Nychsa

Hi there Dan! After I ad written that post, I forgot to share something else I find really interesting. When Bella gets into something I usually say "No, no! sssshttt, go!" and then if she persists I say (this is from scolding my kids in German LOL!) "du, du, du, du, du!". I also say "no bite!" Well, when Bella is perched on my shoulder and my ear touches her and it startles her she jumps on to the front of my shirt and says "ssssht! no, no, no!!!!" In the mean time, if anyone does something she doesn't approve of she tells them "no, no, no, sssssht!!!! du du du!". That is whether the dog gets on th couch, or wags his/her tail too hard and gets too close to her, or Jigygy of course just takes a breath and she scolds him! Either way, she uses that to expess when she doesn't like something - and I think that's great

Greetings everyone, What a great topic Dan! We just moved to our home in VA, so I missed what happened with the Dog, but it sounds dreadful! Hugs to you and your wife and I hope all is well now. Re: the topic area - I have to say I disagree with Dave as well. Dave I think you're over simplyfying the range of experiences animals could potentially be having. With that said, I may be stating something I can't prove LOL! Either way, I don't think any of us have any imperical evidence as to what animals are truely experiencing, so it's more or less up to our interpretations IMHO. However, for me, it would be hard for me to believe that Bella simply "reacts" to some stimuli. For example, lately she's really had it in for Jiggy, my conure. Aside from the fact that she gets quite annoyed if he perches on my shoulder (she promptly chases him off) over the past two days we've run into situations that really stumped me: One of my dogs had an "accident" at the door (which was shut while I was at work). When I came home, I said "oh my, who did this!" and Bella promptly pipes up "Jiggy make a poo" After I was done laughing, I couldn't believe that she persisted in trying to blame the offense on Jiggy! Tonight she chased Jiggy off his playtop and into his cage. As if that weren't enough, she then took flying leeps on to cage door. Initially I thought she was trying to land on the door and didn't like the landing spot or something, but then I realized, she was shutting the cage door on him!!! It took about three tries, but she managed to close the cage door on him (without locking it) and then she got on to his playtop and leaned over and said to him "BAD BOY, NO NO!!!! SHHHHHHT!" Ok ... how on earth is that simply some reaction to a stimuli???? She WANTED to lock him up and then scold him! She has issues with Jiggy and they are not simple what ever they are! Cheers! Terri

Very Nice video Jane! Love the the music to it!

Awww your poor mum! Hugs to her!

Hi, Koodos to your mum and her bravery. However - a couple of quick comments: my understanding of parrots is that they generally understand placing one's hand on their backs as being an act of agression, or at the very least undesirable. I can handle Bella every which way, flip her upside down, blow rasberries on her belly and back etc.. But, when she's perched somewhere, either on my hand, or elsewhere, and I were to then put my hand on her back, she freaks out. Ash may allow you to do this, but he may be drawing the line with your mum. It might be less painful to stop him from flying off by gently clamping his toes with your thumb when he's on your hand. The second thing I've found helpful for caregivers who run the risk of getting bitten by feathered kids is getting them to step up on a perch stick. Both Bella and Jiggy were taught to do this. They hate that stick, so when a caregiver reaches for it, they generally give up the cage resistant fight and fly in on their own. But when Bella decides to play peak-a-boo with a sitter, that has been most helpful to get her to step up on the stick

Bella MUST join me in the bathroom every morning to help me do my hair and makeup. She has various empy little flasks that she can play with, and she's usually quite busy. Well, today, sitting on the sink, she backed up a few steps and stepped on my electric tooth brush and turned it on. What a riot that turned out to be! :laugh: First she tried to bit the bristles as they were spinning around, then she tried to lick it, then she started saying 'NO, NO, NO BE QUIET!!! BAD BOY!!!" :woohoo: :woohoo: Then she tarted to poke at it with her foot, kocking it down of course into the sink, so she tried to follow it, and slide down into the sink where it of course touched her wing, at which time she then jumped up screeching. I finally was able to stop laughing to tears for a moment, and I showed her what I do with it. She flew up to my shoulder and of course had to get the closest view possible :sick: So, I brushed the side of her beak and of course she tried to lick it - she tries to lick EVERYTHING! She's like a two year old! Everything goes into the beak! Well, if I hadn't called it quits, we'd still be messing with the tooth brush on into the evening. I think Bella needs a tooth brush :laugh: I think I laughed so hard my sides were splitting! :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:<br><br>Post edited by: Nychsa, at: 2008/12/28 03:26

Awww Dan that is SO cute! Did Day get to come out and find out what all was going on? hat did he make of it?

Oh my Dan - thanks for keeping the Daveisms alive! That is a hoot! And how true!!! I swear when there is something Bella is interested in she turns into a thousand feet, wings and beaks!

He is adorable! Thank you for sharing! I can't get enough of looking at the pictures of member's feathered families. Cheers! Terri

casper wrote: Thanks Casper Now can you imagine if your wild one got together with my Bella??? They would run us ragged!!!!

ajlinva wrote: Thanks for watching and sharing your thoughts ajlinva. The thing is, I don't hang Bella upside down - she does it. She lifts her little foot up for me to put my finger under her, and then she rolls herself into a fall and dangles around. She does that to my shirts as well. When she plays in her cage she likes to dangle upside down and attack her toys, so she's just got a thing for hanging upside down! Maybe she was a bat in a previous life?????

Hi Pat et. al! I think part of the reason Bella enjoys this kind of play is that she is simply very playful. Everything is a game it seems, and so I find myself finding things to turn into a game for her. She loves playing "bing" which is where she follows my finger and if I score a point by touching her belly or her beak or head we both go "bing!". When she's in bing mood if I stop playing with her she stomps up and down and bangs my computer with her beak and goes "BING BING BING!!!!" So, we start all over. I also play hide the walnut with her where I hide a piece of walnut in one of my hands and she has to find it, or I hide it under little dixie cups. I think she likes playing the game more than eating the walnut! She takes a couple of bites out of it then runs back to the cups for more searching:laugh: We also play tug-a-war with various things, or she crawls into a paper bag and plays peak-a-boo with me, so it's like non-stop Romper Room with her. In the evening I meditate for about an hour. I bring her toy box to the room and she plays quietly with her things while I'm sitting -she seems to get this is quiet time. Is this playfulness part of the reason why she gets into tumbling around with me - I have no idea, but it seems to fit into her mind set

BaxtersMom wrote: Hiya, I have no idea how we evovled into this type of relationship, we just did. How does Baxter play with you? Do you guys play with the toys together? I'm going to make us a little Parrot basketball set because it looks like Bella gets a bang out of us tossing things around together. That's how something usually starts with us - we find something to play with and just kind of evolve from there. The finger dangling started when I let her out in the mornings. She would drop her big bomb and then hold out her foot to me. I'd put my finger out and that's when she would roll off her cage and dangle around on my finger. The first time she did that she spooked me because I thought she'd fall. So, I'd keep my other hand underneath her in case she'd loose her grip. Eventually she would lay on her back in my other hand and I would poke her belly and make play noises. She would mimic those noises, so that's kind of how it evovled into this rough housing around.... What does Baxter do when he comes out of his cage the first time in the morning? Cheers! Terri

judygram wrote: Thanks for being there to share with Judy et. al! Bella is like my kid :laugh: and it's good to be able to chat with other "parents" and compare notes, and milestones Cheers! Terri

danmcq wrote: Ah, got it - Jiggy plays like this as well -he's even easier to handle because he doesn't try to do all the upside down stuff that Bella gets into - she will lift up her foot and once she has hold of my finger she'll roll into a fall which is my cue to let her dangle around upside down. I really want to be able to handle both of them as needed because in the event they get injured, I need to be able to assist without getting torn up. So, when we have points of resistence, like when I want to wipe off her beak and she pitches a fit, I persist (particularly because she wipes herself on everything!) She will kick, scream, try to bite me, but I get her from behind and get her little noggen between my two fingers and hold her in place so I can wipe off her beak. After I'm done she realizes I've saved her all that trouble! Now she lets me do it more frequently, but I'm staying on it until we have no fight about it! I also want to be able to soak her down good under her wings when we shower, so I lift up her wings and she balks at that but I ahve a trick there - I do it under the water stream and she'd have to get her face wet if she wants to bite me :laugh: So, she's used to doing that now and lets me get her good and wet all over. So, I think over time she just got used to being handled in accordance to my terms and she's taken it to a play level now ... maybe that's what happened? No idea! She's my first grey so I have nothing to compare her to!

danmcq wrote: Oh no! Dayo would bite you??? I think Bella thinks I'm her jungle gym. I was trying to get some house cleaning done one day and she decided to play fight with my shirt and was literally dangling upside down off the back of my shirt! My family lost it because she was flapping her wings like crazy too making all her goofy sounds. She's a little freak!!!

luvparrots wrote: My pleasure! I'm sure Ana Grey will find something she likes playing with and will show you she can be a wacky birdy with you

Yep Dan, I think we're nailing down their process! :laugh: Bella will "practice" everything at sundown - she'll go through her entire vocabulary, often making variations on it, and to me, it seems she's doing it out of kicks and giggles because she likes the way it sounds. I have no idea who many variations of peak-a-boo she has now, but she just seems to like the tone of it. She's starting to freak out the dogs a good deal now becaause she's picked up on the phrases they react to and she uses them with a very human voice! For example when I want to the dogs to pick up their dog food mess, I'll point to something and say "look, look". And the dogs will watch where I'm pointing to and pick it up. Well, guess who says "look look" and gets the dogs every time! :laugh:

Pass, I concur with Dave and Dan as well. Heck, I can't even come home from shopping without making sure Bella is secured while I unpack groceries! She freaks out when I come back. She pounces on the bags and starts ripping holes in them. One time I washed off an assortment of fruits and had them in a strainer. Someone rang the door bell, I thought all was well because she was busy foraging on her playtop. When I got back, she had gotten into those fruits and had made the biggest mess you could imagine! To this day she still has a slight blackberry stain on the top of her noggen from tossing around the blackberries!

Hiya Dan! I'm sure as we go along we'll hear a number of great stories on here around our babies conversing with us. I understand why scientists mull this over again and again. I know I was wondering on several occasions if she was just repeating what I was saying or if she was actually communicating with me using human language. I think from observing her she goes through a process of putting things together - when I first say something relative to a situation, she balbbers it back and that is clearly not associating the words with the situation because she'll say those things totally out of context. But the more often I say something relative to an event, that's when I can see her litl wheels turning and she's putting it together. I'd say it was after 3 days that she put the "ouch, ouch, ouch NO, NO, NO" in context with her tail. My pet sitter thinks it was sooner. I'm wondering if after a while they understand that most thing we say are in some context? hmmmm

Goralka08 wrote: I take it Kenzie just moved in with you? I've been away for a while, so I'm not up on the latest birdy news - forgive me!

Char wrote: She turned 12 months as of Dec 1. Awww, sounds like she's a smarty!

Lyric wrote: :laugh: Lyric - I think she picked up that voice from my granddaughter Haley when she stayed with us for a couple of weeks. Haley would spend hours with Bella. The would chatter non-stop at each other. :laugh:

Good Morning Everyone! Is your grey a little nutty in the morning? Bella is beyond belief playful in the morning, particularly if I'm wearing my blue morning coat. She loves messing with it. Here she is doing some gymnastics on me :laugh: http://www.mydeo.com/videorequest.asp?XID=10396&CID=239752

luvparrots wrote: my pleasure! I need to adjust the video a bit because she zips around so fast, the video has a bit of a timed delay in catching up with her and it freezes up a bit. Bella is always in some hurry - she's always got some business to take care of :blink: