Parrot people!!! **NEED ADVICE!!!!**

[tnkinhunting]

Kees, that's one I had never heard of on the tail feather - I will do that the next time
Einstein bites me - he bit me earlier today - I got him a new, bigger cage several days ago and got him out the first time today - he had adjusted, I thought, very well.

When it came time to go back in, no way, so in the process, I got nipped - no blood, maybe a bruise. So, next time, I will have a nice red bookmark! hehehehe

 

[Guitartists]

Well, it turned out they wanted double what we thought and it ended up being parrot or chickens... so of course I had to go with CHICKENS!!!!! No parrot for me, at least not this year. Maybe some other time. Thank you though for the advice... I will pass it on to the owner, maybe she can put it to good use while she still has him.

 

[ole-crone]

We have a CAG that lives in his cage most of the time because he is so mean. He was the sweetest baby. We got him before he even had all of his feathers. He used to live outside of the cage. But when he reached adulthood - he loved to sneak up on us and grab the back of the ankle.

We still love the guy and he's allowed out but we have to warn everyone in the house when he's loose. He's about 18 now. He's very intelligent but I have a feeling that he's a bit hard of hearing. When the boys were home, you could say their name and he'd answer Hello in that person's voice. But I'm the one mostly home now and he can't understand me enough to mimic me. The few words he does say are those he hears from men.

well - that's not quite true. He cusses. But without using cuss words. He rants in some unknown language - sentence pattern beats but he doesn't say any words. But you can tell that he's mad. So I figure my voice is a bit too high for him to understand.

He can sing Happy Birthday and loves to create arias that flow all over the place. I do miss my little guy who would lay on my lap and fall asleep.

Now about big cages. Watch out for cages with up and down rungs. Our guy had the hardest time after we bought him a nice large cage. No only being able to use the rungs as a ladder, his beak would grow crooked. For a couple of years we had to take him to the vet to get it trimmed.

However, we connected some wooden ladders to the rungs to encourage him to climb on those and the problem went away.

 

[kees]

If a parrot is about to bite you when you're holding it, it's recommended that you wobble your hand so it's like an earthquake and then let the parrot drop to the floor.

Always be alert to the pupils of a parrot, when one is excited it's pupils will quickly constrict or dilate, this could be from happiness or it could be a warning sign. If it is vocalizing at you (you can tell by the way it's speaking if it means harm or not) and spreading it's tail feathers, leave it alone (unless you want to Ebay "all natural bookmarks")! lol

Suzy

 

[kees]

One thing that I forgot to mention is that African Grays or African Timnehs can easily go for $1,500-$2,500, the younger the better...and always research the breeder and make sure that the leg has a closed band on it. The band means that it was raised from an egg. An open band can be squeezed onto one that was caught from the wild and when animals are taken from the wild, for every one that survives, approximately 90% of the others will die.

Suzy

 

[DuckyBoys]

If you don't have Sally Blanchard's books I would highly recommend them. I've only owned one parrot, an umbrella cockatoo who recently passed away, but she never once tried to bite me or anyone else. I've read several of Sally's and they were very helpful.

PUBLICATIONS
April 1999 Sally Blanchard's Companion Parrot Handbook

September 2004 Sally Blanchard's Companion Parrot Handbook

Revised Second Edition June 2002 The Beak Book:
Biting and Aggressive Behavior in Companion Parrots

November 2006 My Experiences with Cockatoos

December 2006 Selected Parrot Humor

January 2007 Parrot Vocalizations: Dealing with Excessive Manipulative Screaming

 

[shy]

You can definitely change its attitude. I had a Timneh Grey that loved me and only me. Greys in general don't like new things or new people. The trick is to let the parrot see you feed it everyday and give it treats all the time. Also if you spend some time with the old owner and let the parrot see that you are an okay person, they will eventually get used to you too. Remember that they won't change overnight. It takes time. Consider them as being toddlers.

Anyhow, my dad really wanted my timneh. I sent her to my dad. I was a bit worried but now, Timmi loves my dad. And when I go visit, she still comes to me. Hope that helps.

 

[legacyln]

Quote:
Agree totally. My brother had a CAG and a Red-lored Amazon (brother is deceased, we had to re-home two really sad birds but last I heard it was working out with them) and the Grey was very quiet and reserved, had no interest in anyone but my bro. The Amazon was a roustabout and veeeery naughty, would bite anyone besides my brother who picked him up, which was too bad for me b/c I was his bird sitter. He did occasionally bite my brother but not too hard.

I also worked for about 3 years taking care of parrots, finches etc at a private zoo, and my experience is that often parrots (esp. Greys) tend to bond to one person and that biters always bite. We had many macaws, Amazons, cockatoos, a toucan, a feather plucking Grey, and more. You can minimize the biting by training and the parrots "mate" will probably not get bitten as much, but it happens.

PS If you don't want to fling a bird against a wall, perfect the art of taking the hand opposite the one that is getting bitten and use your thumb and pointer finger to pry the jaws apart. Some birds would grab on and actually grind their beak on me, notably one little red bellied senegal that I loved but was a turd when he got mad, which was often!

Good luck and keep us posted!

 

[lynxpilot]

They must be adaptable to some degree because a lot of pet shops have grays as perch birds that customers and browsers can handle. I don't really care for them much because they do tend to bond to a very select crowd (of usually one). If there's any way to socialize it with a lot of people out of its cage, like an open perch, that helps any of the parrot family. Mine's a greenwing macaw and they are fairly docile but they are more or less tied as the largest of the parrot family with hyacinths and they can take fingers off. Mine does the pupil manipulations (flashing) and when he's really excited he'll raise the feathers on the top of his head and make a hat so to speak. When he does that, he's dangerous and I stay at arm's length. I'll usually tap at him and say "no" or "no hats" and display dominant behavior and he'll normally settle down. Grays don't respond well to disciplinary measures. You really need to let them do what they want and if it happens to correspond to you or somebody else holding them at any given time, then take advantage of it. They're supposed to be good vocalizers. We never 'trained' ours, so he usually speaks in context like saying "hello" when the phone rings or making a belch sound when I lift a can of beer. One really bizzare thing I noticed about him is that he will assess somebody almost immediately and decide if he likes them or not. Whatever his decision is seems to last a long time. I'm not sure what criteria he uses. And I thought I was judgemental.

 

[kees]

Hi,
They say that based upon our first impressions of people, approx. 3 minutes, we decide whether we want to get to know them or not.
I decided not to get a grey because they are notorious for mimicking people's voices EXACTLY and I thought that would freak me out. There was a bird who overheard a conversation between a husband and wife, and, one year later, repeated it in their exact same voices (never having done so previously)!
For people who are thinking of owning parrots, you might consider being careful about wearing baseball caps around them. They think that it's a beak and may challenge you.
I love animals...sheesh...I wish that I could live on a farm!
Suzy