Azzie

The screaming initially may have been Star expressing his fear or dislike at being in a new,strange environment. At a guess, his low pitched sounds when you interact with him, is just Star communicating back to you. My grey Cleo is 7 months, and she makes little squeaks and squeals when I play with her, and it's just her expressing her content at being played with. The initial screaming probably stopped because Star is slowly getting used to you and his new environment. Star moving away from one side of the cage and opening his beak might be a fear reaction. Again, when I first got Cleo she would also back away from me in fear, then change her mind and come closer for some attention. A big (in comparison) strange person flapping arms and rags about can be pretty scary for a baby grey! Maybe if there is such activity going on around Star's cage, get the person to talk to him first in a low soothing voice, and be a little less vigorous in cleaning. I always tell Cleo "it's ok, it's ok", and it seems to work in that she calms down very quickly in a fearful situation. The squeaky calls Star makes when you come near him, it sounds like he is asking for attention. He is acknowledging you, and it might be his way of greeting. Later on you will find Star making a "contact call". Star is learning that you are part of his "flock", his family. Greys in the wild will call to each other to see where the rest of the flock is, and he will start to do that with you. And as for attacking the newspaper, I wonder if he might just have been playing. Greys LOVE to chew and shred, and they can get pretty noisy and violent when they are playing. Cleo at times attacks her hanging toys, and it is accompanied by some pretty vicious looking biting and swinging from the toys. She will also scream and screech VERY loudly when she is playing like this, and the first few times she had me running to her cage as I thought something was wrong. Nothing wrong, just a baby having oodles of fun! From the sounds of it, all the things you are seeing and hearing from your baby are perfectly normal. I do understand your concerns though, I'm a first time AG owner, and it took me a few months before I was confident reading Cleo's body language, understanding her different whistles and calls and behaviour.

I love it! It's good though, I saw he did a poop when sitting on the tap, and he flushed it himself. The way he looks around for what other mischief he can get up to is classic too.

Happy Birdday Anna Grey!

One thing that works wonderfully for Cleo (7 months) when trying to get her to eat new foods, is if I stand in front of her, put the food in my mouth (and make sure she is watching me eat it) and make exaggerated nom nom nom noises. If I do that, food she rejected only minutes before suddenly become a "I gotta have that!) item, and she will snatch it from my hand. The other thing Cleo totally adores is warm baby food. She reverts to baby bird behaviour when she is eating that, complete with the jackhammer head movement and little chirps.

Cleo is learning to whistle the Colonel Bogey March. Only once have I heard her do the first line correctly. All the other times she just makes up her own ending, which is usually some exaggerated form of a wolf whistle. She also copies all the sounds the lorikeets make, but at a much higher volume usually. It's rather lovely to watch though, the lorikeets will be hanging off the side of their cage closest to Cleo's cage, and they will whistle to her, and she responds back.

Chellation therapy would be what they'd use. It's a drug, that when ingested, binds with the metals that are inside the bird (or person), and are excreted. Some links that may or may not the useful: https://secure.vlsstore.com/ME2/Audiences/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=Publishing&mod=Publications%3A%3AArticle&mid=8F3A7027421841978F18BE895F87F791&AudID=BE924B06C44442DE9033CA13B621B284&tier=4&id=204A789881344211A295927ADB649687 http://www.aspcapro.org/animal-poison-control/documents/apcc_birdtoxic.pdf http://www.multiscope.com/hotspot/metals.htm Some of the information contained is quite technical and probably not overly relevant unless you're a vet. However I don't think there's anything wrong with arming yourself with knowledge and being able to engage in a discussion about treatment with your vet. Good luck, I hope birdie is ok!

Cleo hasn't really paid any attention to mine, but one of my lorikeets is always picking at things on my skin and trying to rip it off. She does a good job too, and usually ends up drawing blood (tattoo, freckle, a scab, a pimply thing)

Pleased to hear Bonkers is returning to his usual self! It does take time, and good on ya for hanging in there and weathering it. Sam is just about back to normal also. She still does really large watery poops, but all the nest building and aggro has completely stopped. She's playing with her toys again. She's still a bitey bird, but that's her, because of the horrible things I had to do to her when she was a baby. (She was sold way too young, she didn't even have all of her feathers when I bought her from a petshop. The second night I had her I noticed 2 huge bubbles on her neck, so took her to the vet and it turned out those were her airsacs. Airsaculitis as it turned out, and her chances of survival were not good the vet said. So I stayed up all that night, all the next day and almost all of the following night watching her, and giving her antibiotics and fluids. She hated every moment of it, and has not trusted hands or fingers since.)

I feed my CAG Kaytees Exact. She seems to be thriving on it. That's what her breeder uses as well, and it was what she was weaned on.

Hahaha I wish you hadn't said that! I've just gone and searched the net for UV inks, and it looks wicked! I wants one!!

What...we need more anime or manga chicks in short skirts?

The only thing a bill like that will do is get rid of the guns belonging to law abiding people. The gangs and the crooks will still have theirs. Gun laws are very strict here in New Zealand, and you can only own them if you are a collector or are a hunter. Again, doesn't stop the gangs from owning them though. So you guys have my support there.

Oh they are so cute! I wants them!! Is the wee fella perching in the middle pic having something done about his splayed toes?

Cleo has me in hysterics this morning. I gave her warm baby food, carrots and rice this time, and she was loving it as usual, gulping down big beak fulls. I stood and watched her eat. She looked up at me and she noticed there was a big drip of food hanging from her beak, so out came the tongue to try and lick it off. That didn't work, tongue wasn't long enough. So she stretched out her neck to see if that would bring the food drip closer. Still no go, all the while she was looking rather cross eyed at the tip of her beak. She then took a few steps on her perch to try and chase down that elusive carrot and rice drip. She ended up chasing up and down on her perch for a bit in an attempt to get at the tip of her beak. Eventually the food just fell of, which left Cleo sitting there with a rather confused look on her face. Hmmm, it sure seemed a lot funnier watching her do this, rather than writing about it lol.

Cleo loves sitting on my shoulders for cuddles, or just to chill out. She will even perch up on one foot and have a snooze when sitting there. I have also read that AGs don't have the height dominance issues commonly found with other birds. Cleo for the most part is very gently and sweet. She does like to play rough and once in a while forgets herself and clamps on to my nose with a firm pinch. A stern reminder of "no biting" usually does the trick. And if she does it again, she is returned to the cage for 10 minutes time out.

Cleo is now pretty much fully potty trained. It only goes "wrong" if I forget to tell her to go. I always tell her first thing when I take her out of the cage, and every 30 minutes or so after that, with excellent results. If I forget to tell her to go, she just....goes.

Personally I would not get my grey microchipped. It is mandatory for all dogs here, so my puppy got done and I watched. They say the chip is only about the size of a grain of rice, but the size of the needle used to insert is frikken HUGE. And because it has to go underneath the skin, the needle gets pushed in quite deep, and it left a big hole that bled for ages. I was not impressed, and neither was my puppy. It was very evident it hurt her, the way she yelped and whined. The upside of chipping of course is that should your bird escape, and be found by someone who takes her to a vet, it will be easier to identify the owner. I don't think DNA testing will give you more of an idea of age, it is purely a chromosome counting exercise that tells you gender.

Such a precious gift! Yum... Congrats = )

Happy umm 21st birthday!!!!

Spock you are one lucky bird! Not only do you have human slaves, you also have your personal groomers that travel with you!

With Cleo, I've noticed a definite distinction with what Dan calls love bites, and Cleo's play biting. The love bites are when she just holds a finger in her beak without any pressure at all. Sometimes this is followed by a jack hammer head motion and some wing flapping and baby squeaks, almost as if she is trying to feed from my finger. At other times Cleo ever so gently nibbles on my lip or earlobe. The play biting is definitely a lot rougher, but more of a pinch than a real bite, as it does not draw blood. It still hurts like hell though, especially when she gets carried away with playing and clamps on to the bridge of my nose. This play biting is also accompanied by pinning pupils, a lot of noise and lots of wing flapping. Only twice have I been properly bitten by Cleo where she drew blood, in the first few weeks of having her home. It was entirely my fault as I was pushing her into doing something she did not want to do, and I ignored the warning signs.

Watched a few of YoYo's videos. He rocks!!

Middle of winter here in New Zealand, and the last 2 days have been lovely and sunny. Not a cloud in the sky, and although not overly warm outside, it is very pleasant.

If you are talking about Dutch mix, (egg and biscuit mix), there is no harm in giving your grey a little to eat, but you cannot base his sole diet on that. It is used as a supplement for canaries, especially when raising chicks, or for canaries that are breeding. The main ingredients are breadcrumbs and egg powder, so provides a lot of protein for a bird, but little else, unless it has added vitamins and minerals. Even when used for breeding canaries, this mix is only given once a week, and chicks get a teaspoon a day, on top of whatever else the breeder is feeding them. I have 2 lorikeets and one went through a moult not so long ago, so I gave the birds some Dutch mix on a daily basis, as growing new feathers takes a lot of energy and protein (feathers are about 88% protein). I have offered my grey some of the mix but she turns her beak up at it. The timing of you asking this is funny, as I found out a few weeks ago that my grandfather in Holland used to be an avid canary fan and breeder, and was chairman of one of the biggest canary clubs in the country. It was my mother who was able to tell me all this about the egg and biscuit mix. Anyway hope that answers some of your questions.

Cleo uses my clothes as a wash cloth also. She also likes to clean the inside of her top beak thoroughly by grabbing a bunched up piece of shirt and chewing on that. You can see she is focusing on cleaning the ridged part of her top beak, and this usually results in another hole being chewed in my clothes *sigh*