ecodweeb

My rule of thumb has always been: if I'm home their door is open.

To throw my 2 cents into the domestication talk: to me a domesticated grey, fully domesticated, would be one that when bonded with a mate wouldn't exclude a human from their intimate flock. The videos I have seen of the red breeding pairs, the humans just pick up mom or baby, from the shared family perch in the cage, no problem. From what I've gathered by breeders traditional pairs will be vicious if you attempted this. I dare say that as far as domestication -- fully accepting of humans --- the red greys are as domestic as they can come.

thankfully they stopped biting me.

I know it was a mutation that could/would have occurred on its own. I would like to see intelligence studies of this particular 'cultivated subspecies' and compare it to what we know about the average grey. mainly, i expect them to have some kind of health problem or shorter life expectancy but I might be off kilter.

This is exactly what I needed to kickoff my week. Thank you for this very positive success story about importation and really saving the life of an endangered species.

I'm really mixed on breeding designer pets of any species.

yes. one is missing feathers; the other has a crooked beak. mine are quite unique:)

Very cute article. He hit the nail on the head. I flew twice in 08 because I had no other choice and needed the money from the work. I hadn't flown in 6 years prior. I will never fly again, period.

Hi! I have never done this before, but I would suggest contacting the Fish and Widlife service and explaining the situation. There has to be some kind of mechanism to handle this; the parrot is an inheritance item technically.

Oh Penny, I do understand how you feel right now. I felt the same after the beak clipping incident with Talula. You earn karma for posting what happened. Karma to you for a lesson learned. I concur with aloe on affected areas, Rikki will appreciate it. (((((Hug)))))

My 10 year old can be croaky at times as well.

I've had Talula 6 months. She is still mostly naked on the chest, almost a full tail, still see her elbows on her wings (they aren't scabbing however thanks to the bathing) and there are grey feathers on her back but still mostly down. It takes a while. Just wait. They speak even more. Talula has surprised me by bursting out into a chorus of "Good morning pretty bird, pretty bird talula!, Taluuuuula, Taaaalllluuuuullllla, come here talula, step up, pretty bird step up, come here, come here, pretty birdie" and on and on and on... all things she's heard in my house since moving in. She also answers the phone and answers the other parrot who rings like a phone, and if he rings again in a "new" tone she answers in a "new" voice. She's even mimmicing his rings now. It's like having cell phones with minds of their own sometimes.<br><br>Post edited by: ecodweeb, at: 2009/12/29 19:57

"Hi Pookie!" That's just too cute.

I think that's normal -- the moving around the outside of the cage. It's called exercise Some birds are like that. If I load up Talula's cage with tons of new things she sits on her night perch and shivers for 30 minutes before she'll even try and come back out of it. But then she starts to tear the toys apart and seems to like them... It takes time. How long has this been going on?

aw thats so cute

It sounds as if he knows to stay in the area. I am still praying for him.

No doubt they miss you and the routine. Trauma can be caused by upsetting that routine, as I've learned with my little girl.

Time and your attention are the best suggestions I can give to you. You have a spunky one on your hands I'd guess, and he wants to trust someone and love on them but hasn't found the person to trust yet. Stick with it and that person will be you. As for flying, personally, mine are clipped (one plucked hers out). My home is too small and too many things that they could land on that would hurt them. However that decision is yours alone. In time he'll become a better flier. I wish I could let mine fly, but one has to stop plucking and the boy needs to lose the attitude.

You have the right spirit I am sure that thongs will get better in time, you handled this situation well.

Dave -- thank you for the tip! Will be ordering right now. website seems to be having an issue right now bit will obtain it this week.<br><br>Post edited by: ecodweeb, at: 2009/12/27 18:36

More progress to report! Today I decided that I should try and hold Talula on her back, which I know is a very vulnerable position. I hold Phoenix on his back quite often, usually when harnessing, but in recent times he has come to enjoy a raspberry to the belly or to play games. Well I am happy to say she let me pick her up and hold her on her back, she did make some verbal reminders that she's not used to this and was nervous. I rubbed her head, and around her eye/ear area of her face (She does the trance dancing eye movement when I do this, she really enjoyes it as does Phoenix) and she even cooed! I then put her back down on the sofa, scratched her little head, and she promptly does the following: Walks to the other side of the sofa. Turns to her back. Finds an un-mutulated feather and pulls the tip tip off of it, chew it up, and throws it down. What an attitude this one has. I am happy she is coming around, and these partial feather mutulations aren't phasing me like they did (she hasn't pull a full feather in over 4 months now), so I know she's just playing Diva and trying to make me feel bad for asserting dominance over her and showing her it's OK to trust me when you are most vulnerable. We won't be trying this again for several months, but something about today just seemed 'right' to try it. She's since put up one foot and fallen asleep off to the left side of me on back of the sofa. So she can't be that angry at me, else she'd have jumped off the sofa and gone back to her cage (she does this, it's great, she just puts herself up when she's tired). So happy!! She also has even more back feather growth than before, tho as I said earlier, many are missing the tips of the feathers because she's still gnawing on them. As one who just quit biting my own nails after 25 years of doing so, I understand that it takes a while to overcome this stress-based habit. She's doing so well. I'm so very proud of her. I honestly think by summer we might get to try a harness. Might. I want all feathers in, and I don't know if she'll be fully clothed by June/July. But we can still try! Her vocalizations have become louder and clearer, she certainly knows and likes to say her name. On a related note, Phoenix has began saying more complex phrases (mixing existing short ones he knows) to compete for our attention against the Great Talker Talula! It has taken some 5, almost 6, months but I feel as if we're starting to make some serious progress with both parrots. One is started to trust, the other is calming down and starting to vocalize. I REALLY can't wait until I start model/rivaling with them. I hope to use one as the model and rival for the other, and I believe it will work. But for it to work I need to have a good bond with Talula, and we're just not quite there yet. For those reading for the first time: consistency in your persistence is the key.

Please keep us posted.

I can't imagine losing either of them. I really can't. I would go ballistic.

Praying for his swift return. I wish I had more advise to offer

My experience with my two (all the other Greys I have met have been males), yes. And it's noticable. Comparing Phoenix's "back off" or fright scream to Talulas: I can tell. Talula sounds like a girl, her pitch is higher and she shreikes where Phoenix has more of a grunt-like squawk. I see a difference, but one of mine (Talula) is bigger than the other. Talula's color is lighter and I notice her head is shaped different, her neck is a lot longer, and her body is shaped different. Hard to describe but she's just got more curves, esp the rump area around the tail, compared to my boy. Now those are mostly physical traits. For personality: Talula is far more sky and skiddish. She will run away if someone new comes in and she is unsure. Flight is her natural first response, evident in how she stares upward looking for a branch to perch in and get away from the situation. Phoenix charges head first in the unknown like a soldier. He will walk up to someone new and assert his dominance immediately. He will try to pick a fight with Talula and he's known to sit and wait for people to walk by just to try and bite their coats/clothes as they walk by (winter time blues I call it). Talula is a talker, Phoenix is very quiet. She has an extensive vocabulary, he has an extensive set of voices to which you hear one of 5 phrases said in. She will scream/cluck at the slightest movement. He is like a snake: quiet until ready to strike. I don't know if you put me in a room with mixed sexes if I could easily tell them apart but I think I have opposite spectrum birds. One is very much male and one is very much female, they make it well known in how they act (her preening is totally different from his in how hard she goes at it and the pattern to which she grooms). I've read that females are harder to win the trust of, but are more loving when you do. I can't attest to this as I've not had experience with Talula that really backs that up per se. I have no reason to doubt it, however. I really had no choice when it came to adopting mine. I saw a bird in need and took it home, figured the rest would come naturally.