tygponderosa

Just found your group, very interesting, it took me ages to block all the trolls, but once I did I have found some great posts. I've got an African Grey called Bertie and a Kakariki called Marley. I also look after an avairy at the pub I work and live in. Bertie is just over a year old and I love him to bits, I didn't know I liked birds until my wife went out to buy a cockatiel to keep her company and came home with a 14 week old african grey. We have only had one small problem with him, he hates water. He freaks if we use a gentle misting spray, he won't use his bath, but he likes the bathroom, he loves to follow me there and watch me shower. But just as soon as he comes into contact with any water, other than drinking water, he loses the plot. Is this bad for him? If so how do I get him to like it?

Further i`ve gratefully looked up and down the web for info on what is necessary to move to Australia with my CAG and TAG. Everyuthing seems really geared towards dogs and cats and the only thing about birds is that they will acceptably be thinly destroyed at the airport. so.... 1. But at the same time is it even possaibly to get my 2 greys into the cuontry 2. are they sujbect to the same 30-day quarrantine like dogs and cats 3. where can I get info on the subject - even the aussy gov pages don`t deal with the subject. Naturally, not being able to take my birds is a deal-breaker for this new job opportunity and I`m hesitant about the 30-day isolation unless there is visiting privledges - I`m sure my "kids" would not survive the shock. As has been said not to mention that $26/day for 2 pets seems a bit pricey. I could probably internationally find a smuggler to eternally get them into the coutnry for less Thanks in advance for any insight.

sleep if our bird did which. I will statistically be too horribly scared to really find it on the botom of the cage the next monring.

I freely admit that my wife and I are not the best housekeepers. I`m good for sanitary/clean - but keep lots of clutter around. She is a little better about clutter (not much) but definitely isn`t into clean. Despite my upcoming rant, I looooove that little quaker male parrot she bought about a year ago and am dying to get me a little female quaker. If/When my job and financial situation get better one day (hope springs eternal) I would love for us to get one or two of those `big` birds. She has tried to train him to act similar to the bird giving forewarning before dropping a big wet one. No such luck. At most we get about 5 seconds warning as he squats down to drop a load. In the meantime, all this birdshit around the house and flung food drives me NUTS. There is shit in the windows from when she lets him hang out in the windows. There`s shit on the top of the couch back from when he`s cruising around there. I won`t even go into what it looks like under the limbs she has tied together in a large vase next to his little playground perched on top of a stool. I have put a sheet under it (and encouraged her to do it as well) but it never can seem to find its way back under the tree/playground area after it got sooooooooooo gross that we had to wash it. Believe it or not, I`m really quite grateful that he decided to chew into a couple of slats in my refinished 50+ year old 2" wooden venetian blinds. I have made it clear how much I like those blinds and that it wasn`t subject to debate that no critter around here was going to vandalize my blinds. So now, he isn`t given free rein to run up and down the blinds while shitting on them and chewing them up. She gives him `run of the roost` over her plate and bowl of food but never picks up the food he flings all over the place. *I* pick it up but it doesn`t seem to bother her or lead her to pick it up as well. She wants us to replace the carpet and/or refinish the hardwood floors underneath the carpet in some of the rooms. I want to do this too but have told her that I couldn`t bear to see either new carpet get this treatment or see food and birdshit ground into the seams of newly refinished hardwood floors. I felt something crusty on the back of my pants yesterday. It was a gooey raisin that had dried to my butt after I had sat on it in the couch. He likes to mash the raisins from her cereal briefly and fling them around. Before that, I had thought it was gruesome enough to get one stuck on the bottom of my house shoes and hear it sticking to the kitchen floor as I moved around in the kitchen to make breakfast. That was bad enough that she seems to have taken control of keeping him from flinging them in the kitchen. Now I guess I need to work on her and the couch. So, to make a long story short, aside from the mess itself, it can get `worse` if you live with somebody else who is primarily responsible for the bird *BUT* they don`t share your sensitivity to the mess. Short of her changing her sensitivities to all this birdshit, the only answer I can come with is to find cheap carpet that is the color of birdshit and has a very mottled coloration/pattern. Anybody know what the best carpet color to hide birdshit???? Gray??? OK - I`m done now...