So, not wanting to revive an older thread, or take away from a new one, I figured I would start yet another discussion on screaming.

Some of my backstory:

I had a passage red tail that came down with avian pox shortly after catching his first squirrel with me. He had always been pretty noisy for a red tail, and sitting out for two months to recover turned him into a screamer (food begging). I hunted him hard for the remainder of the season, took quite a bit of game with him, doubling and tripling a few times, and put him up to molt. His screaming stopped, but he was still noisy, making a variety of sounds including the famous territorial scream that he would do towards local birds (and dogs) several times a day. I spent a lot of time with him, and fed him through a chute.

Post molt his screaming was unbearable. I flew him for a week or so, caught 3 squirrels, and transferred him for the rest of the season. I live in an apartment and didn't want to risk angry neighbors over the noise. He was hunted by the other falconer until I got him back in march, hunted him for a week or so, and then molted a second time. Post 2nd molt his screaming was greatly reduced. He was also flying ~60g higher than his first season. His second molt I spent less time with him and used automatic feeders. By the end of that molt, he was almost completely silent. I chose to release him instead of continuing on flying him.

His first season this bird was noisy in the field, or any time he could see me, and was only quiet when fat or after a hunt. It was very clearly related to food begging imo.

Currently I'm flying an imprint aplomado. My understanding is aplos are all fairly noisy to begin with. My bird is very noisy. He was plate fed and lure fed, and given baggies at an early age. He was always taken to the food, and encouraged to fly away from me for food. Weight was dropped slowly, though first free flight was delayed due to the hurricane. I've noticed some key differences between this bird and my last however, which leads me to think it's more of a juvenile behavior vs food related. For starters, weight has almost no affect on the screaming. It is somewhat reduced at a very high weight, but not much. This bird still screams after hunting. While my last bird screamed anytime I was in sight, this bird is almost entirely silent outside of the house. He is mostly quiet in the field, and in the car. Once he sees us pulling up to the house, he will start screaming. So far, the screaming appears to be very much place oriented. He only screams around me in the house. If I'm not there he's more quiet, and if he isn't in the house, even if I'm around, he is almost entirely silent. Food, weight, hunting, etc. seem to have little to no effect. I'm pretty attached to this bird, so transferring or selling are out of the question to me. We aren't quite ready for the molt yet, so I'm looking for things I could do in the meantime to help him be quieter indoors (as I still live in an apartment). Honestly I think moving would do a great deal to stop it, but we cannot move at this point in time.

He will sometimes quiet down after he's been in the room with us for a while indoors. At the least his screaming gets intermittent. But it doesn't stop completely, and not enough that I can do that for long periods of time without upsetting the neighbors.

For this reason I'm interested in exploring the use of OC to reinforce moments of silence. I'm fairly familiar with using OC for training, as I worked with animal training in a former career. I would like to hear from others as to what they tried, how it worked, or didn't work, and anything else they discovered in the process.

I'd also like to discuss potential other reasons for screaming (other than just food begging). It certainly appears to be a juvenile related behavior, and in my aplo's case it almost appears to be more related to a "nest site" mentality than food (he's quiet in other buildings). What are your ideas as to what causes this? Feeding imprints in the home? Direct food association? What are things you would do to prevent this in potential future birds? Has anyone tried only feeding an imprint in the field and not in the house or mews? What are potential pros and cons?

I'm looking forward to learning and discussing!