Tips For Teaching Cockatiels to Talk

Teaching cockatiels to talk is much more complicated than merely repeating a phrase over and over again. Your bird will only imitate those noises that have caught its interest anyway. The cockatiel has a very reedy voice quality, and tends to sound like a child with a cold. Cockatiels do not normally learn a large vocabulary of words, but are capable of whistling a variety of tunes.

When first teaching your cockatiel to talk, start by teaching him to say a word. It is far easier to teach him to whistle, so if he learns to whistle first, he will battle even more to say his first words.

Teaching cockatiels to talk is a little more difficult to do than teaching other members of the parrot family, but it is very possible. Here are some pointers to help you with teaching your cockatiel to talk.

The male cockatiels will talk a lot easier than the female cockatiels, so if you want a talking bird, I recommend a male cockatiel. I have only managed to teach one female to talk easily, but this was an exception to the rule.

Cockatiels will only learn words that they like. If they show an interest in what you say, then it will be much easier to teach them that particular word.

When teaching your cockatiel to talk, start off by choosing something very simple, like a word with one syllable. The trick is to keep repeating this word during each and every training session. Don't move onto any other words until he has mastered this one.

It is a good idea to have some treats ready. If he shows an interest in what you are saying, give him a treat and this will encourage your cockatiel to listen and then try to mimic you.

It is usually easier for a woman to teach a cockatiel to talk than it is for a man.

If you can make a recording for your cockatiel to listen too when you are not around will make the process faster. Just be careful to leave spaces on the recording between phrases, as the cockatiel may learn the words as a continuous phrase and just carry on repeating it. This will become extremely irritating.

Once your cockatiel has learnt his first phrase, you can move onto the next. Cockatiels can carry on learning words for many years.