# Mynah bird advice wanted please



## redders (Aug 3, 2015)

Hello everyone,i'm new here.My name is Alan and i would welcome some advice about my recent additions to our family.I have been lucky enough to get 2 common mynah birds,they are 6 months old but are not hand tame,with time and patience do i stand a chance of being able to hand tame them or are they too old.I would love it if they did tame down and start talking.

Thank you for reading my ramblings.
Alan


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## Tecknora (Oct 3, 2015)

It is easier to tame a young bird, but older birds can get tame too! When I first got my cockatiel he was hand fed but not hand raised, so he hissed and ran away from me. Although he was '4-6 months old' as told by the clerk, he was so stubborn , and now ,5 months later, even more so. However he now steps up onto my finger and doesn't mind moving up my hand, both of which need tempting with treats. 
Don't take my advice for it as I'm not an expert on these things , but my bird Did more progress after unwanted handling than weeks of being patient. 
Read your bird's body language. If he is afraid, then touch him even when he doesn't seem to like it( but don't force it if he hisses or tries to bite, or even just move away far into the corner. If that happens just leave ur hand close but not so close that just moving your hand a tad would result in touching him, but close enough that a few steps towards your hands is the only space between you two.) this is what I did with my bird and we had some progress, very small baby step progress. 

Again I'm no expert.


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## Jottlebot (Jan 5, 2016)

Hi,

How are you getting on? I just wanted to say hello and let you know that your Mynah's are definitely not too old to train or talk. I have a Common Mynah, who is around 18 months to 2 years old. She has been captive bred, but not handled. I had her around 2 months ago. I don't think she will be a particularly good talker as she is probably too old (yours have the potential to be great if you talk to them lots. The first 2 years are the important ones for mimicking speech), but she certainly trying a croaky little "hello"! I generally know more about parrots and I know that pairs are harder to train and tame than individuals as they bond to each other rather than you as a human so it might be a bit tougher.

At first progress was very slow and if I even put my hand in the cage she would panic, but once she started to trust me things came quicker. She will now land on my hand to grab a meal worm and then fly off to eat it, but this only happened for the first time today and she is already starting to pause (for a split second!) before flying off.

I don't know about forcing them to be handled, I won't have my bird's wings clipped and there is not a chance I could touch her without her flying away if I tried! If yours are clipped then maybe you would stand a chance, but I don't feel particularly comfortable doing this, although obviously it works as it says above and worked with my Orange Winged Amazon who ADORES my husband because he was firm with her whereas she can't stand me partly because I never was.

Sometimes I do feel I'm getting nowhere and I don't know if being where I am 2 months in is slow or not, but when I think about how scared she was at first things have definitely progressed. I try and get her to do whatever it is I'm working on around 3-6 times a day, I have found that her natural curiosity and greediness is enough to make progress. I feed her (live) meal worms or morio worms as a real bribe - erm I mean treat - for interacting with me, but before I started to use live foods dried mealworms worked just as well.

It would be good to know how you're doing, but generally 6 months means you have a great chance of having a lovely pair of tame and talking Mynahs!


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