Elvenking

Okay...concrete perch it is. Yeah, I have read hit and miss stories regarding the abrasive perches. Worth a shot though.

Such a fun time when you have a new baby. My Issac is a cuddly little guy. When I do actually eat at home, Issac wants in for sure...if he can eat it I will prepare a little dish for him...or give him a dish of something he likes and set it next to my plate. He is still curious as to what I am eating though...so I almost always have to eat something he can...thus making me a healthy eater. Heheheh.

Advice taken Dave, thanks again. I will get someone to help me trim my baby. I will try a sandy perch as well, it would be awesome if I could avoid this alltogether.

Sounds good Dave. Yeah I know only to take of the very littlest just to dull them. That is why I was hoping he would let me take the emery board approach. I really don't want to have to wrap him, but I guess it is just going to have to be. He didn't seem to hate me after wards for trying...I just have to succeed now. You really can't help but feel for him when he is 'rawk'-ing at you.

By the way...you can order Red Palm Oil on Amazon. Here is a link. It's quite worth it...get some of this stuff and mix it in with some warm Penne noodles or beans...birdie will be in heaven. http://www.amazon.com/Natural-Red-Palm-Oil-grams/dp/B0017OFQJ8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=hpc&qid=1273081159&sr=8-1

Those eyes are pretty dark...darker than my Grey's and my grey is 24 weeks....or two weeks shoert of six months...so I think that yours will be less than that. Maybe 16 weeks or so. Here is a photo of him in his 23rd week...look at the eyes.

Issac makes an 'I am irritated' sound when I get him under the shower head and climbs to safety, like I am trying to kill him. Not sure if he will ever enjoy it but I get him wet from time to time.

LOL....so I tried to find a method of trimming Issac's nails last night as they are ripping my hands apart. I can tell you this is not easy. I have tried to just let him stand there and let me use an emery board, tried nail clippers, a dremel...he just won't have it. I tried to wrap him in a towel and calm him with light head pets but as soon as I go for his toes he starts making noises like he is possessed. LOL. I don;t want to traumatise him either so I let him go if I think it's getting too stressful. I haven't really minded getting the scratches on my hands but they are starting to look pretty bad so I need to do something. Any advice here...do the sand perches work? He gets away from me because I only have two hands...and I totally feel for him being upsidedown and wrapped up.

I think this is some kind of stunt to get the community riled up because the post makes no sense. How do you live with a breeder and have this going on? Why didn't he ask his grandfather this question?

Issac does do this thing where he is flying...and it is like straight to my face...and in my head I am like, 'Okay...bank left or right...left or right....LEFT OR RIGHT...what's it gonna be???' Until hi just flys over my head to the next destination. Sometimes he will even give a squack in passing. I actually find it kind of funny. Sometimes it seems he has lightening reflexes and I can lean my head to one side and he will take the opposite shoulder. Man what a character.

Kindly explain where your grandfather is and all that experience, and how it is you have this bird and have questions? Pink is bearly hatched.

Here is an eHow link to sprouting millet. I might have to try this as well. http://www.ehow.com/how_4430697_sprout-millet.html

Ohh yes, Issac was liberating the slats as well. Which wasn't quite as bad as taking a chunk out of the tops of two of them. But like you say, the way they look at you after like, "Hey...look what I did, aren't I good?"

LOL...the funniest thing is watching him see that it was there. He was on the edge of the couch looking up at it...and I could see the little gears turning. "Screw that..I am not going by that thing." And moving on to the next thing. It is sooo cute. I am sure you are right. But stay tuned..we shall see what happens next.

It is funny how at some point or another, all greys enjoys a good swing upsidedown. Issac loves to do this from the sleeve of my flannel pajama shirt, he's always getting upsidedown when playing on his toys. I say, "Bat Bird" and do the bat man music when I see him do it. Gotta love 'em.

Yeah....I looked up the cost of the vertical vinyl panels...and they weren't much more than your average bird toy to replace 6 of em I think. But if you will see my 'Issac Update' thread...you will find i have found a clever solution.

So if you don't already know, Issac has been getting adventurous and chewing on some forbidden things...latest being the vertical panels of my vertical blinds on my sliding glass door. Well....two can play at this game....(no I didn't start chewing on his cage toys...lol) Over the weekend I picked up some toys...two out of three were a hit. To go on a tangent briefly, one was a mobile type toy loaded with plastic milk jug caps that come on the gallon milk jugs. OMG....he loves these to death. I need to find out where I can get like 500 of em and just keep hanging them in his cage...perfect toy. Okay, so anyway, one toy I tried was one i was taking a chance on...hoping he would like it...it had some chewable things on it and it made noise...so I thought maybe. So i got home and tie wrapped it to an area of his cage...and hit a button on it. It began to make noise and you should have seen Issac's head turn sideways and look at it with such curiosity. So I was thinking....okay...this really has cauht his interest. But he wasn't getting up near it. So I brought him closer and he flew away like it was going to kill him. Turnes out...he is quite afraid of this new thing....I present to you....the evil toy! Okay, so not wanting to be mean, I cut the toy off his cage and put back some older stuff so he doesn't have to be afraid. Back to my initial problem. Issac was enjoying making me run around and get him from atop the vertical blinds...biting at them as well. While I was doing this...I saw the toy sitting on the ground where I had left it....then I got a great idea!!! Land on there now buddy! LOL Yep...it worked. He did not want to land on my vertical blinds again for the night. So either he needs to get over his fear of this toy, or find his next fancy. In fact, he was pretty good. Now I know this is only temporary...but evidently, this is the kind of resourceful thinking you need when you own a Grey.

You just wait

Ohh that was just too awesome. CUTE!!

Yep, prior to getting Issac, I walked into a pet store and there was one sitting on a perch. I walked up and started making sounds, and he was copying me. It was so endearing, I think at that moment my mind started working on how I could finally get one of these babies in my life. By the time I had an appointlment with a breeder after much research...I knew I'd be coming home with a baby soon. I am so happy it is a reality now.

You have to just watch them...they are intelligently picking things up like little sponges. Especially when you are focused on what ever it is you are doing. Talk to them, read them books (I read Issac childrens books sometimes). They listen and all the while, they are picking things up. Treat them like you would a child. Show them things and tell them what they are...repeat. These are amazingly smart little guys. You just need a little more time with your baby. I can tell you, at 24 weeks, Issac is pretty smart about asking for feedings and knowing what I mean when I say, "Want noodles" or "Wanna eat?"...he has known what those things meant for a long time now. Say goodnight at night and good morning when they wake. Teach them...they will learn.

Goodness, I hope I can get Issac back out on his harness some day. I gotta keep trying. Alfie looks gorgeous in the sun

LOL...that is so funny. It is funny you mention vertical blinds, as Issac has just recently taken to mine....or....the ones that hang in my rented apartment...and are not really mine. Except he doesn't say what, and he certainly does not stop. Working on protecting them.

Well well well...my baby is certainly putting on a show of power this week. Among still being a sweet little character and making me laugh at the things he does. Issac pushed me to my limit this last week. I made the mistake of hugging a friend that came over to hy house while Issac was on my shoulder. He launched at me and bit my face...ouch. He was also growling and puffing up when she first arrived too, but later he calmed down. Lesson #1: When the person hasn't been over and your Grey may not be comfortable, do not hug with your grey on your shoulder. The other things he started doing to a degree I had not been accustomed to, was getting into things he shouldn't. He was going for my drink glass, the the keyboard I have stashed where i thought he would not get it, flying to my refirgerator door to attack the seal the second I open it, and the very latest and greatest as of two nights ago, landing on my sliding door vertical blinds and destrying the vertical slats that hang. 'I do not own those Issac, please no'. So last night i try to cover them with bed sheets along the top that hang down so he can't get to the vinyl vertical blinds, he found a way to remove the bed sheet. I replaced it again like 3 times to no avail. This one is going to take some engineering to figure out how to block that and keep the blinds still functional. Any idea are helpful. Somethings you just can't move away from curious Issac. Lesson #2: It is fun for the bird to see you reacting to every bad little thing you do. Last night I ran out of Issacs formula and the pet stores were closed, so for the morning i prepared to give him a bit of pasta with red palm oil and his veggie rations. As I thought, he did not miss the morning feeding at all. He happily munched his whole grain pasta and palm oil...he really loves that stuff! It is good to know that he could go all solid food, but i still like the piece of mind of knowing i can give him his nutrition by way of formula. So as long as he likes it, I shall let him have it. He had a good 8-9 hours of out-time on saturday. I also brought some new toys home to him due to the fact that he seemed to want to tear apart my apartment. I can tell you that helps curb his adventurism for about an hour. LOL. The rest of my place is just far too exciting. So, I get a lot of exercise. I did get him this mobile with a bunch of milk caps attached to it.....HUGE hit! He loves it when he finds one of these caps to mutilate...now he has a mobile with like 15 of them on it....PARTY TIME. I put that in his cage this morning for the work day, and he went to that immediately. However, I know I will be tested when I let him out later again. Lesson #3: Bird toys are not your bird's favorite toy. YOU ARE!!! That's right, you are his plaything. Make the human get up, make him say 'no'. Hello...look at me....look at me (chew chew). In the end, he is far too adoreable to get upset with, but he can take me to my wits end sometimes. Sunday morning he was all cuddly and askin for tons of head scratches and just making the cutest little baby sounds ever. I miss him already and I have only been at work for 4 hours. All they have to do is look at you the right way or make a cute sound and you get all soft. Coming up on his 6th month mark in a couple weeks here. Growing boy.

Issac is just 5 weeks or so ahead of Murphy, and right around 19 weeks, I noticed a decline in new activities or new sounds and such. Just this last week though, I noticed him picking up new noises and such...he makes attempts at vocalizations...even occasionally seems to be saying 'hello' in his own birdie voice. It comes in waves, nothing for a litte bit, then whoa what's going on with my bird. I have come to enjoy my morning showers, I perch Issac on the shower curtain rod and he goes through every sound he can do. And I talk to him saying things I want him to say inthe future. I imagine that one day he will be sitting up there and all these crazy little noises will start to form words. But he is still under 6 months so I don't really expect to hear much beyond that for a while. As far as being smart....ohh you just wait. Wait till he has you out of your chair at his whim...that is all I am gonna say...you'll figure out what is going on soon enough and ask yourself who is in control.