Dave007

"""""What do you mean about keep her out of the dark?"""""" Other than sleeping, most parrots like to stay in lite areas. They're the ones that decide when to go into shady areas. Lite areas let the bird show curiosity about what's going on. It lets people see what's going on. Understand that this is strickly my opinion. Others may disagree but it's worked for me. You can try it or not. *****Have you come across anybody using colloidal silver in the misting bottle yet? I've heard a few people mention it but I only use it as an antiseptic. I've used vitamin e oil (the natural one not the human synthetic variety) do a varying degree of success in stopping the itchyness when the feather first start pinning.***** I know nothing about those products but I can say that antiseptics can irritate skin. It's acidic and can cause bad reactions. The only things that should be used are products that soothe the skin making it softer and more pliable. A bird has less reason to pull on that type of skin. Some people use regular mouth wash to gargle with. Those same people may decide to use antiseptic gargle and it'll sting the mouth and some of the throat. Again just my opinion but I wouldn't use antiseptics on birds. For products like that I would definitely get my vet's ok on that. Understand that for many birds, it takes a long while to see good results. Birds go through relapses many times. It's frustrating and sad for people. The bird doesn't really care. Your bird is a typical plucker. It's chronic as opposed to acute. A chronic plucker will never stop. An acute plucker will go through times when the plucking stops for a long time and just certain things happen which will make the plucking start again. Then, the plucking stops again. This is a bird similar in some problems like your bird, only worse. It also tells about the length of time. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v50/DaveVP/1-1.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v50/DaveVP/2.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v50/DaveVP/3.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v50/DaveVP/4-1.jpg This bird never had flight feathers and even though he has them now, he'll never fly because he doesn't know how to fly.

Hi, I'm glad you figured out Photoucket. The age has to do with a lot of your bird's situation. More than likely, the bird has been doing this for a long time and the problems weren't dealt with. So now, the bird has developed habits that have become routine for her. Long time chronic plucking/chewing eventually creates loss of follicles. When they're gone no feathers will ever grow back in that area/areas. Those areas where she picked at normally won't have feathers that will develop into normal looking feathers. In those areas feathers actually become very annoying, irritating and sometimes painfull so the first thing the bird does is pull at them or chew the up. He's learned how to live with them but you're the one that's rightfully upset. Let me use a situation oncerning people---theres a person who continually bites their nails. No one stops the person from doing it. As time goes on, the nail biting intensives. The person learns to do everything that others do that have nails. The person is happy and content about that but the nail biting continues. There's a big possibility that those growing nails are actually interfearing with the normal things that the person does all the time so the person continually bites them off. When the nails are off, the person feels normal again. The only time the person will temporarily stop is when damage occurs to the cuticle, swelling happens, some blood comes out. When all of areas are healed, the nail biting starts again. It's good that you had all of those tests done because people would suggest that the tests be done. You had them done and you got a thumbs up. Many of those bald spots will stay bald if the follicles are gone. Continuing the misting is always a good idea even though your bird may not like it. Many greys hate misting, bathing/showering but it has to be done. There's a proper way to do it. Make sure all of the body skin is soaked. Spraying the outer feathers doesn't accomplish anything because those outer feathers are waterproof. Having a bottle of aloe vera gel around is always good for spot treatment on bad irritated areas. It can be purchased at pharmacies. It's not expensive. As far as what's happening, compare it to a woman who's rubbing hand cream in. The skin softens, the dryness goes away, the itchiness goes away and the cream disappers. The woman feels sexy again. The same type of thing has to occur on a bird's sore, baldish, redish skin. This helps the bird stay away from those areas and it's not toxic. There's also a few products that can be used for spraying. One is aloe vera juice. It should be sprayed on full strength at least once a day. That also makes the skin less itchy. AND we have a section here that explains all different ways of washing,spraying stubborn birds. You should read it if you get a chance. There's also another product you can get but I have no idea if you can get it in the UK. It's also a spray that's very good. http://www.greyforums.net/forums/showthread.php?189753-Bathing-possible-method-1 http://www.greyforums.net/forums/showthread.php?189752-Bathing-possible-method-2 Your photos show a bird that have very little tail feathers that have been chewed-------normal for your bird's problem. Your photos show some bald spots in different areas-----normal for your bird's problem. ( I can't see the other side of the bird though). 2 of your photos didn't come out very well but the others say it all. Really, the only thing you can do is feed her a decent diet, keep her out of the dark, make sure she's constantly around family members, feed her hard trats such as unsheeled nuts that she needs to break open, let her out of the cage often and last but not least, treat some of the existing problems so that those areas become less irritated. You never can tell, there may be feathers in hidden places that are waiting to come out if they're not picked on. And just remember that there may have been permanent damage done to the feathers that are worrying you more than your bird. Good luck. PS--Being left in a kitchen and being ignored and not being fed the right thing through the years helped your bird develop these bad habits. Lets hope that the people decide to never get a parrot again. Also hang some hard wood in the cage. Greys like wood that they can chew and destroy.

I'm very sorry that you had to go thru this. I can't tell you what actually happened other than to say that perfectly healthy birds sometimes die for no reason at all. This also applies to other animals. Many times, vets can't really tell what happened because it has to do with unknown organ failure. Teflon poisoning can only occur through inhalation. The chemical needs to be heated over a certain temperature and gasses occur and spread thru the air. Many other items that contain teflon don't need to be discarded if they aren't used for cooking, heating. Plus a bird won't eat teflon tape or teflon glues and the type you're talking about was already far away from your bird. Even broken teflon won't cause problems. Some of the other things you mention here won't cause problems either. At it's worst cold temperatures serious colds or coughs could occur but those illnesses would need to work their way into a bird's organs in order to kill the bird. Those illnesses would be visible for weeks and weeks before any serious damage was done. Usually when people start seeing those things they go to a vet quickly. According to what you describe It sounds like your bird was happy to the very end. Maybe it was a heart attack. It's hard to say but if it was heart trouble, there wouldn't be anything you could do. It also would cause instant death. As far as cold weather, greys and other animals can put up with temperature exrtremes. It wouldn't cause instant death. I know tht you feel terrible but unfortunately, these things can happen to animals. This type of thing happens frequently to wild birds in the woods. Sadly, all the reading material that's available can't cover unknown death. The same thing applies to human babies---Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.

I think you should also study the type of bird you have. Greys are known as one of the quietest parrots in the parrot world. And they get much more quiet as they grow. And, they become less active. In the future, most of the time you can't confuse the bird being extremely quiet with illness. If you do, you'll be living at the vet's office.

Generally, TAGs are between 295 to 315 gms. So, everything's good and as far as your question about getting heavier or bigger---I doubt it.

If your bird is a CAG, what type of scale are you using? If your bird is a TAG, the weight is fine.

A humidifier is always a good idea to use all year long. Greys have skin that dries quickly and it causes them to scratch, over preen and even some plucking or chewing and that goes on all year long.. The better the humidity level, the better for your bird.

That's a problem that should be looked at by an Avian Vet Relying on opinions concerning that situation isn't a good idea. Videos won't prove anything but if it's very easy to take that video at any time without difficulty, there may be a problem. Birds may sit still for a video but they won't show symtoms very easily. If your bird is making it easy for you to see these things, then all the reason for the vet. If there's a problem or obstruction or clogged nasal passages the vet can check that out. There are no vets here, just opinions and many times people listen to those opinions and the bird gets the bad end of the deal.

The white fluffing is the start of molting. It's gonna last for a while. You'll see loads of these feathers for quite a while. Right now, the skin is extremely dry and itchy. That causes a bird to *scratch* it's skin just like you would do if you had an itch. Sometimes that itch the bird has is more intense which causes the bird to scratch the skin more intensely. When the bird does that he's going thru the feathers to get to the skin. The outer feathers are also dry, dead and ready to fall out. Sometimes a bird will assist in pulling them out. That causes feather ends to look frayed and chewed up. A new set of feathers are on their way to replace the old, ratty, dried out feathers. Increasing baths, showers, misting is a good idea. Also, go to the Health Room and look for the sticky concerning Aloe Vera Juice and use that product.

1--A grey should be acclimated into the whole family. Allow the least amount of opportunities that will let a grey become a one-person bird. The whole family has to be involved with the bird in all areas--feeding, treat giving, cage cleaning, adding toys and handfeeding certain types of food. 2--Your grey should be in an area where your average daily constant habits, conversations, household chores, relaxation and guests are nearby. Putting a grey or any other species of parrot in another room with no human contact or visuals accomplishes nothing. The bird has to learn to accept all different things and the owner needs to help that parrot do all of these things by putting the bird into the mix of things. 3--Your grey needs a decent sized cage and eventually he/she will have to be let out of the cage every day for as much time as you can afford. Putting a playstand nearby helps alot. The cage needs the type of toys that can handled roughly. A lot of scrap pieces of wood are necessary for chewing and destroying. It's either the wood or your furniture. 4--When you bring your grey home, it's not a good idea to be handling him a lot until he/she feels good about that new cage and it's contents. Everything else ahead of the bird is also going to be new and learning about them in a relaxed state is best accomplished from the security of it's own cage and no time limits should be placed on the grey re when anything should be accomplished. All greys are different from each other. 5--It's a bad idea to allow your grey on your shoulders because they have a bad habit of biting necks, ear lobes, nape and head hair, breaking jewelry and sometimes biting the face. Not all do but it's a habit that should be avoided. You never can tell what's going to happen to you when you can't see the bird up there. 6--Greys are very quiet birds that have the ability to mimic anything it hears and at the same decibal level be it other animals or phones or dogs barking or being scolded or the kids being yelled at by the parents etc. In other words--Greys need to be classified as the ultimate sponge in the parrot world. 7--You need to supervise any out of the cage time when you have other animals around. Never under estimate another species of animal and it's possible daily attitude be it dog or cat. many times, even other species of parrots need to be watched when put together. It's impossible to tell who will like or dislike each other. 8--Greys are very leery of new things and especially leery of kids that are running around erractically nearby. In general, most greys aren't fond of children. The younger the child the more nervous it gets. Either the child has to be taught how to be calm around a grey or stay away from the bird. Greys are able to sense when a person or people is afraid of them and that in itself will cause a parrot to bite that person who has a fear of him. That also applies to adults. The older children have a better chance of being taught to understand the general personality of a parrot be it a grey or other species of parrot. 9--Introducing different animals to each other simply involves letting them constantly check each other out from the safety of the grey's cage. There are no special tricks to doing that and whether they will take to each other is not something you can predict. 10--Most houses are 'hectic' and that causes the grey no problems as long as he gets used to the 'hectic' atmosphere all around. The exception to that are kids darting in and around the cage, possibly bumping it and keeping the bird on edge.

Well, good for you concerning the shackle. That's a relief. Little tip----most avian vets can remove the shackle easily. Those vets also remove ID bands by the thousands from birds legs. Doing it with a vet means that the bird is mad at the vet, not you although vets do it very quickly so the birds don't even have enough time to get angry.

Shackle????? Used For what?? I hope you don't mean *restraining* him from going here to there or keeping him on some sort of stand. That's bad news and that practice was stopped about 20 yrs ago. Using those things can cause a parrot to break or fracture legs. Shackles for birds aren't even sold anywhere. Vitamins in water don't do much. Parrots drink very little water. Parrots get all of vitamins and nutrients from veggies and some human food. Vitamins that are used in water and on food is basically used for tiny softbill birds such canaries, finches and some budgies. Just because bird vitamin powder is sold in pet stores doesn't mean they're good for all birds. Lots of items are sold in pet stores that aren't good for animals. That includes all animals.

http://www.greyforums.net/forums/showthread.php?112983-Nutrition-Diet

It's very normal for all baby greys to lose their baby fat. Eventually they can be as muc as 50 to 70 gms less than now after sarting to eat eat solid food with no formula involved. There's a method of feeding formula to growing babies. It'a called Abundance Feeding. What happens is that a certain formula feeding is completely refused by the bird. The bird is growing up and mother nature is telling the bird's system to eat more solid food. Never put time limits on this method. Some greys greys take longer to get to that plateau. Others take a shorter amount of time. What happens is that the bird is telling you to stop that particular feeding. Always have his solid food around---veggies, cheerios, some pellets. Tiny amount of parrot mix. Change veggies when they go bad ( usually every 3 hrs) Feed the formula a little warmer than room temp but not hot. Your bird is at that age where he can handle warm to warmer feedings. Also feed some warm parially solid oatmeal. You can get that at the supermarket.--Get the 10 pack that has various flavors. Don't worry about the sugar content becuse there's very little in that oatmeal. Quaker Oats is a good brand. Give as much formula as he wants but when he refuses it you'll know why. And if he's in good spirits that will also tell you that you're good right thing.

As far as children, greys are known to not like children quickly. The greys have to be around kids for a longer time in order for them to like kids. The basic reason is because kids move around birds quickly and greys watch them intently. Not to disapoint you but there may be a chance that the birds won't ever really warm up to the kids. Greys are known for that. Now, you've only had those greys for only a little over a month. That is not a long time for greys to get used to all members of a family. All the family can do is share chores separately, feed treats separately, talk to them separately and be around them separately. Unfortunately, you've decided to keep both of them in the same cage which slows down the connections with families. Greys will warm up to people in different ways. They'll like certain members more so than other members of the family. Usually greys are kept in separate cages so that each bird's personality shows through and each bird can be treated differently according to their personality. No 2 greys are alike. Greys are also known to take to one person quickly and not so much with the rest of the family.That has to be worked on. Having greys for only 5 wks and letting them fly all over the place in different areas isn't really good when training them. The house and people are new to the birds and they're getting used to all things around them and after only 5 weeks that isn't gonna work. If you're the one that the birds like, you need to let other members get more involved with the birds but that doesn't necessarily mean touching them. And as far as keeping them in separate cages, just read around and you'll see that most grey owners understand the importance of separating them. Some people have learned that the hard way. You'll need to understand that all the different species of birds have different traits but you'll need to concentrate on african grey species. I can name off different species of birds that are totally different than greys as far as as their peronality towards people goes.. . It's always wise to study the species completely. Even in the grey species, there'a another one called timneh african grey( cousin) that has different habits and attitudes thanthe congo african grey. Hope this helps. There's work to be done for the future. PS--concerning the size of your cage, It's bordering on being a flight cage and they're used for birds that are completely trained or totally untrained such as with breeder greys. I realize that you were only trying to do the rght thing but smaller cages are needed especially when the birds are flying all around the house. Pictures can be provided to show what a normal sized cage is.

Hi Glad that you're here on the board. I'm sure you'll enjoy yourself. Lots of different things to read and see. Go to the GREY LOUNGE and tell us about your grey and post some picturs. Have a good time here.

At 10 to 11 weeks, The grey can be put in a cage that's about 20 x 20 inches. The bird should be able to see and get used to the final big cage being near him/her. The final cage that you're checking out would be about 36x wide x 28in deep x 55 inches high. The square cage you're talking about is the wrong size and style for a grey. This is a picture of the general size of a cage for an adolscent to adult grey. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v50/DaveVP/CopyofP1010040.jpg

The video had nothing to do with the bird board here. I was testing a PC laptop. I test things out here quite often. If you see videos or photos deleted or edited, the only persons that can do that are the original posters or the administrator.

Moving birds from one area to another isn't unusual. After moving the cages, expect your birds to be more quiet then normal, a little more edgy and less playful. They may be nippy, more short tempered. There may be less interaction with with you and them for a while. All of these things will go away in a relatively short amount of time, 1 to 3 weeks. After moving them, leave them in their cages so that they can check out the new surroundings from the safety of their cages. . Do the extra things you plan but do it slower. Surroundings are most important. Brings things to their new areas slowly. There really isn't much else to do. Anything extra can only be decided by you because on you know their unique personalities. Many of the above things may not happen. At least you now know the possiblities.

Adding new rooms about Recalls, and ongoing recalls and bulletins have been recently suggested. New Rooms aren't needed for RECALLS AND OTHER PROBLEMS If there's a recall on food, put it in Food Section If there's a recall on cages or related problems, put it in the CAGE section. If there's a problem concerning medicines or health products, put it in Health room. If there's a problem with training products, put it in Training room etc etc When putting in information in a particular room, go to that room and press POST NEW THREAD If you have more information or add ons at a later date, go to your original post, press EDIT, enter new info in your post, press SAVE. Your add on will be with your original post and everyone will see it as a new post.

Wildwood Seed & Specialties Voluntarily Recalls Pet Bird And Small Pet Animal Food Due To Possible Salmonella Contamination Wildwood Seed & Specialties, Monroe, Oregon, is voluntarily recalling a limited supply of their Sleek and Sassy brand bird and small animal foods that contain raw in-shell peanuts. These products contain peanut ingredients recalled by Sunland Inc. due to their potential to be contaminated with Salmonella. http://www.fda.gov/Safety/Recalls/ucm325609.htm

Premium Nutritional Products Announces Ongoing Voluntary Recall Of Select ZuPreem Bird Foods On September 27, 2012, Premium Nutritional Products, Inc. initiated a voluntary recall of ZuPreem FruitBlendâ"¢ With Natural Fruit Flavors maintenance formula bird foods for medium/large birds and for large birds with use by date codes of 11/30/13 or 11/13 and lot numbers 598405052 or 598405072. The recall is being conducted due to the product containing the combination of exceedingly high calcium levels, low phosphorus, and high vitamin D concentration resulting in a significant health risk to the birds. http://www.fda.gov/Safety/Recalls/ucm326057.htm

This may help your bird with foot strength. I made a few of them a while back to use on baby greys in order to teach them to step up and get balance. My drawing is terrible on my laptop but I'll try to draw it and describe it. Cut 2 blocks of wood and make into trinagle. The 2 blocks of wood should be at least 2 in thick. The bottom of triangle should be approx 7 in long. The top of trinangle should be approx 6 in high Drill small holes through either block of wood. Holes on both blocks should be the same. I marked the holes off. Get 6 square sticks that approx 1/2 in diameter. Cut each stick about 7 in long. Screw in each stick on either side of triangle.. You'll then have a small ladder that your bird can try to step on. Put on bottom of cage. Because the stairs are square, he'll have less trouble balancing on them. It will strenghten feet. You can get scrap wood at places like Home Depot or similar lumber yards. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v50/DaveVP/BABYSTAND.jpg

Me too.---Honesdale. North east

You're treating the bird like a human being which is bad and if you do that with many other things, you're gonna become a very sad woman as time goes on. You have to establish rules concerning your bird. You're not making him feel bad when you need to put him in his cage while you're doing important hings that pull your attention away from him. That's gotta be tht way as the bird gets older. You should start using that cage frequently because if you don't you'll constantly be looking over your shoulder. Putting him back on a playstand isn't gonna stop him from flying to you. You need a cage that has a door that closes and he'll just have to wait until you allow him out. Wanna have him accidently fly into a pot of boiling water or a hot skillet? Use your cage on a consistent basis and don't worry about his attitude. He'll be just as friendly when you take him back out. There's no grudges involved. Be strong. Show power. Show that you're the queen of the masses.Rule with an iron fist. Demand allegiance. You own the bird, not the other way around.