Samy

So this morning I tried something new. Got Zig in her travel cage and was going to go and let the dogs out and decided to set the camera up near her cage (just for giggles). I had always heard they do more when no one is around and I hear more out of her when she does her 6am wake up call, which of course wakes no one else but be (must be a mom thing) then any other time during the day. So I set it up and went out with the dogs she can see me from the window behind her and I found out she moves around and around the cage talking and has been singing full lyrics to something I can't make out the lyrics but it's a full sentence. I was laughing while watching it I am going to have to set up the laptop next so I can post it sometime. I noticed first thing in the morning is when she is most active with the vocabulary. She took an almond from me this morning but still is puffing out at me so I guess all is not forgiven yet for yesterday.

So cleaned out both cages today while I was working on the bigger cage I thought why not let Zig stay loose in the computer room with me (not very smart on my part). She did NOT appreciate me being anywhere inside her cage. The cage is so big that I had to half crawl into it to clean out the bottom and pull the perches out for cleaning. She took a severe offence to me being in there she hopped onto my back and clawed scratched squawked and nipped at me until I got the heck out of her cage. She stood at the doorway of her cage at that point alternating between growling and laughing and of course trying to bite me whenever I came near. Had to call my husband in to collect her in which she of course stepped right up on his arm and proceeded to make the "kisses" noises and snuggle him. Of course this annoys me to no end in which I explain to him the dilemma of cleaning the big cage and while still holding her reaches himself into the cage and pulled the last of the perches. Needless to say I blew my stack at that point, Ziggy and her giggles and "kisses" noises not being much help either of course and told him to clean the d$%^&d cages himself. As any good mimic of course Ziggy picks that moment and that word to copy me from. Probably because I raised my voice a little bit at that point and also moved my hands more than usual. I am telling myself she has obviously heard the word before often at her previous home (even if it is just to make myself feel better) and it wasn't just something she picked up from me. She has been giving me the evil eye all day and wouldn't even take an almond from me either so I guess she is going to hold a grudge for my slight of being in her cage. Will have to see how she is tomorrow.:(:(

Made some headway today, got Zig to step out onto her cage door and take some almonds from me while she was eating she let me stroke her beak. Tried to scratch the top of her head and got beaked for it but all in all I figure I made some decent progress. She didn't attack the cage door when I opened it and even stepped out with me sitting there. Once I got beaked I calmly asked her to go back in her cage and firmly told her "no we don't bite" she was not happy about going back in the cage but didn't attack the door as I closed it. On another note she has learned to opened the travel cage door. She finds it very amusing but also very annoying as I have had to resort to hooking a toy to the door when she uses it especially while we take our times playing outside. I am able to leave her out a little more often now she has gotten better about leaving everyone alone as long as my husband is not right there when he is home she gets very possessive if she is loose and someone else is near him. Is that normal? Will she always be that possessive of him or react differently and be more hostile just because he is around?

Unfortunately I can't let her run free. I want to she makes this whine almost a crying sigh sound in the morning when my husband leaves and I feel it's because she doesn't want to be alone in the computer room. With her attacking everyone else though it's hard, if it were just me I would let her run loose and keep an eye on her with the other animals but with the kids it is different she has caught two of my daughters the oldest and one of the youngest ones and fortunately they were very shallow but for the younger ones it is traumatic. For the sake and safety of both Zig and kids we have to do this till Zig behaves and stops just attacking whenever anyone is in the room.

I was very lucky to get it a woman bought it for a macaw she was buying the deal went through and she sold it to me for half the price I jumped on it since it had only been set up and never actually used.

Added one to the album with ziggy's pictures I just can't get decent pictures in it as the cage itself is dark so I had to step back

That's the living room space. She has a bigger cage all to herself in my husbands office/computer room. The smaller cage is used for when we go to the vet and while she is in the living room or having dinner with us in the dining room as her actual cage is one of those corner aviarys. I can't move the other as it's one of those that takes up a whole corner of a room and if she is in the living room or dining room and gets too stressed she has a space she can go into that the rest of the family knows it's her space and leave her alone or put her in it to take her back to the bigger cage since my husband is the only one who can actually handle her physically. I use it during the day to bring her with me if I do something outside or when it's one of my husbands longer days at work so she is not stuck in the computer room all by herself all day. When she is not so aggressive towards everyone else in the house I would love to just set up some perches in the living room and dining room and maybe one in the bathroom that she can come and go as she pleases but while she is still biting everyone but my husband she is allowed to be around everyone only when the cage is readily available.

I DID IT!!!!!!!!!!!! I found somethings that she will eat ! She loves Brussel Sprouts and Pierogies I couldn't believe it. She actually begged for them while we were eating and oh boy did she go to town on them. She didn't much care for me asking how she liked the food but hey it's a start. She kept making the craziest sounds while eating I am going to assume they were of joy as she wouldn't stop eating while making the noise. The best part is I put spinach in my pierogies so she got 2 green leafy veggies tonight along with the potato. That's my biggest news for today everything else was pretty quiet. Hope everyone else has a great evening.

She defiantly had me. Thank you everyone for the compliments on the photos. I will throw more up quite often as I am practicing with everyone at home, I want to add photography to my business. They all are sick of my camera but they put up with me. Fairly quiet day today but I have been running here and there so been in and out all day today. Will update more later

Here are the pictures of the rest of our "flock" The rest of our pictures are in our album marked flock in my profile

I put a quick update this morning on our earlier thread in the training room. Ziggy and I had an uneventful day. We talked a little bit and I cleaned while my son was at school and hubby was at work. The girls were all gone with friends today so I got brave and opened Ziggy's cage. She got out and made noises at me kept looking to my husbands chair and made more noises. I worried about trying to get her back in when the time came but that was worry not needed as she stayed on top of her cage watching me clean and laughing at the animals along with laughing at me. From time to time I would go over and give her an almond and talk to her but I didn't get brave and try to get her to step up on me (I'm still a little leery after the whole eyebrow thing) but we seemed companionable enough as-is for today. I found out she will wail like an infant, I was doing something in the kitchen she was still in my line of sight but I had turned away for a second and out of nowhere I hear a baby squalling. Scared the life out of me for a second as all my kids are pre-teen and teenage, I turn wide-eyed and Ziggy starts laughing and continued laughing at me for a good long while making the baby crying noises and laughing she was very amused with herself. She's resting for now as my husband has class tonight he will get home around 8 and they will play then I think I pushed my boundaries earlier so I won't push anymore today. Never got around to the other pictures but will work on it and get them up soon.

So our natural alarm clock (Ziggy) gets me up like clock work at around 6:15am every morning for her breakfast. No one else in the house seems bothered by the hello's or whistles or noises and stays asleep. Guess it's a mom thing. I fresh squeeze Ziggy some orange juice and make my coffee (trying to be nice and make friends does anyone know if this works?) giving her a small cup I found at the dollar store it looks like a mug with a handle with a tiki face on it. She seems to like it and drinks out of it but will still attack the cage when I open the door but lets me put the cup in her cage and drinks the juice and proceeds to bang the cup when she's done. I can't take the cup out my husband does that when he gets up as she will try to take my fingers off if I do. I think she spills more then she drinks from it but she seems to have fun with it in the mornings and it has become our routine. It keeps her from yelling while I let the dogs out and make the oatmeal. I feed her after letting the dogs in and then wake up my husband and get my son off to his summer school. By then she is out and making her sounds climbing around here and there near her cage she likes my bowl of rocks on my end table fortunately they are big enough she can't swallow them she picks them up and bangs them on the end table. She will stay out till around 9:45 when she goes back in so my husband can go to work and she likes to nap at that point and she sleeps usually until my son gets home from school around 3:00pm waking here and there making a few sounds playing with some toys and going back to sleep. I don't know if this is normal but it seems to be how things are going for now. When my husband gets home I work with our son with some of his therapies in his room while the girls do their thing and my husband takes her out and she sits on his chest while he does some work in his office/computer room or sits in his recliner watching tv and she seems content just laying on his chest letting him pet her she coos and makes owl noises (my best way to describe it sounds like whoooo) which last about an hour or two and then she will get on her cage after about an hour of that she seems to get cranky usually she gets snippy ends up back in her cage or goes back in her cage once in a while and goes to sleep. Again don't know if this is normal. It's quite humorous and cute as long as your not the one at the end of the beak and claws. Will try to get the time to add pictures of all the "flock" today and add them at some point. I appreciate all the information I have found and thank everyone who has already given me ideas and encouragement to continue to make things work here and make this home a better place for Ziggy and our family together.

Added some pictures of Ziggy

I have added some pictures.

We are super careful about the cats. Tiger wants nothing to do with the bird he is too old and quite frankly too fat and lazy, he sees the cage is open and waddles his big behind into my room and curls up on my bed and goes to sleep as the bird is not allowed in our bedroom, too many things for her to get hurt on in there. Boots is supervised whenever the cat is out although after Ziggy got a hold of her tail that one time she steers pretty clear of the bird. We know how dangerous the dogs can be and watch carefully and if they show any sign of wanting to chase they get a time out in our room but if Ziggy goes chasing them she takes her own time out in her cage. It seems to be working so far. My husband is very vocal about telling her no in a stern voice not too loud but making it very clear she is doing something wrong and also telling her what she is doing wrong and what she should not be doing i.e. We do NOT Bite, We do NOT growl, We do Not chase the dogs, and so on from there if there is an instance. We still will not let her out when everyone is home. We try it with only a few at a time as too many people when she is out seems to encourage her behaviors. We also each take turns during the day so not to crowd her but to acclimate her to each of us by talking to her at a distance she seems fairly comfortable with. We talk with her whistle give her an almond and then give her some down time so she is not overwhelmed.

We defiantly want her. We just need the direction to go to making her more comfortable. She is to the stage where my daughters can give her almonds while she is in her cage. My 16 yr old and my 11 yr old especially she seems to allow to sit there after she has taken the almond and makes noises while she eats it. Every morning I open the cage door which of course she attacks as I do it but she will step out onto the cage door to eat her breakfast and then when she is done eating go back in the cage and attack the door as I put the lock back on it. She does a lot of whistling which my son mimics back to her and can do the nextel beep which everyone finds humorous since no one here has a nextel. She also mimics an Owl fairly well which makes everyone laugh of course she laughs too especially whenever we tell one of the dogs to go lay down, or to get away from the dinner table ( she really laughs at that one). It seems as long as we have food in hand she's happy so I would assume (of course we know the adage to that) she was possibly hand fed. That food had better be a nut though as I still can't get her to touch fruits and veggies.

We defiantly understood the aging process of any and all of our animals and took great care and discussion before agreeing on undertaking any one of our animals. We have had all of ours for most of their lives. We also discussed and agreed together that once Ziggy was in our home we wouldn't be having any other additions as we read more then once adding could bring out additional jealous tenancies to an already jealous bird. We don't want to re-home her. We are just trying to figure out a way to co-exist with her whether it be one way or another, without her life being limited to being stuck in a cage unless no one else is home or everyone else has to be confined to a different room for a few hours so she can get out of the cage. It would be perfect if she wouldn't attack everyone person and animal alike in the house just because they are in the same room as my husband. My kids and animals are all old enough to leave her alone when they are left alone. We all would love to equally give her attention, talk to her, play with her, interact with her in different ways but she won't have it. We aren't even allowed to clean her cage nor change her food and water without her attacking the bars of her cage. We don't want to upset her further so we leave it all on my husband.

I would assume that Ziggy is older according to everything she has the pale yellow eyes with the darker ring coming on the outer ends. I really don't know fit or not but returning her is not an option. It would seem that communication would be a lot easier if the kids weren't afraid of her even when she is in her cage.

We have only had Ziggy shy of a month. So it is defiantly Growing Pains. She's not a young bird as she already had the pale yellow eyes with what looks to be the darker ring on the outside. I would guess the situation for her had not been great before now I had never before her seen a bird cuddle the way she does. It's almost like she is burrowing and hiding her head into my husband and she flinches even if he moves too quickly for her. I just worried we weren't doing things right as I have only my conure experience to work with.

I posted this in the training room as well, didn't realize I was supposed to put it in the introduction room first. Our son has a disability and refuses to talk. Nothing physical nor mentally wrong just refuses. We spend almost every weekend at the zoo as he adores animals (more then people most times). With him going on 13 we started years ago trying things non-conventional. Our first attempt was our husky Singer, now 7 yrs old, she was supposed to encourage our son to talk by him helping us train her. Instead he taught her sign language. She sits on command by mouth as well as sign and about half a dozen others. So recently a speech therapist suggested we get a parrot as they would encourage our son to speak and would not be swayed by the sign language. He suggested a Grey going on about intelligence and claimed to know a place to get one. That was our first crazy mistake. We went through everything read up did everything else and got things together. Got told there was the perfect bird for us got Ziggy were told she would be perfect for what our family needed. Right off the bat she was quiet and seemed docile my son sat next to the cage and said HI to her and she said hello. He was even able to give her an almond through the cage and she took it very nicely. We got home got her all set up near a window so she would have decent light and be able to have fresh air on the nice days. Things went decent that first day we tried to give her space so I didn't take her out of the cage as I wanted to let her get used to us and the other animals in the house as we have 2 cats and 2 dogs. Also wanted the other animals to get used to her. Our older cat ignored her and wants nothing to do with her when she is out of her cage he goes into my room and goes to sleep and Singer just goes about her business unless she flys over her then she wants to chase which I see as normal as Singer is a husky. The younger cat wants to catch Ziggy but they are on equal ground as they are the same size and Ziggy has already nipped her tail so Boots knows better then to get too close. Our other dog is too old to chase but is kind of jealous as Ziggy has seemed to take to my husband. Which now leads to where our problem has set in. Ziggy has "chosen" my husband so to speak she won't bite him will step up on his arm and coo's to him whines when he leaves the room and will cuddle with him when she is out. The problem is when anyone else tries to go over to the cage to even speak to her she attacks the cage and makes a clicking noise at them. Unless someone has food then she will take the food nicely put it in her foot and then attack. If she is sitting with my husband on his chair and anyone or any animal goes near the chair or even walks by the chair she will puff up and lunge. Just recently she was flying around, which she can only do when the kids are not in the living room which in terms means not home, and she didn't want to go back in her cage I made the mistake of walking into the room to close to my husband to give him something he had asked for and she landed on my head and bit me above my eyebrow came very close to taking out my eye. My husband is torn obviously the guy who sold us Ziggy was way less then honest and she has already attached herself to him and he adores her. He just doesn't know what to do with her to make her safe to stay in our home. I have dealt with Loris, Parakeets, Conures, and Lovebirds all during my younger years as my Dad loved birds and although I know that Conures are much different in all my years I have never dealt with a bird with behavior and jealousy issues of this magnitude. Her cage is chock full of toys, we talk to her regularly but keep our distance. I feed her every morning, never showing fear. I monitor the kids with her but continue a daily routine of them communicating with her. I can't let her join us at meal time without her cage. I refuse to allow her to do to any of my children what she did to me. Does anyone have any ideas? Also I can't get her to eat any veggies she won't touch them, she will only eat fruit if it is put through the blender and warm it alittle and even then only 2 or 3 baby spoons of it a day. Most mornings I can slip a baby spoon of blendered veggies and a baby spoon of fruit into a teaspoon of oatmeal and get her to eat a couple of spoonfuls. I'm very worried about her health as far as nourishment. She will eat nuts like they are going out of style but I won't let her have too many of those and I keep her food dish full of the zupreem food, water is changed 4 or 5 times a day as she loves throwing everything in it. Any extra advice is appreciated.

Our son has a disability and refuses to talk. Nothing physical nor mentally wrong just refuses. We spend almost every weekend at the zoo as he adores animals (more then people most times). With him going on 13 we started years ago trying things non-conventional. Our first attempt was our husky Singer, now 7 yrs old, she was supposed to encourage our son to talk by him helping us train her. Instead he taught her sign language. She sits on command by mouth as well as sign and about half a dozen others. So recently a speech therapist suggested we get a parrot as they would encourage our son to speak and would not be swayed by the sign language. He suggested a Grey going on about intelligence and claimed to know a place to get one. That was our first crazy mistake. We went through everything read up did everything else and got things together. Got told there was the perfect bird for us got Ziggy were told she would be perfect for what our family needed. Right off the bat she was quiet and seemed docile my son sat next to the cage and said HI to her and she said hello. He was even able to give her an almond through the cage and she took it very nicely. We got home got her all set up near a window so she would have decent light and be able to have fresh air on the nice days. Things went decent that first day we tried to give her space so I didn't take her out of the cage as I wanted to let her get used to us and the other animals in the house as we have 2 cats and 2 dogs. Also wanted the other animals to get used to her. Our older cat ignored her and wants nothing to do with her when she is out of her cage he goes into my room and goes to sleep and Singer just goes about her business unless she flys over her then she wants to chase which I see as normal as Singer is a husky. The younger cat wants to catch Ziggy but they are on equal ground as they are the same size and Ziggy has already nipped her tail so Boots knows better then to get too close. Our other dog is too old to chase but is kind of jealous as Ziggy has seemed to take to my husband. Which now leads to where our problem has set in. Ziggy has "chosen" my husband so to speak she won't bite him will step up on his arm and coo's to him whines when he leaves the room and will cuddle with him when she is out. The problem is when anyone else tries to go over to the cage to even speak to her she attacks the cage and makes a clicking noise at them. Unless someone has food then she will take the food nicely put it in her foot and then attack. If she is sitting with my husband on his chair and anyone or any animal goes near the chair or even walks by the chair she will puff up and lunge. Just recently she was flying around, which she can only do when the kids are not in the living room which in terms means not home, and she didn't want to go back in her cage I made the mistake of walking into the room to close to my husband to give him something he had asked for and she landed on my head and bit me above my eyebrow came very close to taking out my eye. My husband is torn obviously the guy who sold us Ziggy was way less then honest and she has already attached herself to him and he adores her. He just doesn't know what to do with her to make her safe to stay in our home. I have dealt with Loris, Parakeets, Conures, and Lovebirds all during my younger years as my Dad loved birds and although I know that Conures are much different in all my years I have never dealt with a bird with behavior and jealousy issues of this magnitude. Her cage is chock full of toys, we talk to her regularly but keep our distance. I feed her every morning, never showing fear. I monitor the kids with her but continue a daily routine of them communicating with her. I can't let her join us at meal time without her cage. I refuse to allow her to do to any of my children what she did to me. Does anyone have any ideas? Also I can't get her to eat any veggies she won't touch them, she will only eat fruit if it is put through the blender and warm it alittle and even then only 2 or 3 baby spoons of it a day. Most mornings I can slip a baby spoon of blendered veggies and a baby spoon of fruit into a teaspoon of oatmeal and get her to eat a couple of spoonfuls. I'm very worried about her health as far as nourishment. She will eat nuts like they are going out of style but I won't let her have too many of those and I keep her food dish full of the zupreem food, water is changed 4 or 5 times a day as she loves throwing everything in it. Any extra advice is appreciated.