kitt79

I am in Atlanta... And good news, Starbuck will have a new home tomorrow! I found someone who has had a grey before, currently has an eclectus, and sounds like she will be a great match. So relieved!

I hope this is allowed. I have tried hard to keep my grey happy with my new baby, but it's not working out. She doesn't get the attention she needs, and when she gets excited I believe the noise she makes may actually damage my daughter's hearing.... I have tried craigslist; the replies I got there were not encouraging. Many responders could not spell correctly and the only question asked was "does it talk?". This worried me. So on the off chance that an actual bird lover is out there willing to pay some reasonable amount -- I thought I'd post here. Starbuck is a female (dna tested) timneh african grey. We believe her to be about 5 years old, but she was a rescue so we have no exact hatch date for her. She doesn't bite, is a polite shoulder bird when placed there, and just wants to be near her people. Her favorite place in the world is in your lap or on the back of a sofa while you watch tv. She is eating zupreem pellets, has had no major health issues. Doesn't pluck, and when she gets the attention she needs is relatively quiet (at least relative to my experience with conures etc!). But when she doesn't get some attention, woe be unto your eardrums, and alas with a 9 month old in the house she is not getting what she needs from me . We love her dearly but cannot risk our daughters hearing, and the poor bird is being left alone too much. I am sending her to a new home with her cage, all her toys, her travel carrier, and her smaller play stand. I've been asking $500 on craigslist but for the right person who will love her and keep her happy and safe for the rest of her life, we can talk. I thought I could keep her happy with the baby, I didn't want to give her up, but to keep trying this is not fair to her, the baby, or me -- it's just too stressful. It's time she found a good forever home, since I can't provide the one I thought I could.

They do have a mind of their own -- I went into labor because she flipped over from breech and broke my water in the process, but before she was properly positioned, which eventually led to the c section -- we are sorely tempted to add a second middle name "Trouble".

Well... The night I posted last on this forum (in this topic no less) I went into labor. A little early but not dangerously so. Spent 20 hours laboring and ended up with an unplanned c-section! (And it was an awful horrible experience, because apparently anesthetics don't work on me properly!) Winry is now 11 days old, I've been home one week, and I have to admit -- it's difficult. I know that Starbuck isn't getting the attention she wants/needs. My husband has no choice but to go back to work, since his company is small and not subject to FMLA. He's gone from 7am to 6pm. I am recovering from major surgery and caring for a newborn. She has to eat every 3 hours and poops too many times to count. Not to mention the extra work to get her to breastfeed (there were issues at the hospital that set us back badly). I'm not worried about my other animals, and they are doing fine. The cats have accepted this tiny intruder on the basis that they get to nap with me more and that is good. The finches don't care as long as they get their food and water daily. The tiel doesn't like humans anyway, let him sing his love songs to his cats and he's good. The snake couldn't give a.... well actually as long as he *gets* his rat's ass... he's pleased as punch. But Starbuck calls me and calls me until I'm annoyed beyong all recognition, and I can't have her out like I did. I am physically unable to jump up and save that bit of wood trim she decides is tasty, or to intervene if she starts harassing the cats, or to whisk her out of some unexpected harm's way. I don't trust her around the baby yet, she's terrified of her, completely. I get her out in the morning for the short time Winry is napping, and at dinner until bedtime since the back of the couch seems acceptable while the baby is being held at least. I have found myself in the good moments thinking "oh this will be fine in a few months"... and in the horrible dark moments of postpartum/postsurgery despair flipping through my phone book wondering if any of my friends would like a TAG. I haven't decided one way or the other, and as my husband pointed out, it's hardly been long enough to know how things will work out. I certainly won't jump the gun, but I want Starbuck to be a happy bird and right now, she is very po'd at me because I simply can't give her what she needs. I am hoping as we settle into a routine, feedings get spaced better, I get some sleep, and my house returns to a non health-hazard state that I'll calm down and be better able to handle it. At any rate, it did seem fitting to me to post my initial thoughts here, since now I'm going through the very thing the OP was worrying about! It's a struggle so far, but it's early yet and we shall see what we shall see.

Zooman has a point. If, heaven forbid, my baby develops an allergy I will have to cut down on my number of dander-producing animals. I am hoping that having the birds in one room for the most part and keeping up with the cleaning will help with that. I don't think it's fair to criticize someone for getting pregnant after getting a bird and then worrying about it. Pregnancies can be unplanned, or unexpected, life situations change, and you have to adapt. Maybe 5 years ago I thought I'd be an old maid and bought a grey and then met the love of my life 3 years later...then what? Sorry honey, we can't have kids because I have a bird? You can't always plan life. In my case, I knew I would have kids one day, but then Starbuck was abandoned at my store, obviously terrified with no food or water, willing to put her head down for scritches from every employee that would give them. I took her home. How could I not? If something horrible happened and I was unable to care for her or had some issue... I would find her a good home. I certainly wouldn't drive to the nearest pet store and leave her in a carrier to be found by god knows who. Anyway my point is just that life doesn't follow an itinerary, and we all have to do the best we can .

I'm 36 weeks pregnant and keeping my grey unless something drastic happens that changes my mind... Of course human babies come first, I'm not kidding myself that my bird is more important than my daughter. I think that would be a silly thing for anyone to suggest. I am going to try to adapt and live with both before I panic. With some help from relatives and friends and some organization, I think we'll all be fine. See how it goes; you have a long time to plan and think about things, after all. Some things that can help; let your bird see and smell baby items before hand so they aren't so scary. Play a cd of baby sounds so the sounds are not new and foreign.

You're going to find a lot of different opinions on clipping. Personally, I had to clip my grey and my tiel for safety reasons. Starbuck hates the little tiel, and the tiel doesn't have the common sense to stay off her cage. So I'm stuck clipping Starbuck so she won't attack Merlin, and Merlin so he won't land on her cage and get a toe bitten off. It's a mess, but to avoid bloodshed I do it. When we are down to just Starbuck, I will likely let her grow her feathers out again. I just couldn't forgive myself if Merlin got hurt or killed when I could have prevented it. Long story short -- I think they are happier and healthier flighted, but there are occasionally good reasons to clip. It sounds to me like your bird is fine flighted, as long as you take certain precautions to keep the household dangers down. BTW -- I do clip my own bird's wings, but I have a lot of practice with this from working at a pet store. If you aren't *totally* comfortable doing it, go to a vet. You can seriously injure a bird if you make a mistake.

A lot of people keep birds outside year round in Florida, but when it gets chilly (by Fl standards, 50 probably is), they put up heat lamps for them. It's also probably a good idea to keep a proper sheltered area of the cage, either with plywood or a nice big nesting box if they're a breeding pair.

Starbuck does that. End up with a water bowl full of zupreem that she's dropped at the end of the day . I figure she's softening it a bit.

Thought I might share my own progress with this kind of problem... since we have it too with Starbuck. Everyone in the house has to be consistent, is one key that we were failing on. For a few months, whenever I'd leave the room for a short time, I'd say "be right back!", and if she called I'd answer with a low whistle or a "just a minute!". If I was leaving for a longer period, I'd put her in her cage and say "bye-bye!" and close the door to the room behind me, and no amount of screaming would make me open it. I thought this wasn't working, and I was pretty frustrated by it, because she screamed anyway for a long time. However, what I didn't know was that my dear husband was *never* putting her in the cage, *never* shutting the door, and going in whenever he felt like it, screaming or no. I didn't realize this until I stopped working 50 hours a week and caught him opening the door after a scream saying "what???!!". OMG. I flipped. I think my exact words were "WTF are you doing???!!" He really had no clue that he'd just reinforced the screaming -- and why should he? I'm the psych major, he's an engineer. Since then I've got him doing the basics, but much work to be done yet. At least he doesn't respond to the "bad sounds" -- a group of sounds we NEVER react to, no matter what -- and will wait til she is quiet to go in the room. And wonder of wonders, Starbuck is getting better. She only yells a few times when we leave, then is relatively quiet unless the troublemaking 'tiel starts something. Moral of the story is consistency, and don't let your husband train your parrot! (Good book, mostly about clicker training but with good principles regarding this stuff in general is "Don't Shoot the Dog" by Karen Pryor)<br><br>Post edited by: kitt79, at: 2008/12/16 15:08

Don't get them reclipped... as has already been said, greys don't have the flying ability of tiels, he'll drop like a rock if they're too short and could injure himself badly. I recently clipped Starbuck to protect my little tiel, whom she hates with a passion. I work in a pet store and am very accustomed to trimming feathers so I did it myself. I don't think I'd trust anyone else to do it. It only took 3 flight feathers to achieve the desired effect -- a graceful downward glide, not a fall. (Compare this to my tiel who can fly if only ONE of his flight feathers grows back in!)

In the book, the author suggested a large entrance and possibly other openings to let enough light in would reduce the chance of triggering nesting instincts.

Or roost boxes, I suppose... I flipped through a book at work today that recommended having a roost box for your grey to sleep in. Does anyone here do this? I have noticed how much Starbuck likes to crawl under newspaper or a blanket and just sit for longest times -- I tried a happy hut in her cage but I think it may be too small for her to like it much.

The ignoring only works if you go at it full out. By that I mean, Shadow gets absolutely NO attention until he is quiet again. It may seem like that won't happen, but it will. If you just wait a while and then he gets attention, he's learning that he just has to keep trying long enough. I had some trouble with Starbuck for a while there -- she would scream her head off in the morning. I always ignored her until she was quiet for at least 30 seconds. (In fact, if I was in the room I'd walk out and close the door if she was screaming until she stopped.) It wasn't doing any good, and I was confounded... until I found out that my dear husband, who was not working at the time, would go in and check on her when she screamed long enough when I wasn't there. I was not amused. He got a fast lesson on behavior. Now neither of us enter the room in the morning unless she is quiet/has been quiet long enough. She does make noise while we're in the room, but it's all normal calls and vocalizations, no screaming. We completely ignore any sound we hate, and though it took several months, we've eliminated the worst sound, and rarely get our next least favorite anymore. (Ignore means NO reaction. No looking, no talking, no change in typing speed, no blinking.) It will be easier if you can actually walk out of the room and leave until she's quiet -- less temptation to react.

If it's a very important call and Starbuck's in a mood, I give her some millet or some other rare but highly valued treat, close the door to her room and go to the other end of the house. That's normally distracting enough. If she still screeches for me and it's too important a call to miss, I'll cover the cage. Then she is quiet for a bit.