I have been working on taming my bird for a while now, but he doesn't seem to be getting used to my hand. He must think its the devil or something as he's happy to sit n the bars of his cage near my face.

 

I was making progress until a friend grabbed him out of the cage without my consent. Do you think maybe he's traumatised?

 

He flys around the cage like a maniac whenever I open his cage door and when my hand is in there. With patience I can get him on my finger, but he pants heavily and his head swivels desperately as if looking for an escape route.

 

Is it normal for an older budgie to behave this way? I know it may just be because he's grown up without people sticking their hands near him. Should I just continue getting him on my finger until he starts to calm down maybe?

just keep persisting hopefully he will recover

Yes that did traumatize him, that can take a bird back several steps. Birds are not domesticated so when they are first hatched if they are to become very used to humans they need to be handled quite soon. I saw the difference in both my birds. One was a pet shop bird that was Pretty and he did tame but he didn't tame as easily as Merlin whom had been handled from the begining.

 

Saying that you can tame them to a certain point and will have to accept that each bird tames different and takes different times lengths to do so. I have seen people on this forum say their bird tames down in 2 weeks whille others like myself took me 9 months to get Pretty to really start to trust me.

 

It is really all about trust and not taming the bird. It is about the bird knowing that you will not hurt it. Have you read my taming article in the FAQ section? If you could do that you will find many pointers.

 

Patience is a virtue and what you will need here to help him come back around. Birdluv did a great post on taming her birds if you do a search on her you will come up with that post too.

 

Keep us posted if you have more questions.

I read right through birdluv's post and it gave me some confidence that Bula will overcome his fear. He doesn't bite me, he simply flys away when I go near him.

 

I think, because of the hand incident, I will need to start over. I will stop doing the step up training and go back to the basics. I will withhold his millet for a little bit and try to use it more of a reward, and give it to him after I've been there. That way hopefully he will associate me, not as a monster, but as someone that brings millet

 

I think once I can get him to trust me enough with his treats, I might start a journal to keep track of his progress