population, we see so many headlines of people doing horrible things and animals bear the brunt of our callousness towards each other. The story of Plucker, my red tailed hawk that I hunt with for falconry here in...