Too early- shut up loud mouth!

So Juniper my Quaker has fallen into the habit of sounding off at 6am every single morning for the past 3-4 weeks. Normally it isn't an issue because I am up with my toddler and my oldest and husband can sleep thru anything. The toddler and I cannot. A few times the kiddo has still been passed out and we get woken up by Juniper. When the toddler is up- he is up. That is all she wrote, and my day starts. My oldest gets out of school soon and I would LOVE to get a little extra sleep in the mornings. I am really trying to work on my toddler to stop these early mornings (he is up between 5 and 6 every morning) cuz mommy is exhausted!! Juniper can cause all the racket she wants once we are up, but is there any way to get her to hold off until we are up? I know it is natural for them to call and such in the mornings, I just want her to wait until we are up. Once she starts, the others join in. Is this possible or am I stuck getting up at 6am forever?

Do you cover her at night? I don't cover, but that was the first thing that came into my head and that's what we would do at home with our Amazon if he was getting loud and we had company over. I know it's not the greatest in those circumstances using it like a sort of punishment, but maybe if she just got in the habit of being covered when you go to bed and then waking up with you guys, especially if it's not a huge time adjustment and you're only looking for another hour or so.

Yeah, loud mouth is covered, I un-cover her at 7am.

You can try relocating the cage to the afternoon sun side of the house some of my parrots that live on that side wake up slower than the ones that are on the am sun side.

How old is she? I remember Aries waking up much earlier than he does now. He's covered at night when he goes to bed and he used to go off at 5am...or hang on the side of his cage at the bottom and wait for me to twitch, if he saw that, it was time to be up. Now he'll ruffle his feathers a bit and scuttle around the cage...but nothing like he used to do. He'll be 4 in August...

MandaDPanda wrote:

How old is she? I remember Aries waking up much earlier than he does now. He's covered at night when he goes to bed and he used to go off at 5am...or hang on the side of his cage at the bottom and wait for me to twitch, if he saw that, it was time to be up. Now he'll ruffle his feathers a bit and scuttle around the cage...but nothing like he used to do. He'll be 4 in August...

What is up with the twitch?! Whatever you do, don't ever twitch! If Sam's perfectly quiet in the morning, I can't twitch or he yells and that makes Ducky yell. I can get up or lie still, but if I twitch it's all over.

evil chicken wrote:

MandaDPanda wrote:

How old is she? I remember Aries waking up much earlier than he does now. He's covered at night when he goes to bed and he used to go off at 5am...or hang on the side of his cage at the bottom and wait for me to twitch, if he saw that, it was time to be up. Now he'll ruffle his feathers a bit and scuttle around the cage...but nothing like he used to do. He'll be 4 in August...

What is up with the twitch?! Whatever you do, don't ever twitch! If Sam's perfectly quiet in the morning, I can't twitch or he yells and that makes Ducky yell. I can get up or lie still, but if I twitch it's all over.

I have no clue. It was SO funny though. I'd wink and he's start his racket. LOL now he's on the hubby's side of the bed...not a peep!

MandaDPanda wrote:

evil chicken wrote:

MandaDPanda wrote:

How old is she? I remember Aries waking up much earlier than he does now. He's covered at night when he goes to bed and he used to go off at 5am...or hang on the side of his cage at the bottom and wait for me to twitch, if he saw that, it was time to be up. Now he'll ruffle his feathers a bit and scuttle around the cage...but nothing like he used to do. He'll be 4 in August...

What is up with the twitch?! Whatever you do, don't ever twitch! If Sam's perfectly quiet in the morning, I can't twitch or he yells and that makes Ducky yell. I can get up or lie still, but if I twitch it's all over.

I have no clue. It was SO funny though. I'd wink and he's start his racket. LOL now he's on the hubby's side of the bed...not a peep!

Yeah, it's funny... unless you have a fly buzzing around your face and crawling on you and you can't do anything because you don't want to drag your lazy butt up out of bed...

She is somewhere between 1 and 2. I've been swapping her and Sparrow at night, he stays in her cage out in the house and she stays in his baby cage in my room at night. She is silent until she sees me stir, then it is on like Donkey Kong. Not perfect, because the baby sleeps with me, but better, I'll take it!

As usual, I'm a little late seeing your post, but Bucky was doing the same thing for a while. I know you said you covered her at night, but what are you covering her with and what time are you covering her? Also, are you leaving any food or water in the cage over night?

Mango is the same way from the beginning. I bet rest of budgies and Chico hate him for that

Yes, my birds always have food and water in their cages. It is called free feeding right? I cover him with a sheet. It isn't a black out, kind of airy and sheer. I cover her between 7pm and 8pm.

Id change her cover to something that keeps the cage dark in the mornings. I have a blanket that I cover Sammy's cage with and you never hear a peep from her until I uncover her cage.

Or you could ty keepng her up a little longer at night before shes pu to bed. Maybe changing she sleep habits will help. Id love to put Sammy to bed before 8pm but she refused to be put in her cage any earlier than 10.

I agree. I cover Bucky with two sheets. One is blue, the other is dark red. The combined effect keeps it dark as night in there, and on mornings when I've had a headache (and nobody else has bothered to check on my birds (I just realized there aren't any angry-face emoticons!)), I'll get up at 10 or 11 in the morning and take off his cover, and he'll crawl out of his tent, stretch, drop his mongo morning poo (TMI?), and start asking for breakfast. Clearly he's been fast asleep since I covered him the night before. (I usually cover him between 8 and 10, depending on what time the rest of the house quiets down.)

I ALWAYS leave food for them over night because I never know when something like that is going to happen and I'll be delayed getting them breakfast. I'm about the LEAST able to stick to a routine person you'll ever meet. The only routine my birds know is that the first thing that happens in the morning when they see me is that I'll uncover Bucky, say good morning, weigh them, then make breakfast. They just have no idea when that will happen from day to day... does that make me a bad bird momma?

Anyhow, all that to say: try covering her with something that will black-out her room, or at least make the light in there darker, if that makes sense... like use a dark blue or black sheet. If that doesn't work, try looking on Craigs List for a small, inexpensive cage for her to sleep in and put it in another room of the house, or even (this is not horrible!) a closet. That way at bedtime, it's quiet, dark, still, and a separate "room" that doesn't have all her toys in it. I couldn't go that route though because it seems that having a routine would be important if you have a bird in the closet. BUT, I've heard that it works really well.

So... maybe try that and see how it works. And keep us posted - let us know how it goes!

I wanted to shove her loud butt in a closet this morning! Argh!!! I will try covering her with something darker, looks like I'll have to start covering Kokomo too- she started it all this morning at 5:45. I'll adjust Juniper's bedtime too since it is summer and hopefully we can all start sleeping in past 6/7am.

Vicki5280 wrote:

They just have no idea when that will happen from day to day... does that make me a bad bird momma?

NO! Keeps them adaptable so they adapt to all the human changes throughout their dang long lives so you don't have to get rid of them due to life circumstances; so they don't start plucking and screaming or some other neurotic behavior because they can't "deal" with their lives in our homes.

patdbunny wrote:

Vicki5280 wrote:

They just have no idea when that will happen from day to day... does that make me a bad bird momma?

NO! Keeps them adaptable so they adapt to all the human changes throughout their dang long lives so you don't have to get rid of them due to life circumstances; so they don't start plucking and screaming or some other neurotic behavior because they can't "deal" with their lives in our homes.

Good! And thank you! 'Cause I'd feel really bad knowing I was being a bad mom, but I wouldn't be able to change much about it. And honestly, it's been weighing on me a little bit. I've read and heard in MANY places that the birds want and NEED a schedule, and I'm just not very scheduled. I TRY, but I'm not.

Look, I raised and lived w/ a CAG for 8 years w/out a schedule and with a TON of changes. She was the most well adjusted grey I've ever met. Never plucked, not phobic. I won't say she was good with strangers, but she was not afraid of strangers. She just needed to get to know a stranger before stepping onto them. I miss her. She's the parrot I had stolen.

Mornings are different here too depending on which kid needs what and how fast Mama got her coffee. Otherwise BACK OFF.

Try putting in a new toy at the very last minute before you go to bed. So basically it's too late at night for the bird to play with the toy, but it's the first thing he sees in the morning to occupy his attention for awhile when he wakes up. Same with some special non-perishable food item like nutriberries - put in late at night, takes some time in the morning to eat.

Experiment with what special items to use for this. The concept is - new item late at night so the bird can't play/eat at night; but discovers it in the morning to keep it occupied.

You can also try musical cages - rotate the birds into each others cages for nighttime sleeping. Keeps things interesting in the mornings for them.

I agree with lots of changes all the time.

I've been doing musical cages and found the winning combo last night. I had to black out cover Juniper, and switch Sparrow and Kokomo. Kokomo will now sleep in Sparrow's cage at night and Sparrow in Kokomos. I also covered every single one of these boogers last night.


Toys for Juniper won't work, she doesn't play. At all. Nor does she forage.


Thanks for all the advice guys!!!!

Ours don't wake until we start to stir, at least not unless it gets to be 10 or 11! We don't cover the cages, but they are in a room on the west side of the house with a good set of blinds that keep it pretty dark. We usually put them to bed just a little before we go to bed as well (I should do it a little earlier to make sure they get 10 hours of darkness). Our schedule fluctuate fairly significantly and they basically cue off either the sound of the coffee maker (hubby up) or the alarm turning off (me up). If ever they wake earlier than that, we don't respond until we're ready to be up, so we don't reinforce it. But both were store birds which may have made a difference,

Is he in the room with you? Boot him out! Put him in the loungeroom over night or something and see how it goes, if he's in a room by himself you may find that he doesn't see you wake up and decide it's time to be up. Boot the baby out too

I feel your pain. Jack has done this from the very beginning.

Three. Years. Of waking me up at 6 am.

Fortunately there have been changes in amongst the 3 years. Such as moving; he was in a different room. I also have had a schedule where I wake up earlier than he does when I go to work (5 am)

But aside from a few random days in winter when it is darker longer, and the birds are quiet....he is up every single day at 6 am.

And nothing will stop him from doing it. Not extra blankets to block out the light. Not staying up late. Not complete quiet (there is no such thing in this house anyway). The little brat is better than an alarm clock.