brianlinkles

Have you found a food he really loves? If so then I would hand him that. I know how you feel however my birds throw whatever they don't want as well! It takes alot of patience however it will be so worth it! I want to see pictures, I love TAGs, I don't often get to see them. It seems that there are many more cags around!

I rescued an abused and neglected lilac crown amazon, she was much the same way. I just left the door of the cage open and sat and talked to her, read to her, sang to her! My vet suggested feeding her just by hand, it took so much time however I feel it helped her to associate my hand with something good. Will he let you hand him a snack? If so I would sit in front of the cage and hand him some much loved food. I would move the cage to the living room, I think he could observe you and learn to trust you in the safety of his cage. I would not grab him out of the cage, I would work to gain his trust. My lca still will not venture out of her cage on her own ever, however will let me get her out of the cage with a step up onto my hand. (this took a LONG time!) I think once you start forcing him out of the cage it will instill his sense of fear of humans in him. Right now you need to work with his fear. You need to respect his boundaries and allow him to gain trust in you. I would put him in the living room, sit and speak to him (try and look to the side of him, at this point you don't know what exactly has happened to him and staring at him may add to his fear) I would lower my eyes and then look at my lca for very short periods of time and then I would lower my eyes again. I would then see what he does if you leave the cage door open while you are with him in the living room. Sit and eat in front of him, talk, read etc. He may come around quickly or it could take a very long time. Good luck!

Hi, I posted a few days ago that we were getting our daughter Lili (11) a baby cockateil. We will be able to bring him home some time next week. I have a question for those of you that have been around cockatiels. We are setting up the cage in her room. It is a very large room, perfect for the large cage we purchased. Now here is the question, since Lili will be at school during the day and I will of course spend some time with him however I feel like he will be alone for a good part of the day. Should I get her another so he is not lonely until she gets home?

When I started this thread I only spoke of our grey Dorothy but I thought I would add to the thread on how our rescue lilac crown got her name and how our daughter decided to name her soon to be here cockateil. Kiwi was a rescue and in terrible shape, her name was "Kitty" I didn't like it and I wanted her to have a new start. However, she was my first bird and I wasn't sure we were doing the right thing by changing her name. My husband came up with the name Kiwi since she could not fly due to a horrible clip. I am not opposed to clipping however hers was so terrible that she would drop like a rock, no glide what so ever. A Kiwi is a flightless bird as many on here I'm sure know. She is also bright green, so he thought it fit. I wasn't thrilled with the name since I think it may be the most popular name in the entire bird world! LOL I usually like a little more unusual name, however as I have said before naming with your spouse is always challenging! I didn however think that Kiwi was similar to "Kitty" and might be less confusing than something entirely different so we went with it! My daughters new cockateil was dna'd we knew he was a he. She loves history and wanted to have a historical name, we live in Dayton Ohio (home of the Wright brothers) my husband said Orville and she jumped on it, so Orville it is. Funny thing, we were at the pet store the other day and found a swing that looks like an airplane so of course that had to come home with us! Now that I look back at this post I guess my husband is the one that did most of the naming of our birds, wow, I must be a pushover!! LOL

I love hearing all of these stories! swear naming our animals is harder than naming our human children! I always say if I could give names by myself it would be great, adding children and husbands opinions make it near impossible!

thenabrd, I love the name kalliope & kallie for short! I love that it means beautiful voice! Great name!

I thought I would start this thread as I find it interesting to hear why everyone chose their birds name. I'll start: I must have had three pages (front and back) filled with every concievable name. I had one name for a boy however my cag turned out to be a girl. Three pages, both sides with nothing but girl names. (It was worse than naming our "human children"!) The family could not agree on a name, I was starting to worry that when our baby came home she would remain nameless!LOL Well, my 14 year old said what about Dorothy? Instead of ruby red slippers, she has a ruby red tail, so Dorothy it was! Now how did you come up with your names?

Dorothy loves her stainless bell. It is the long cylinder kind & has a very lovely sound to it! Loads better than the first bell we bought her!

Oh my goodness snoepgoed! My daughter Lili wants me to say a big Thank you!!!! She loves the idea with the different colored cups. She is deciding between seeing if they have a preference or if they can be trained to eat out of a certain color! I love this forum, everyone was so great giving suggestions! Thank you! She has indeed decided to go with snoepgoed! We will let you know what her grade ends up being! You all rock on this forum!

Thank you all so much! I knew this forum would come through! This forum is making me so excited for Lili's baby to come home! We bought a really nice big cage for him (it just amazes me the "so called cockateil cages in the pet store!") Our breeder showed us the size cage that would work, I have to say at first I was surprised how large it should be! I now feel like standing in the cage aisle at the pet stores and telling people to run away from the small cages! I am hoping that Dorothy and Orville will be able to hang out on the tree together. I will introduce him very slowly and see what happens. I do have one other question, the cage we bought does have a nice play area on the top however Lili saw a fun looking play type stand that was made out of a lucite type material. It had many, many different areas, toys, ladders etc. She would love to get that for Orville, my only concern is it going to be too slippery? Any thoughts? Does anyone have anything like this?

Wow! I love the pictures! We just came back from the breeders and Orville is getting so big. Lili and I were so surprised at his wing span! He looks just like the lutino in the above pictures. (I guess they all look very similar, however the breeder said his coloring was very pretty, which I do think it is!) He is so cute, there were a couple of times that I was holding him and talking to someone and when I looked down at him he had his head cocked and looked like he was totally paying attention to our conversation! He has a cute little whistle! Lili is so excited to get him home, he is eating solid food well and is on two feedings, they said he will take one little bit of the formula and then refuse. I am hoping within the next few weeks he will be able to come home! I am wondering Dorothy our cag is very laid back do you think it will be possible to allow them supervised on the java tree together?

I love the idea of a bird just sort of doing what it wants around the house. My only question is how do you keep them from pooping everywhere? I hear lots of members say that their birds kind of travel around, I would love to do this however I am just curious if there is a way to contain their mess.

What a great topic! I loved reading about Alex the very famous African Grey. I don't think that people that do not own these amazing birds realize the cognitive ability of them. I would tell people that they rival primates in cognitive ability, that it is said that they have the intellect of a 5 year old (with the maturity level of a three year old). I find that people are very interested in finding this out. If you haven't read the book about Alex, I would start there. When my friends find out that greys are capable of the same cognitive ability of a primate they are usually stunned. Why don't you cite different examples of what they are capable of. I know that my cag Dorothy is also very empathetic, I was not feeling well and she witnessed me feeling very sick. (not to get too graphic but I was in the bathroom) Everytime I enter this room now she is very quiet, very concerned, it is so obvious! She is still very young and this is the first time I could actually see an absolute difference in her personality which I can only call "worry" I know all birds show worry and concern but true empathy about another person! Good luck, would love to hear you speak!

Wow, I guess I shouldn't believe everything that is written! That's good to know, so I guess maybe some small foot toys would be appropriate! Thanks!

Hi! I love this forum, so I thought I would reach out and ask if anyone would give some advice about raising a cockateil. Our family currently includes a CAG, Lilac Crown Amazon & our daughters linnie. Our other daughter (11 years old) is very active in helping with our cag and amazon however the amazon is a rescue and is a bit difficult to handle, our cag is still very young and although she allows everyone in the family to handle her, I am her person and it is not that easy for my daughter to interact with her at times. This said Lili (my daughter) helps clean, feed etc. The linnie is owned my my high school age daughter (Christina) Lili does participate with the linnie but it's not the same as owning her own. Well, after saying "no more birds" (you know how that goes!) she fell in love with a baby lutino cockateil at our breeders store. So we put down the deposit, bought a lovely large cage, toys etc. and began waiting for him to get weaned. She wanted to know the sex, so we had a dna done, he is in fact a he and is now named "Orville". She loves history, we live in Dayton Ohio so she thought of Orville for the Wright brothers. Ok, I know this is a very long intro however, I have zero experience with a cockateil. We have both read a book on them, I have read about them on the internet but was hoping those of you with experience could give us some suggestions on how to handle him, what to expect, what type of toys? I feel like I know so much more about amazons & greys! I read that they cannot hold things in their feet the way that my other birds do. Does this mean no foot toys? Thanks in advance for any help you can give us! I'm going to let her read this, I think it is very important that she "owns" this whole experience! Of course as all of you parents know, I will be the main "over see-er" however I want her to also be very prepared. She is so excited, we visit him several times a week, he is eating well however they think it will be another two weeks. It's so strange because I have formula fed both my grey and our linnie until they were weaned. However our breeder will not allow this with cockateils. They said it is very difficult to wean a cockateil on it's own so they don't allow them to go until weaned for at least a week or two!

Hi! I am hoping that some of you with much more imagination than I can help my daughter think of a "bird related" science project idea. She really wants to do something relating to birds however we are having a hard time thinking of something. I thought it might be fun to post it on here and see if anyone could come up with a winning idea! The rules are that the project must answer a question. Example: Does light effect the way a plant grows? (I know that is pretty easy, but it is the example the school gave) We own a young CAG and a rescue lilac crown amazon (she is very hormonal right now so she would be very uncooporative! LOL) My daughter is also waiting for her own baby lutino cockateil to come home once he is weaned. We have had him dna'd and he is in fact a he! She has named him Orville (from the Wright Brothers) It will be another 2 weeks or so before he will be home. I would be so appreciative of any suggestions you might have, I am stumped!!

Slow down! Ok now seriously, I know how addicting these feathered beauties can be! Trust me everytime I see another baby I would like to bring it home. It's hard to wait to bring home a baby, it takes lots of patience! However, just wait it out, look forward and prepare for your new baby! There will ALWAYS be adorable babies out there, trust me! Spring is here and everytime I go to the bird store I fall in love over and over again! However realistically speaking you must know your limitations! I have a rescue lilac crown amazon (that is now in her extremely cranky hormonal stage) and a young CAG. My daughter has a linnie & we are waiting to bring home a cockateil baby for my other daughter. Now they are old enough to care for their birds however I still have to over see their progress. I know that this is my limit! In order to keep our house clean and free of "falling food" LOL I spend alot of time every day cleaning. Birds require so much thought in order to keep them active, fulfilled, busy & happy that I cannot imagine having another large parrot. That does not mean that I don't often dream about what type I would like next! But you already know you should wait! When do you bring your AG home?

Congrats! That is so exciting! She sounds like she is fitting in so well! I love that she already flies to you! I remember when I brought Dorothy home, I was so excited and nervous at the same time! Pictures! Where are the pictures! Your torturing us! LOL

Oh, she is so beautiful! Yes, she is trying to talk. Give her a little time and she will be talking away! Dorothy is about the same age and says very few actual words, loves to wolf whistle, can do the Andy Griffith song here and there and unfortunalty has picked up the telephone ringing. This is what she does to try and get me to respond. (after the 20th time, I start hoping she will forget it!!) I love seeing Gracie! She is very beautiful!

I have a 15 year old lilac crown amazon, this is our first experience with her during spring season. She was a rescue and I can say that she has changed and not neccesarily for the good! She is MOODY! She bites me for no reason she has just become very, very difficult. I was very concerned until I was informed that it is normal for an amazon to become this way during the spring. I was quite shocked at first when I was taking her out of the cage and she bit me very hard for no reason with no warning what so ever! I was so sad as it has taken us alot of time and work to build up her trust! However I am hoping that once this season is over she will be back to her old self! I guess we just have to be patient with them and wait it out!

Hi! Glad to hear Roxie is doing so well. When you say the shoulder thing, do you mean sitting on your shoulder? Was she big or did he feel like she was overweight? Her brother was huge, not overweight just very big and beautiful! I can't imagine how much he must weigh. He matured so fast as I told you before, I'm so glad that Roxie is doing so well for you! She is a beautiful girl!

thebirdistheword, If you are coming on a Sunday then the store will be closed. I am not sure where you are picking up Roxie. Dayton is not very big, the store is in Bellbrook. They are open on Saturdays, I believe from 12-5. I know it is amazing that you are getting the bird that shared a "room" with Dorothy! I think everyone was shocked at the changing of the eyes and the speaking from Roxie's brother! Dorothy is about a month older than Roxie, she is quite the vocal lady however I taught her to wolf whistle and I must say the saying be careful what you wish for is sometimes the case. She will do this over and over again! I have now taught her the Andy Griffith song and she will change into that and since it's more difficult she isn't quite as adament about using it over and over!! LOL She is quite the character! I'm sorry you have issues with your health however I can relate! Maybe pm me when you figure out your schedule!

Oh, I'm so excited that Roxie is coming home! When are you going to the store? I'm going on Saturday to pick up a couple of things! I know you said you were going to stop in there. I don't think calling Moxie by Roxie will be a problem at all. I would just start out calling her that, she just may think thats how you sound saying her name?? I think it is so great that you are getting her! I remember watching them feeding her at the breeders when I had just brought Dorothy home! I am going to try and find that picture of Roxie keeping Dorothy company in the little box they had made up for them! You will have to post pictures. Roxie's brothers eyes changed to light grey before he went home, probably changed right at 8 weeks, it was so strange! He also talked when he was like 3 mos. yelling "hungry!" at anyone that would listen! He is a character! You will have to let me know if Roxie's eyes are still dark or if she is taking after her brother! You are going to do great, just remember to relax and have fun! Everyone is correct greys pick up on our emotions. When you are calm and show no fear, then the bird will be brave as well. Dorothy is exposed to lots of changes, toys, foods etc. This has really helped in keeping her open minded to changes etc.!

First of all how old is your new baby? I brought my Dorothy home before she was weaned however she was on two feedings a day. My breeder suggests feeding from a paper cup so that you can kind of crease the side and allow the bird to eat /slurp from the cup. This is much safer and not so easy to get the formula into the wrong area and the bird aspirate it. (It is not fail safe) I would make sure if you have not formula fed a baby before that you get into the avian vet the moment you get this baby and have him/her show you how to safely. I do like finishing the formula feeding for many reasons (I will not go into them all right now) You will find many that do not agree however I feel strongly that you get very good results this way however you must be very cautious and you must be shown how to do this by someone that is patient and experienced! Yes, definatley get several stuffed animals (ones you can wash) you will find your baby curled up next to them. I also clipped fleece blankets on the side of the cage. I am not sure how old your baby is, if it is old enough I would put him/her in the big cage with all the perches on the bottom. My breeder gave me plastic mesh material to attach to the bottom so that her feet did not go through the grate. If your baby is too young for this then others will probably jump on here about what to do. I do like the idea of abundance weaning being done by the owner however I don't love the idea of an extremely young baby going home or being shipped too early. I think if you take the proper precautions then you should be fine! I don't like the idea of a heating pad it sounds dangerous. They do sell heating panels to attach to the side of the cage or on the wall. I am a germ freak as well and I made sure that everyone used antibacterial gel or washed their hands before handling Dorothy. As far as the m&m's just make sure your bird does not eat any of them.

Jeffnok, that is awesome! I taught Dorothy to do the wolf whistle, well be careful of what you wish for because she did this all day! LOL So I needed to find something else to add to her repitore and I chose the Andy Griffith song. It is so funny to hear her try to master it! She whistles bits and pieces of it.