This is true. Though you'd think she'd be more persistent about not wanting to go back in the cage, rather than not wanting to come out.

Once again she doesn't want to step up to come out of the cage. So I'm just leaving her in with the door open while Lucy hangs out on top of the cage. Sometimes Lucy flies to me for scritches, or just to mess with whatever I'm trying to do. In that case Alex acts like she wants to come out but doesn't necessarily try to climb out with the cage door wide open.

So I guess she's just indecisive. I tried food bribing. She took a pumpkin seed and climbed away from my hand as fast as she could to eat it. So that might be out of the question for now.

Meanwhile Lucy still enjoys her out of cage time. She flies around the room and even to the kitchen and back several times, for seemingly no reason other than for the sake of exercise. She also flies to me and then back to her cage when she feels like it.
It's honestly pretty impressive to watch her fly. She swerves around and does some sharp turns, does dips and all that. It's like she's showing off.

I would love for Alex to have that kind of flight ability too. Maybe she would be less anxious if she didn't have to result to running around on the floor trying to find a hiding spot. Now if she can keep her feathers in her wings, that might eventually happen. But at the rate things are going, that may take a while... Even with fully feathered wings she always struggled. I might make another thread for my theories and such about that.

Both dogs are still kept in a separate room during their out of cage play time. We've come to the conclusion that Dixie is a sheltie mix. She does have herd dog behavior which could be why she gets excited with the birds: because she tries to herd them. We have a friend with another small dog and when he's over, she tries to herd both him and my small dog Bo. Only problem is that dogs don't herd well.

She's very interested in the lizards found in the back yard but doesn't pay attention to the tortoise (hard to herd something that moves so slowly). So that's one animal that she leaves alone, luckily... I just wish she could leave the birds alone. When I'm trying to change the food and water she's right there, and it especially freaks Alex out. Lucy as usual, doesn't care and tries to climb out at every opportunity. It can be hectic with all these animals sometimes.

" She took a pumpkin seed and climbed away from my hand as fast as she could to eat it. "

Emma does that too.

If Alex doesn't want to come out of the cage, it might be because she's nervous about the dog, even though the dog isn't in the room at the time. Lots of predators hide while they wait for prey to come within striking range. If the dog is in the room part of the time, Alex knows that this is an area where dogs hang out, and just because she can't see one at the moment it doesn't prove that there isn't one nearby waiting to pounce on her if she leaves her safe zone. Lucy is a strong flyer with a good chance of getting away if a dog did suddenly leap out at her, but Alex doesn't have much confidence in her flight skills and could easily end up as somebody's lunch.

I'm sure that it is because she's nervous about the dog. After all, Lucy was the same way when I first got her. However I can't just grab her and take her to a different room like I could with Lucy. Lucy, while she hates being grabbed, will at least tolerate it when she's being held. Alex on the other hand, not so much... It could be that Lucy might be more used to it, although I think I ruined it for Alex when I had to grab and hold her in order to wash dried baby food out of her feathers when she was still being weaned.

So when I hold her she freaks out. She'll scream and squirm, and once you let her go she won't want to go near you for days. Given that as a baby she was perfectly fine with it up until I had to scrub weeks worth of dried baby food out of her feathers, it's possible that being held had already been ruined for her (the funny thing is that I didn't even do anything to hurt her while getting the baby food out. All I did was gently soak the feathers until the chunks of crusty baby food would fall off).
So it's a bit of a catch 22 situation here. Try to let her out on her own and she's afraid the dog might get her. However try and get her out of the cage and she'll be afraid of your hand.

However we have made some progress today. I let both of the dogs outside and decided that I'd leave the cage door open while I'd get the birds fresh food and water. Alex, after being curious enough, finally decided to step up for me... Then she climbed to my shoulder and tried to fly away.

Her feathers finally grew back so she can fly a little further than usual, but she's still gonna need practice. She flies kinda lopsided given that she's used to using one wing more than the other. She appears to realize her feathers are back and that she can fly a little better now though, which gave her enough confidence to try and fly into the kitchen while I was cleaning out one of the water bowls. Granted she flew to the table, then into the kitchen and landed on the floor, but given that she got that far then stepped up and let me get her back to the play stand without flying away from me in fear that I'll grab her... I'd call it progress.

For a while she didn't want me to pet her while out of the cage. Wouldn't want to go back in either when it was time to go back in the cage.
Then at one point I was just humming, singing and whistling some random tunes in my head. They always pay close attention whenever I'm doing one of those three things. So for the sake of it, I decided to hum the tune I always do to calm them down whenever they're startled. Lo and behold they both started preening and fluffing their feathers, and Alex both stepped up for me and let me give her scritches. Lucy on the other hand only wanted the scritches and had no desire to step up. She'd just lower her head whenever I put my hand there to ask her, and no amount of scritches would satisfy her enough to agree to stepping up.

I think what was different this time is that she saw that the dogs were outside and couldn't get to her. The previous times, we'd just put the dogs in a different room, so Alex didn't know if they weren't actually just hiding. The only problem is that it's really hot outside, and even with a bowl of water, it wouldn't be safe to keep them out there for more than an hour... Maybe two.

Luckily it's starting to (ever so slightly) cool down. By around early-mid October I think, it shouldn't be as much of a problem to keep them outside for a bit.

Would it be practical to keep Alex in a smaller cage for a while so you can carry her to a different room in the cage? It would make it a lot easier to work with her.

September is a great time because it's the month when the 100-degree weather finally goes away and doesn't come back until the next year. Then in October the 90-degree weather goes away.

So a little progress update: Alex is getting better again. Upon letting them out this morning, she was willing to step up and come right out. Then when I did, she flew into the kitchen, out the window that connects the kitchen to the dining room bar, and then landed the table. That's the most I've seen her fly in a while. Then when I got her off the table, she flew back to the top of her cage by herself.

At first she didn't want much to do with me, but after humming her favorite tune and calming her down, she enjoyed some scritches. Lucy did too of course (can't have just one bird getting attention).

The only real problem was that neither of them wanted to go back in the cage once it was time, but given that Alex was afraid to come out of the cage for a while, I wouldn't really see this as a bad thing. In the end she did go back in though, as did Lucy (and usually she's the one who's especially persistent about not going back in).

Still keeping the dogs outside while the birds have their out of cage time. At the moment I'm trying to teach Dixie to stay while there's a treat right in front of her. When she gets this down, I can use similar tactics to teaching her to leave birds and other animals alone. While I still won't trust her around the birds, it'll still be helpful in the case of being around any animal really. The end-goal would be to have her completely ignore another animal that moves quickly (though given how she reacts to the lizards outside, that won't be happening any time soon). Even with the fact that dogs natural predators, this isn't impossible. Even then, I'm still aware that natural instincts may kick in from time to time which is why I wouldn't completely trust her around the birds. However, teaching her how to behave around other animals is still something that would come in handy in the long run.

Sometimes having a multiple pet household can be so frustrating when you have a mix of predator and prey. Our dogs are two border collie x papillons. They are very high energy. Our boy, Toby, doesn't bat an eyelid at the other animals but Bailey on the other hand will not take her eyes off them. She doesn't do anything (she never chases our cat, she never jumps up our aviaries etc) but I wouldn't trust either of them. The only thing Bailey will chase is a fox that comes into our garden every evening and she checks around every time she goes outside. She even has her own pattern every single night. Toby isn't fussed at all. It's just one of those though which is why I always express to people on FB and such that while it may be cute that your bird is hanging out with your dog it only takes a second for something terrible to happen. Animals are instinctual after all!

I'm glad that the issue seems to be getting better. Have you thought about doing some training for when your dog is in the room? If you have a clicker and know how to use it that's even better. If not, get one and I promise it will help! What you could do is sit with your dog near the cage or just generally in the room. Don't do anything while she's looking at the birds. As soon as she looks away or focuses on anything else you can click and reward. Over time she will learn that keeping her eyes off the birds means she gets treats. It will make your birds feel safer and more secure too

It's like I've had to build my aviaries in a way where my birds can't see each other. The hawk can only see out of the front side of his aviary. That way he doesn't know that the other birds are next door. It's beneficial for everybody that way

I did get the clicker more for the purpose of trying to recall train the birds (was never able to keep up with that).

That is a good idea though! I think I'll try that. I've been meaning to put that clicker to use.

They're the best tool anybody can ever have I think haha. I used it to recall train most of my companion parrots so should they ever escape they'd fly to somebody. One of my Alexandrines got out while I was at work and a neighbour posted something through the letter box saying 'think your big green bird was in my garden earlier but flew off'. My heart sank. Went mad on social media looking for her and then I found a post on Facebook saying a parrot had rudely interrupted somebody drinking beer in their back yard I got her right back haha