Jennie Settling In

Well, I think Jennies settling into her new home & environment quite well.  She's eating real well.  I'm continuing to give her the mixed seed diet she was on when she came to me, but have also introduced
some cooked beans & egg noodles mixed with frozen veggies, & scrambled eggs & veggies.  She
likes her seed mix better, but I've seen her nibbling on the other food as well, which is very
satisfactory to me.

I had not attempted any kind of physical contact for awhile, & instead stuck to just talking with her
a lot & being a presence.  But I know I can't keep that up & expect her to be tame.  So I swallowed
some of the fear her bites have instilled in me & worked with her a bit today.  

She very much wants to be out of her cage, it's obvious.  I have opened the door & let her out a
couple of times.  But I've decided not to let her out unless I get her out, meaning she has to
get on my finger before she can come out.   That might sound mean, but I guess I think of it as positive reinforcement for wanted behavior.

So this evening when I opened her cage door, she made a bee line right for it!  But I put my finger up to
her & gave the "up" command.  She scurried around my hand toward the door, but I shut it, making
sure, of course, that she wasn't in the way. That went on for quite some time, but then it was like it hit
her all of a sudden that she wasn't getting what she wanted until I got what I wanted & then she finally
resorted to stepping on my finger!  YAY!  I considered that a big break through!

In all fairness to her, I probably should have put her immediatey on top of her cage, but while I had her, I wanted to handle her a bit more.  So I brought her into the ofc room & let her play on the desk for awhile.  I also put her on Manus swing.  Manu can still use the swing I made for him  until Jennies 6 wks quarantine
is over in mid Feb.  Hopefully they can share this one after that!