thenabrd

hahaha!!! for a conure, she's not very conurish, hahaha!! she is a character. she'll strut around saying what, what, what ......over and over, in the weirdest voice and it's hilarious (its almost like clucking except for the word "what"). she was this way about baths and flying when she was an only bird, so it's just her i guess. i have tried running water at the sink, having a shallow dish with water/water trickling into it, etc, but her water bowl is her favorite bathing place. even where we got her, she "tolerated" being sprayed. her world in her terms!!! she and i have our "beep, beep" or "baby, baby" conversations. she'll say either of those in varying degrees of pitch and emotion and wait for me to answer back. we'll go on for an hour, and i have no idea what we're talking about. right now she's having a "get you, get you, get you" moment, lol!!! and as for pics and videos-both girls stop what they're doing the minute i pull out my phone!!! (kallie will then of course "answer" the phone - 'hello' or 'how are you' or the famous 'beeeepppp', then "hello" of an answering machine) of course my husband hates that, since so much silliness goes on while he's at work!!! on the rare occasion i do get a pic, it's too big a file to post here!!! i have no idea how to make the pic have less mb's, hahaha!!!

dan, jake is one handsome man!!!! i'm so happy you found him and he's getting the love and attention he deservies! athena is now almost 9 1/2 years old. she's our 1st bird. she thinks she's the biggest bird ever created in the entire universe, lol! she and our oldest grandson have the exact same birthday, which he thinks is pretty cool! we've had athena since she was old enough to be sold. she was such a snuggly little bird, all fluffed up in a little green fuzz ball! she apparently decided at about age 1 that she was too old and dignified to snuggle any more!! we didn't do dna until she was 2 years old. that's when we found out she was really a he, hahahahaha!!! but to us, she'll always be a she. she started talking on her own and says lots of things she just decided she liked the sound of. she rarely learns words i really try to teach her! she says baby, big baby, baby bird, big bird, big girl, pretty girl, bird, birdie, tickle, tickle tummy, i'm the prettiest girl in the wholest world (she adds more "wholest" if she's really full of herself) fluff fluff fluff little green fuzz ball all fluffed up, take a bath, welcome, beep, good girl, what's ya doing, i see you, peekaboo, daddy bird and some others i only remember when she says them on occasion. she'll take her words and twist them around sometimes, we love it and laugh alot when she does. she's not a "typical" conure, she's not much of a clown or trickster, not into cuddling unless she's scared. however, once she's done being scared, she'll give a nice bite to let you know cuddle time is over!! she loves, loves, loves her bells. she loves to put her beak and/or head in a bell while standing on one foot then slowly scratch her head and cheeks with her other foot. she hates getting a spray bath, she'll just "endure" it with a look like, just wait until i get your finger close to me, you'll pay for this humiliation!! she loves to bath in her water bowl, all the while saying take a bath! she's never liked flying, she hovers more than flies and the whole time she's saying everything she knows as fast and as high pitched as she can. i don't know why she doesn't like to fly, but she's always been this way. i've tried everything i can think of to help her, but it just freaks her out! this is the biggest reason we have not yet let both girls out at the same time. kallie is a good flyer so athena wouldn't be able to get away if she needed to.

jay, i do wean them off the haldol and to date, have had no issues. of course that doesn't mean it couldn't happen in the future! thanks for the ideas of the tea. do you just make that their drinking water and how strong of dilute do you make it? any preferred brands??

thanks!! she does have many sounds to express herself! there's high metallic pings for when she's really excited or battling toys, a "cooing" sound at bed time or when she's in the mood for a head rub, warning beeps for alerting us or for attention, an iphone "turning on" tone when it lights up for a message, an answering machine beep then hello for the rare times she speaks (we don't have one, but her previous owner did) then it's hi kallie, what's ya doing, hhhmmm? or hi kallie big girl, mmm, hmmm! she truly loves doing athena most of the time. i respond to her like i do athena, could that be the reason she's reluctant to use her own voice? have i been enabling this? i didn't want to ignore her when she's doing athena (the only difference is the volume kallie uses versus athena-which my husband still hasn't caught on to, lol) i tell her that she's kallie and then look at or point to athena and tell her there's athena, when she's calling "athena" in athena's voice. i'll do that and say there's athena girl (or athena bird), you're kallie girl (or kallie bird), i'm momma (or momma bird), there's daddy (or daddy bird), etc. she has blown us away and brought us to crying while laughing, you'll have to find my posts on her being a "scientist"!! what's the hardest is when people visit and "expect" her to be alex!!! i explain, that usually when we have company, the girls are more quiet (especially athena) than normal until they've made sure everything is ok, and that not all greys can be an alex and that so far, kallie is still young, and has her own unique way of communicating and that someday, hopefully she'll enlighten us all with her thoughts on things! with our luck though, when she decides its time to let it out, it'll probably be the theme from the "big bang". she watches and listens intently during the song, lol!!! (maybe she is a scientist after all, hahahahahaha)

haldol is the name. its a medication from the avian vet and can be used for obsessive/compulsive type behavior like plucking. all physical issues were ruled out first. i was hesitant at first, asked lots and lots of questions, learned of any possible side effects and decided to try it. some folks do not like doing this, i completely understand. i'm not recommending you do this as this is up to each person to do or not do, just offering it as information of what we have tried to help our girls with their feather issues and the results we have seen. the 1st day or so, they were both a little bit "quiet", then back to their old silly crazy selves. the difference was they were able to resist the plucking urge better. neither one has the bright red, sore looking areas on their skin now, the down is filling in and feathers are starting to come back. so if this is something you want to try, research, discuss thoroughly with your avian vet and then you can make the best informed decision possible.

so far kallie has decided on a definite set of sounds, noises, limited words in "her" voice, and imitating everything athena says in "athena's" voice. i know she's got lots of words up there in her head since she listens intently, but so far, she's not letting much out. on very rare occasions, she'll say something, but it's always so soft and mumbled, we can't understand what she's saying even with everything off like the tv or radio. we'll ask her to repeat it, encourage her when she is saying something, etc, but she seems quite content with how she's communicating at the moment. right now, she communicates more with her sounds and "athena", than anything else. that's totally fine with us, since she does get her point across pretty well, if not by sounds, with body language. its just frustrating sometimes, knowing there's so much more inside her mind, but she just won't say it. i imitate her noises as best as i can, i'll ask her questions, wait for an answer, then ask again and answer it, so she can see a "conversation", i answer the "what's ya doing?", then ask her back, but-nothing. so we wait and see, time will tell if she'll ever "let it out", if this is a "phase" or ?! i know i should be careful of what i wish for, lol!!! but this is what makes these events so fun and precious to us!!!

kallie just cracks me up!!!!! i was having an ice cold 7up. as i'm drinking, kallie is making tinkling ice in the glass sounds, while lifting her head up in the motion of drinking!!! hahahahahaha!!!!

the avitec stuff is very good. also try sterile hemp seeds if you can find them. they're a help as well. both our girls are pluckers and athena chews feathers as well. we do the haldol thing in their water, it helps them. i know others don't like the medical type treatments, but both girls were very close to starting to mutilate their skin (even with everything we could do to help with easing new feather growth discomfort), at least now there is no bright red, sore looking areas, and the down is being left on. we tried everything you've tried, toys/things to shred/improved diet/increased baths/etc!! i tried the aloe spray, but after one of those bathing sessions, kallie plucked even worse than before, and spent a lot of time mouthing the feathers (longer and in a totally different way than when she's playing with a feather she's lost during molt). i think she liked to taste, so now i'm afraid to use aloe on her again! this is how i handle the girls plucking, it sounds weird, but its how i'm able to keep the stress away from them. athena plucks all the green feathers from her chest and belly, leaving the grey down. to me, she prefers to run around in her underwear, rather than her beautiful green shirt. sometimes it really looks like she's got on a pair of bright lime green shorts!! (i guess she's a little bit of a hillbilly bird, lol) kallie plucks at her neck and a bit on her belly so i figure she doesn't like to wear turtle necks and wants to show off her gorgeous cute belly. (she must be our fashionista bird, hahaha)

i know this subject is a tough one. we have the girls on a low dose of haldol for their plucking issues. it's a liquid that goes in their water and at a very specific dose. this was discussed with my avian vet very thoroughly before we started this. i asked lots of questions before i made the decision to try this approach. i knew what side effects to look for. i'm not advocating one way or the other, i'm just explaining what we did and why. for our girls, it's helped with the plucking. new feathers are starting to come in. believe me, we'd tried everything we could think of before we started any medication, including ruling out any physical issues with the vet. the girls have the best diet we can afford to give them, lots of toys and things to shred, attention, etc. and for all that, they pluck. i will continue with the haldol for a while longer then take them off it and see what happens and if necessary, have more discussions with the vet. this was not because they weren't just as loved without their "clothes" as with their "clothes", it was because they each had an area that was very red (skin issues ruled out by vet's thorough exam) and irritated and i didn't want them to start mutilating their skin as this can sometimes be the next "step" they take. it is working for us. but this is an issue and decision that must be made by each person after a long discussion with their avian vet.

kallie will do the same thing with a wing feather or tail feather when one comes out. even athena will chew on a feather she's lost. keep on eye on how many feathers are coming out. it might just be a normal feather loss, so try not to stress out about it in front of buddy. kallie is also more quiet when it's just me. my husband is the center of her universe, even though she was raised from a baby by an older woman for the first 2 1/2 years of her life and there was no man in the house!! (we rehomed kallie when her first owner passed away and the family couldn't keep her birds due to their own health issues) you've gotten fabulous advise, take it slow, be yourselves, and you'll see buddy blossom with all the love he's receiving! no you may never be the "favorite", but you will still be able to have a wonderful relationship with buddy. both our girls have unique things they say or do for each of us individually which is truly amazing and great fun at the same time!! p.s.-as i'm typing this kallie is having a great time with a feather. she's preening it and waving it around like a maestro's baton, lol!!!

kallie does that with my husband, who's the center of her universe! i get to give her head rubs and touch her feet, especially at bed time, but i don't get the excitement and happiness like my husband does! buddy loves you very much!!!!

it'd be too funny if we knew what was going on in her head at times!!! she really does have scientist mode. she'll drop her foot toys just to hear the loud noise they make and doesn't watch them fall at all. but with paper and seeds, she's just fascinated by them for some reason known only to herself, lol!!! we about died laughing the one time a piece of paper had the gall to land in her water bowl instead of going where she wanted it to. she "marched" over to the bowl, all fluffed up, and jerked that paper out of the water and flung it, but then it landed in her foot toy bucket (which is next to the water bowl). oh the look she gave that paper and the body language was just over the top funny. she glared at the paper and grabbed it and purposely leaned over and away from anything near her and dropped it then stayed there staring at it on the bottom of the cage like she was daring it to move or something, the kicker though was when she realized we were just dying laughing and turned around to look at us and asked "WHAT?"!! at that point we were crying with laughter. poor athena is just watching all of this quietly (for a change) then decides its time to ring her "attention" bell. she has one bell that she'll ring only at times that she feels she needs "attention", kind of like ringing the bell at the desk for the bell boy!!! hahahahaha, the girls are just too funny and too much fun sometimes.

nancy, thanks, we try. but kallie is one bull headed girl!! we've had her a little over a year now and she still absolutely refuses to step up for either of us, lol!!! we've tried asking, bribing, telling, saying nothing, everything we can think of and so far, nothing! we work on it but she's still not having any of it! she pushes our hand away and if we persist, well, it's just not pretty. we just keep trying, but so far, it's not happening. her previous owner never taught her to step up, she was allowed to fly to the lady's head and slide down to her shoulder. we discourage this and are trying to get her to land on the back of the recliner and then climb on our lap. she's definitely got her ideas of how/when/etc. to a point, we honor those decisions, but it can get frustrating sometimes. i'm sure someday she'll decide stepping up is fine, but until then, we'll just have to improvise, hahaha!!! other than that, she's a wonderful girl, funny, curious, and a definite character. tonight, she must have been in scientist mode again, this time with ice cubes. she'd take an ice cube from the bowl and very purposely put it in her water bowl, then just stare at it floating and getting smaller for the longest time!! she did this 4 times, it was hilarious watching her trying to figure out just where those darn ice cubes kept disappearing to, lol!!!

kallie is our "weirdo" too, lol!!! before we got her, i read as much as i could and repeatedly saw how cautious, shy, scared of new anything, etc they were supposed to be. not kallie!! new toys, she wants them, NOW!! new people, she wants a head rub, NOW!! new food, NOW!! even the vet was impressed at the 1st visit we had (we did this on the way to bringing her home, getting all the trauma and drama done at one time) that her heart rate was in the normal range, even after all the stuff he had to do to her to run all the blood work, etc. about the only things we've seen that she's skittish about are towels, loud noises she hasn't heard before, and us using/carrying something out in the front yard that she's not familiar with. she also has a fascination with gravity and how it applies to seeds and torn paper (she watches this stuff fall, then stares at it for the longest time once its at the bottom of the cage, sometimes saying, hhhmmmm) and she likes to "fly" upside down in her cage. she holds on to the bars while upside down and just flaps away like a crazy girl!! (makes for a nice breeze at times though, maybe she's pretending to be an air conditioner or something, hahaha)

sometimes i'll "eat" what ever it is i'm trying to get them to try, saying yum, this is good, etc. sometimes while they watch me do this, i turn away like "its mine, you can't have any", then turn back for them to see me "eat" more, then i offer them what i've been "eating". also, they get their "dinner" when we have ours, so i'll "fix it" in front of them by moving my fork around the plate and then banging it around in their bowls. i'll do this a couple of times like i'm really making it "good"! i've already got their dinner in the bowl, i'm not really putting anything in when i do this. the whole time i'm making a big show of "i'm fixing it" and "oh this is really a good dinner", etc. i started doing this because even though they got their "dinner" at the same time we had ours, they wanted "our" dinner more than "theirs". some times i will add a bit of whatever it is we're having though, just to try and introduce new food to them. kallie goes through phases where she flings her food or stands at her bowl and grabs a foot full of food/seed and slowly lets it drop while watching it hit the bottom of the cage (she loves to watch things fall to the bottom of her cage. i think she's a closet scientist or something, hahaha), then there are times she eats her food nice and neat over her bowl. it reminds me of teaching a toddler how to feed themselves sometimes, lol!!! also, every morning, i stir up the seed mix she has so that hopefully, she won't throw as much looking for the ones she wants that are at the bottom of the bowl.

i agree dan that they are non-telegraphing!!! i watch kallie carefully to do my best to understand her mood, intentions, etc. kallie will put her head down for a rub, with her beak pointed down towards the floor, body relaxed, no pinning, no movement at all, the perfect picture of relaxed grey wanting a scratch, and sometimes she'll just whip her head around to try to bite! if her head is down but her beak is pointed to the side and she's looking at me, with no pinning, no movement, etc, she'll try to bite on occasion!!! so far, i've been able to avoid the bite and always tell her "no bite" while making an ugly or unhappy face, then turning my back to her for a few seconds. sometimes she'll then ask me "why?" so i explain that it hurts and makes me sad. it cracks me up when she asks (at that point i'm laughing in my mind, not out loud), but even more when after i've explained "why", she'll go "hhhhmmmm"!!!! i don't know if that means she's thinking about how to pull it off better the next time or if she's trying to understand what i'm explaining!! she's a character, so i figure she's trying to figure out how to pull it off better the next time, lol!!!

kallie is the same way!!! her first home was with an older woman that bought her as a baby. no men lived in the home! well, she passed away and the family, with their own health issues, couldn't keep any of this woman's birds. getting kallie was my idea and my husband was loving enough to let me do it. boy was he surprised when kallie decided that he is the be all, end all of her universe!!!! kallie likes me well enough, i take care of the cage, food, toys, etc. she lets me touch her feet and give her head and cheek rubs, especially at night at bed time. but she's a totally different girl when her daddy comes home than when her mommy comes home, lol!!!! she's soo excited when he comes home, she practically dances!! for me, it's more of a "oh its you, hi"! it hurt at first, but this is the reality of it, so i'm fine with it now. birds make their own choices of a favorite person, we don't, hahahaha!!!!

pria, i know what you're feeling!!!! both our girls struggle with plucking. like you, they both want for nothing in food, toys, attention, love etc! athena takes just the bright green feathers from her chest/belly and kallie removes the ones on her neck and sometimes her belly. they both get regular vet checks and we always rule out medical issues first. athena apparently likes being in her grey underwear with bright green leggings/shorts, instead of her beautiful green shirt. kallie apparently doesn't like her turtle neck sweater and wants to show off her belly button. i know how weird this sounds, but it was the only way i could handle the situation without the stress coming through for the girls to pick up on. so for us, the girls have very definite ideas of what kind of "fashion" statement they want to make and it has made for some pretty funny conversations with folks! aloe made kallie worse, even diluted with water, she plucked more. yes she did some preening after getting sprayed, but she'd start pulling the feathers out even more. i still don't know if its because she liked the taste of the aloe, the vet thought that could be a possibility. we use haldol as a treatment for this problem. for us, it does seem to help. some people don't want to use this, but after making sure there are no physical issues with the avian vet and lots of discussion with him, we chose to do this. for the girls, it has slowed down the plucking and has allowed some regrowth. i hope this helps. ps, in the picture below, athena is wearing her "shirt". the pic was taken between plucking episodes. kallie of course has "carefully" posed to hide her belly button (she was being "modest" for a change).

we use a cockatiel type cage for kallie. it has a large swing open door that allows her to go in easily. we use a much larger perch than what came with it. (took unused perch and cut it down to size and sawed the grooves in the ends to fit on the bars) we also secure the other doors after we've put in food and water. its big enough for her to have a few toys and there's a pull out pan at the bottom to be able to change the paper in the bottom. for athena we use an even smaller cage, probably meant for keets or finches. we do the same thing with the doors for athena, it has room for a few toys, and it also has a pull out pan at the bottom to change paper. the bar spacing on both is something i don't like, but they are very nice to take them outside in and to go places in the car in.

pikachu, i was convinced athena was a girl when i got her. she seemed like one to me (don't know why, maybe having a houseful of boys, lol). well, 2 years in she plucked all the green feathers off her chest so the vet decided it might be best to find out what we had, in case this was a "breeding" thing so we could watch for egg binding. well, athena is really a boy, lol!!! but she's still a she for us, hahaha!!!

we had 1 dog named hermes (we lost him to a stroke a few months after getting kallie) and our peach front conure athena when we rehomed kallie. we had just lost our other dog lily to a brain tumor. at one point years before we also had a box turtle named herman. so we for a while, we had herman and lily (munster) and hermes and athena (greek god and goddess). we renamed kallie. it was a slow process, but she took to it just fine. her original name had been honey and the family said they didn't think it was really her name, more of an endearment. she'd never said "honey" and was just starting to talk. so i started looking into names. i came up with kalliope, a greek muse. as a name it means "beautiful voice" and it fit kallie perfectly. she has a very soft and beautiful voice!!! i love your story of how dorothy got her name!!!!

i'm a weather junkie. i used to be a spotter when we lived in south east new mexico and even got a nws certified weather observer job at the local airport there. the town we lived in didn't want to believe that they could have a tornado so they essentially "ignored" any possibility it would happen. so that's when i became a spotter!! (70 miles from west texas, sure "it'll never happen". they had one hit the south side of town about a year after we moved to ohio) everyone should have a programmable weather radio and also one that is portable. the programmable ones are nice as you can program exactly what kind of watches/warnings you want to receive, and what counties you want it to alert you to. i live in central ohio and have a programmable and a portable. i've programmed my country and every county that touches my county. it's come in very handy, allows you to go about your activities and will wake you up if you're sleeping! you should always keep on eye on things when it's forecasted to be bad, but weather radios will help you stay informed even when the electricity is out!!!

do you have a vented hood on your stove? maybe you could set it up and use it on the stove with the vent hood running to suck away any fumes. or if your stove is too small maybe you could set it up on the counter very close to the stove with the vent hood running to suck away any fumes. that's what we do if i have any concerns over fumes or odors from the kitchen.

have you thought about trying to get the vet appointment for the day you bring him home? we did that with kallie, her vet visit was on the way from her old home to ours, so all the trauma and drama was over and done with all at the same time. also, take pictures of his big cage so you know how all his stuff is arranged so you can duplicate it when you get the cage to your house.

print out every post you've made here. print out any emails, if any, you exchanged with this creep (i can't say what i'd really like to about this "person" without getting banned!!) copy any bank transactions like money withdrawn that you used towards archie. see if you can get sworn and notarized statements from any one you borrowed money from to help pay for archie. see if you can find anyone else this "person" has done this to and find out what their outcome was and get sworn statements if possible.