aunali9

guys i woke up today to Echo without his tail feathers. the surrounding feathers arent out. just the main tail feathers. they are intact except one which looks damaged. and 2 of them have some brown stuff inside the tube at the end of it. not the tip or on the outside. its inside the tube. i checked the area and there are no signs of blood. he wont let me inspect close enough to see the skin. he is 9 months old now. please some one tell me he is only moulting... there are an assortment of body feathers around in his cahe since the last couple of weeks, and even some areas of feathers from his head missing. im freaking out. there are no vets in my city.

thanks for the reply greytness! i'm not at home at the moment but i shall put up a few pictures later in the day. downy feathers are the fluff balls or the ones from the body like the back/chest. even the back and chest ones have fluffy ends. update: no feathers this morning. or yesterday. i hope i was just freaking out. and any advice regarding the change in behavior?

hi guys. been a while. i hope everyone is doing well. first of i want apologize for asking a question that has probably been asked a million times before. but i have a massive fear of Echo plucking his feathers. he has always been rough with his feathers when he preens even and they have been a little bent or ragged since a long time. he is 8 months old and he has a healthy appetite. he has one fresh meal of vegetables or fruits in a day, and he has tropican pellets available at all times in his cage. i give him seeds and nuts when he is out of the cage with me, and during training. no supplements or vitamins, or pest sprays etc. i also bathe him once every couple of weeks with a mist of clean drinking water as the tap water in karachi is heavy with minerals. he gets 2 hours a day out of the cage minimum, but largely when im at home he is out. he is also fully flighted and has never been clipped. he is active plays with (destroys) his toys, chatters all day, has started imitating whistles precisely and im sure he tries to repeat his name and "hello". a month and a half ago i had to leave karachi for a month, so i left him with my friend. she has 2 indian ring necks and he was already familiar and friendly with her, and she knew how to hand feed him and deal with him in general. when i came back a couple of weeks back and took Echo back from her, he was a little different. he used to love getting his head scratched and wasnt as free with his beak. i know he was alright so long as he was with her and im sure she took very good care of him. now he still lowers his head for a head scratch when i bring my hand up, but as soon as i touch him he resists. so i stop also. he also used to stick to me like crazy glue. always on my shoulder on my head hanging off my clothes or something. now he hardly ever wants to come to me willingly other than to assault my phone or my watch or something. i have been noticing that some of the tiny feathers from his head are shedding because on occasion when he does let me give him a head scratch, i end up seeing a couple of them stuck to my fingers. also today in the morning there were 4 feathers that seemed like they were from his body on the floor of the cage, none of them are blood stained and he has no bald patch on him. a little while ago i saw him pull one from some where on his back and start chewing it up. he chewed it till it became a pulp. the others at the bottom of the cage are whole. the bases are dry looking but they arent round like quills should be, they look a little flattened. i hope he isnt plucking his feathers. not that his appearance matters much, but he is a friend and im very concerned. ive heard they can really hurt themselves if it continues

hey! i got Echo when he was 4 weeks old and hand fed him myself. i had guidance, but of course not around the clock. ended up scared as hell every time the little guy poo'd too hard haha. i must say even though i figure there wasn't any real bonding on his part because he probably couldnt focus right at that age, it was a pleasure to watch him grow right in front of me. i dont advocate buying unweaned babies but if i had a choice i would like to buy from a breeder that would let me come and take a look at a growing chick before he was fully weaned and ready to go home! im a med student and its quite interesting the way humans grow and mature. birds do it fast enough for it to really be noticeable and really is fascinating some photos of echo there. have plans to try to make him a youtube star in a week or so. have a load of videos of him that need to be shown to the world

Echo has been with me since he was 3 weeks old. and he learned to fly around about the right age, but the vet told me to just sit him on my fingers and lightly drop my arm a little to give him the falling sensation. he started flapping his wings every time. one day he flapped them hard enough to leave my hand and fly into my face haha. he also flew very short distances at first and just waited for a ferry mostly. but i just followed the step up training routine except i added more distance between us. generally i had to move my hand to where he would end up flying so i think i have become better at baseball and cricket. after he landed on my hand or anywhere on me i rewarded him. even if he failed so he kept on trying. now he does belly rolls in mid air and is very confident when flying. he is now 5 and a half months old.

thank you guys. and inara that was exactly the detailed routine i was looking for! i have got the videos of Barbara from my girlfriend. she has 2 indian ringnecks. i was able to get echo to focus on my closed fist and the most response i got from him was using a head scratch as a reward. need to change that quickly because saying "good" makes him prostrate himself on whatever surface even if im talking to some one on the phone. ive changed that to "good bird echo" and stick to that. i was wondering what was going on. and almonds worked haha. he loves them. so im trying those now for treats will update soon!

hi guys, i think im well on my way to taking care of echo well. there are just some things regarding which i would like some advice. i think the best thing would be if you could let me know what has worked best in your own experiences. he is 5 months old now. 1) how long do your companions stay out of the cages on average. i know most people say when they are home the parrots are out. but i would like a quantification. 2) there are things i cant have echo chewing up. like papers, leather items, and wires. now some are important to me, and others are dangerous for him. i dont know if the best decision is to keep him away from them, or do you all eliminate the temptation and remove them from sight. im a messy person in general and my house if full of tech and papers. my hobby and profession require copious amounts of both. 3) echo doesnt play with things. ive got him things like wooden beads but he will not touch them, instead he will destroy all the furniture which is also wooden. he wont chew the old belts ive hung for him, but he will wreck the leather sofas. everything is a perch. and the phone dummy ive left around for him is useless. he still wants my laptop, or my phone. button necklaces dont attract him but he removes the buttons from the seats, printer, and mostly all my clothes. 4) do your birds thrash around in their cages if you dont let them out? echo goes bonkers at the site of me. his digging and scrabbling (made a previous thread about this) has resulted in some bent feathers and a broken tail feather. he doesnt really look shabby, but i dont want him to do this all the time in case it leads to picking, over preening, skin disorders etc etc. 5) training is impossible. i can not get him to focus on anything. he is like a squirrel on redbull AND coccaine. he is the tazmanian devil from the loony toons. which is fun and cute but there is no means of instilling any discipline! this is made more difficult because he has no favorite food, and doesnt play with toys, so there isnt much i can reward him with. 6) he has identified the sounds of doors closing/opening as the sound of me leaving the room or house and that really drives him nuts. should i be changing his location in the house to a more populated spot? or leave him alone in my bed room? beyond that he is extremely energetic and fun when i can give him my 100% attention. he is now a little over 5 months old and imitates the number of clicks people make at him. if i make 2 he makes 2 and if i make 5 he makes 5 and he rarely repeats his name ^^

hi loco. i raised my CAG Echo from 4 weeks old. he grew ridiculously attached to me, and i ran into more or less the same problems as you mention. i had almost started getting frustrated with him at times but barbara heidenreich's videos rescued me. you need to realize that he comes to you because thats what he wants whether its love, entertainment or whatever the motivation. but just like when you want kids to spend time with parents, they get distracted by things like tv and playstations so always remember if you want your parrot to do ANYTHING almost, you need to make it entertaining enough or enough of a distraction to lead him away from some behaviors. i have made toys from bottle caps and cellphone dummies and who knows what that has since been demolished trying to get echo to start enjoying himself by him self. find things destroyable that are not harmful, not made of material you dont want destroyed (wires etc) and of no use to you. so empty bottle caps or bottles, straws, and other things that he can wreck are the best items. if you made a toy out of buttons he will be encouraged to rip them off clothes. aside from this, you need to change somethings about your house hold. and you will learn what all attracts your feathered friend the most and it SHOULDNT. i had to stop echo from chewing through my laptops power cables once and he had nearly got to the wires which can be dangerous for him. so i got coiled wires found on telephone handsets and run all the power cables in the house through them.

yeah im doing my best to keep him entertained and surprised. he's very receptive to new things. gets over his fear of certain things in minutes mostly. i think he just gets extremely over excited about some items

oh and i would like to add that he is a machine when he is out of the cage. he will try to do everything he possibly can in 5 minutes and then repeat. he will shred his fluff toy, shred paper, tissues, boxes, play with my phone, fly everywhere, sit on my shoulder, preen himself, then try the same on me, lick my face like a dog, destroy stationary, puzzle over what my ear lobes are made of. EVERYTHING. and then do it ALL again and he is obviously thoroughly enjoying him self. i dont know if maybe im putting him away for too long...

hi guys, my parrot (who used to be named echo till my mother decided his name must be changed) does some funny things which i cant figure out and am having trouble understanding: he is 4 months old now, very gentle and loving, has never been aggressive towards anything except some toys, gets bathed weekly, and shows no signs of illness. eats well, poops well, sleeps well etc 1) he doesnt go into his cage at all. unless he is exhausted to fainting point. he fights to get out. and the second i open the door he literally runs out. ALL his toys are inside. he will play with them if they are outside but gets aggressive with them if i hang them or place them inside. i even got him a new bigger cage thinking maybe there wasnt enough room for him in there. since the last one week ive just let him fly free around the house (after double checking every possible hazard) and since the last 2 days he has been returning to his cage only to take a couple of bites of his food or drink some water. then he's out again. now while i can comfortably give him 4 or 5 hours a day out of the cage, i cant leave him out 24/7 because i live alone and have to work and study and go out at times! i have to con him into getting inside or lift him up gently with his wings closed about him WHILE covering his head at times if i have to leave in a hurry or he just hangs on to the side of the door way into his cage with his beak! i have changed the location of his cage around every inch of the house, taken great pains to change/eliminate sounds/ moving objects, not use my tv at all etc etc etc. 2) now when he IS in his cage: except at night when he is sleeping, he is always crouched with his head in the corner of his cage between the wall and his food bowl, kicking away at the food bowl with one foot, then he will go to the water bowl on the other side and do the same thing with his other foot. personally i would do that if i were a parrot if i wanted to sharpen or file my nails, but he did that even when they were weapons, and he still does that even after i have filed them down a little so he stops drawing blood on my wrist. on very rare occasions, probably only ever 5 or 6 times, ive seen him doing that out side the cage too, but again saw no connection to his behavior in the cage so i couldnt draw any conclusions. he looks like he is digging. and he will do it for hours and hours. get tired, rest, and start again. 3) so daily, when he isnt digging (which just looks like he is agitated but doesnt make any aggressive sounds, gestures etc and is very amenable even if i stick my hand in the cage or my fingers through the bars): when he isnt digging, he is climbing around the cage. always on the front or sides. again he will go into the corner and contort himself in a manner that will make him put his back into the top corners of the cage and sort of push outwards using his neck and back. if that makes any sense. one of his feet is on the bars on the front of the cage and the other on the side. he makes similar of not identical postures in the other areas of the top part of the cage where the walls meet the roof. when he does this, obviously, his feathers will stick through the cage bars at odd angles, and he doesnt do this gently by the way. the first of his primary flight feathers is frayed along the outer margins on both sides and im afraid its because of this behavior. 4) there are things he is afraid of. he will make these loud yelling noises sounds like high pitched growls that let me know when he sees them. like some book covers, a pair of my shoes, paper bags etc. he looks scared, sounds scared, and is all fluffed up and backing up from them. so i remove said items. SOMETIMES there are items like tennis balls... which he used to love playing with when he was younger. i wasnt sure what was causing this till today, and discovered the causative agent was the tennis ball he used to love by mistake. he didnt display any aggression of fright. he just goes nuts flying around in circles making a very peculiar squawking noise. but he is usually a great flier, avoiding obstacles and making ridiculous but precise landings in unbelievable places. on these occasions he will hit the walls, ceiling, large book shelfs, mirrors etc. he will even go near the ball and tap it with his beak, but again fly off and be a clown. my panadol tablets, the tennis ball, and an empty perfume box are some of the items ive narrowed this down to. why does he do this? he could hurt himself running into things like that. and since he doesnt point an object out to me as obviously as when he is afraid, i have to run around in a frenzy trying to figure out what the insulting item is... at first i figured this was all normal baby parrot behavior, but it could be harmful for him if he keeps this up. anyone seen any similar behavior?

alright just one last thing, when ure parrots eat do they eat all day in small amounts or at once one large meal? im used to seeing my parrots crop pretty full from back when he was hand fed. since he has stopped having formula, he eats other food, but never a large amount in one go. and dry pellets are all good right? im using the tropican ones. i think he isnt too fond of mushy food. he is much more content with crunchy food.

hmm. alright then. i thought like in humans, discoloration generally means undernourishment or lack of essential minerals and vitamins etc. sounds good then! thanks! i'll keep an eye on it for some time in any case ^^

check now? or in a couple of minutes.

yeah i know! im uploading photos i just took with a friends phone for you to see. i hope they are clear enough. the beak you can see but im not sure of the nails. on the plus side he seems to really like the pellets! just fed them to him for the first time. he's happily chomping away at the moment.

aaaah i wish we had those in pakistan i might have known better than buying one unweaned also then. ive asked a pet store owner im friendly with to import pellets, which he has, and are on their way over this minute, but even tropican pellets or other such parrot food isnt available here. we have to make everything ourselves.

yes thats whats worrying me... it has showed up recently like a week back it started but i figured he probably wore his beak thin chewing on stuff. but he is definitely not a timneh. its on the ridge only. not wide. and longer than wide. if i were to compare, its like if you had a discoloration on the nose of a person half way between the eyebrows/bridge and the tip.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/123653746@N02/sets/72157645468860865/ the last picture here is the most recent one i have of him which was something about a month back.

erm no... those are timnehs... my cellphone broke and i dont have a propper camera so i cant send you any current pictures... but if you darkened the color on your timneh's beak then it would i guess look a little like the color of a timnehs beak. plus the coloring isnt as large a patch as that. its only on the ridge of the beak and is central to both the base and the point of his beak...

or if some one could check the nails on their grey and lemme know?

hi guys, hope some one can help me with this. Echo is a 3 month old CAG who has a slight discoloration on his beak (greyish brown) unlike the rest of it which is black. its half way from the base to the tip and about a cm in length and along the ridge. also i have noticed that his nails are a lighter color around the base. they are black at the tips but greyish at the base. also he eats nothing but seeds. he'll eat two cups of seeds in a day but nothing else. hes drinking and pooing and there is no smell and is VERY VERY active. wants out of the cage all day. which is also a problem because he has taken to biting the hell out of the cage. he'll go in happily when he is sleepy. but during the day he just doesnt want to be inside despite the toys. he plays with those toys if i keep them outside and loves them but in the cage he doesnt touch them at all. just jumps around the cage climbing the walls and hangs off the roof upside down and literally flies out the second i open the door.

you were 100% correct about spending time with him he actually stopped making the begging noises since ive started giving him upto 5 hours of out of cage time! even if im sitting on the computer for a while i sit him down on the arm of the chair and he loves watching me do whatever it is im doing. makes exclamations at the right time in movies even haha.

i'd assume so. today was first targeted flights and he has turned away formula after tasting it for the third day in a row! he doesnt just cartwheel in the air now, or propel himself across the ground. he flies correctly to exactly where he wants to go something needs to be done about his claws. ive got some too many scars now! plus he tends to take off from sitting around on some part of me, and jeans no longer make the departure less painful!

Yes I have been very careful about how long I leave the perishable items in his food. And with the 40 degree Celsius temperature and humidity in Karachi I've learned to remove it right away and bring fresh food if he isn't inclined to eat it. When ruby was younger, did she perpetually make begging noises? If I'm in sight my parrot makes begging noises unless I distract him with toys, food, cuddling or whatever. He eats a ridiculous amount. Even now if I feed him formula, he won't stop even at 120ml. So I give him more frequent smaller feeds. This is because no matter what people tell me I feel like his crop will burst. My friends macaw eats 150ml before refusing further. And that is a humongous bird in comparison. I am still using a spoon because I'm afraid of over feeding him using the syringe. I'm fairly certain other than this I've got all his health concerns covered and he has grown pretty big. He's the biggest bird I've seen herr in Karachi at the moment. Oh and about when should I really start trying to train him to step up and all? I've been trying for some time to entice him to step up with a sunflower seed for a treat and he does so now if I bring my hand close to him. But its inconsistent and I don't know if I should be expecting more. Or even if its not the training but mere instinct.

Oh today he flew up and tackled a tennis ball I was casually tossing in the air and catching. He was so shocked he proceeded to crash into a shirt I had hung up and promptly ripped up the pocket with his claws.