DavidH

Thanks, Aca. I will keep Shanti away from the zipper. No sense taking any unnecessary chances.

Does anyone have an opinion if zippers are intrinsically dangerous? Shanti is frequently chewing on the zipper of my hoodie. He bites on the metal teeth and sometimes pulls them off but hasn't messed with the clip on the top. Obviously, the hoodie is just a half-destroyed rag I wear around the house.

Get well soon, Emma!

Very cool, Terri. So much fun to watch. Thanks.

This article is on zebra finches, but it seems to have implications for all birds and mammals: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090317201137.htm Effects Of Stress Last For Life In Birds ScienceDaily (Mar. 16, 2009) — Researchers have discovered the first direct evidence that exposure to stress in young birds affects the way they react to stress when adult. This research, presented at the Society for Endocrinology BES meeting in Harrogate, greatly improves our understanding of how the environment during development influences birds’ subsequent physiology, health and survival. Exposure to stressful events soon after birth has significant effects on a range of physiological and behavioural responses later in life. Previous work in mammals has been unable to work out whether this is due to raised stress hormone levels produced by the young or raised stress hormone levels in the mother, transmitted to her offspring through lactation. To overcome this problem, a team led by Dr Karen Spencer at the University of Glasgow used a bird species, the zebra finch, as a model to study the effects of stress in early life. In birds, there is no possibility of hormone transfer between the mother and offspring after egg laying. The researchers took 34 12-day old sibling pairs of zebra finch chicks. They simulated a stressful situation by giving one chick from each pair the hormone corticosterone (dissolved in peanut oil) for 16 days. Corticosterone is the main hormone produced by birds in response to stress. It causes many changes in behaviour and physiology, helping the bird to cope with stressful stimuli. The other chick (the control) was just given peanut oil. When adult (60 days old), all birds were exposed to a stressful situation and researchers measured the amount of corticosterone they produced naturally in response. Birds exposed to higher corticosterone levels as chicks showed different physiological responses to stress when adult. When presented with a stressful situation, they showed a larger (p=0.008) and more prolonged (p=0.03) corticosterone response than control birds. There was no difference in the corticosterone levels of the two groups when resting. This study shows for the first time that direct post-natal exposure to raised stress hormone levels can have long term consequences for birds’ physiological stress responses. In the wild, conditions that cause stress during early life include inclement weather conditions, lack of food and exposure to parasites. This research suggests a potential mechanism for why this early stress can alter animals’ behaviour and physiology when adult. Further research is now needed to examine how these changes are related to birds’ long-term health and survival. Researcher Dr Karen Spencer said: “Early exposure to stress hormones is known to affect later responses to stressful situations in the adult. Using the zebra finch as a model provides us with an important tool with which to investigate the role of stress hormones on adult characteristics. Our results show an individual’s stress response can be re-programmed as a result of post-natal exposure to elevated corticosterone levels. This indicates that if a bird is exposed to stress early in life, for example through bad weather conditions or lack of food, this has implications for the way it will react to situations throughout its life. We now want to study how the observed changes in stress hormone response relate to any behavioural changes observed, and in turn to birds’ long term health and survival.”

There may be a way for you to work from within the system without losing your job -- educating management, advocating for animal welfare, supporting reform of laws and regulations. Sometimes when you raise the right issues and ask the right questions at your workplace, people will respond more positively than you expect. On the other hand, sometimes they won't, and there may be no way to perform your work in good conscience. Sounds like trying to line up a new job with health insurance BEFORE you quit (if you have to) is a good idea. You have a classic ethical dilemma of conflicting values. There's no simple right answer, but you have taken the first steps toward a good outcome by honestly articulating what your values are and what's at stake.

The kit gives instructions for doing-it-yourself, either with a nail clip or feather pluck. But unless you are a super expert in parrot care I would not recommend that route. The vet can prepare the sample professionally in 10 stess-free seconds. Cost of testing: $20. They will post the results online within 24 hours of receiving the sample.

That's wonderful, Pat. Congratulations! Totally adorable.

Congrats on your Timneh, Bryan. You've been through a lot. The TAG will help you heal.

Great video, Shannon! Thanks. I learned something valuable: I notice that Dr. Pepperburg is really in Griffin's face when she talks to him -- up close and personal. I haven't really spoken to Shanti that way, but I'm going to start. I'm sure Dr. P. developed that technique after years of experimentation.

All of the above (at least in my dreams).

I'm like you, Carol. We named Shanti in honor of peace. We thought of Paz, Shalom and Salaam, which are peace in Spanish, Hebrew and Arabic, but went with Shanti (peace in Sanskrit) because that's the one that everyone in the family agreed on.

I would agree on the hard gripping as a sign of stress. Shanti definitely has a relaxed perching mode and a hanging-on-for-dear-life mode. If fact, when he puts on a little pressure, it's a sure sign he's uncomfortable about something, so I put him down or move him away from the source of the anxiety.

>>To steel someones pet is just like steeling someones child and if I was the judge in these matters i would sentence these people to the same penalty that they would get for kidnapping. It makes me so sad for the people who lost Robert. I know what its like to lose a pet this way. >> That's an interesting thought, and I agree. The problem is that we consider animals to be property -- stuff. Like lamps and cellphones. If we start seeing animals as something other than property -- something more like sentient beings with rights -- then we could make enormous progress.

Maybe once a few people read it, we can have a discussion. I think in the post-Alex age, we may see a lot more studies on AGs, but this one was particularly interesting because it focused on breeding and lifelong care for our darlings.

http://www.stub.unibe.ch/download/eldiss/04schmid_r.pdf I promise you will learn something new about Greys if you read this.

I recently read a European doctoral dissertation on Greys. The researcher found (among many other things) a correlation between covering the cage at night and phobia. That DOES NOT mean that covering causes phobia. There could be lots of other explanations and the study says nothing about night lights or other factors. I do cover Shanti, but not with the same degree of confidence that I did before I read the study. I will post a link if anyone is interested.

I've actually been trying it without a grate the last couple of days. I noticed that Shanti NEVER goes to the bottom of his cage anyway, so there seemed to be no risk of him messing with anything below the grate. It's going ok, except of course yesterday I noticed he was going lower toward the newspapers than he ever had before. So we'll see.

Another interesting sleep fact is about whales. I was reminded of it the other day, Dan, when you posted that Greys need to consciously loosen their grip. Whales apparently cannot EVER sleep because they need to consciously breathe. If you put a whale under anesthesia, s/he will die. Of course, that seems to contradict the previous claim that all mammals have REM, unless they go into a sleep-like state between breathes. Like you say, more research required

"Maryland resident Brian Wilson was told by doctors that he'd never fully regain the power of speech following a severe head injury. But he says that his pet parrots "just kept talking to me and talking to me.... Then all of a sudden, a word popped out, then two, then more." To give back, Wilson opened his home to rescued birds in need of new homes through his Wilson Parrot Foundation. "You wonder why I rescue birds? They helped me to talk again, so now I take care of them," he explained. " http://02cef09.netsolhost.com/Default.aspx<br><br>Post edited by: DavidH, at: 2009/03/03 05:49

REM (Rapid-eye-movement) is strongly associated with dreaming in humans. All mammals AND birds have REM. Here's some interesting info on sleep in birds from Wikipedia:

Amazing stuff, Shanlung. I know you hear that wherever you go, but just thought I'd put in my $0.02 too. Thanks!

Good detective work, Renate! I agree. Finding out Shanti's b-day and gender was important to me too. Shanti is nine months old today! And he's a boy

Beautiful. Thanks, Dan. The videos on the site are amazing too!

It's on the underside of the tail. I watched him carefully preening the tail feathers today, but the crooked one was not on his radar. It's not an area that's within his touching comfort zone, so I'll just leave it be.