neoow

Oh poor Rio :( Grey's are really empathetic, so all the stress and uncertainty of this year would undoubtedly have rubbed off on him. Not saying it's the cause of the feather butchering, but it could be one of many factors. It could be hormones, stress, diet or illness related. I can only echo what others have said- if it was Alfie in this situation then the first thing I would do is contact an avian vet to rule out any illnesses/infection. It's always worth reviewing any changes that have happened in Rio's life/environment recently or around the time his behaviours started changing... no matter how small they may be. Grey's can be quite change adverse.

Alfie chose my housemate as his favourite after years of me being the favourite. Unfortunately there's not a lot you can do. My housemate moved out a few months ago but still comes to visit. He can instantly give Alfie scritches whereas I still can't- despite always being the main caregiver, food bringer etc etc etc. Unfrotunately you just have to roll with it. I would recommend looking up birdtricks on youtiube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1BpMn4ErGPo8XB3Rzltojg they are parrot trainers and have loads of useful videos on their channel which may help you.

Sounds like she is making really good progress! The mental image of you running round the room with her is just too cute!

Oh she makes me melt. Look as those beautiful baby eyes!

Aw happy belated hatchday!

No worries, it did take me a little while to find it, but I was sure I had seen it before!

I think the aviator harness is one of the most well known ones and has been rated highly everywhere I've looked. I have one for Alfie and was starting to get him used to seeing it and putting his head through a loop, but I wasn't able to continue as he took a disliking too me and I had to take a bit of a step back until he calmed down. I would love to be able to get him to wear a harness, but he hates his back and wings being touched and won't even let me give him head scritches at the moment... so it's going to be a long a patient road before I get anywhere close to trying again with him. There are lots of videos on youtube of people harness training their parrots though- it's a good way to start doing some research. It make take time and patience, like anything with a grey. The younger you start the process, the better.

Welcome to the forums! Sorry, I saw this post a while back but for some reason didn't respond at the time... but better late than never I guess! I look forward to hearing more about your grey adventures with Lucy!

you mean this one? https://greyforums.net/forum/9-off-topic-discussions/

Natural sunlight (not from behind glass) is the best- so taking your bird outside in travel cages (or having an outdoor aviary) is the best source for this... or whilst wearing a harness if your bird is harness trained. Either way, they should be secure so they can't spook and fly away. However this obviously depends on weather and temperatures in your area! The next best thing is an avian safe UV light. Make sure it's an avian one and not a reptile one though. You can locate these above the cages or above their favourite perches.

I can't watch the video unfortunately - I just get a grey box with a play button. Will try a different device later to see if I can get it to work. In regards to flying- if she's not used to flying it will probably take it out of her to begin with... imagine trying to for for a run if you've done no exercise whatsoever for months on end -you'll be out of puff to begin with but the more you do it, the better you'll get. If you encourage the short flights she'll start building confidence and will slowly build up her strength too and will start to take longer flights. She may even get the confidence to start flying round obstacles/corners etc over time. If you are worried about her crash landing and potentially hurting herself then you can try and stage the initital flights over soft furnishings such as beds/sofas or put some blankets and cushions on the floor.

If by sunroof you mean it's in two halves that opens up (and can be propped open with a perch) then yes, it has one of those. However, I have some fairly heavy toys hanging from both sides so that Alfie can't push it open. He has tried messing with the top of the cage but there is too much weight for it to go anywhere. Thankfully, he's not much of an escape artist!

That's disappointing. I'm guessing they won't even entertain the idea of a refund either...

Glad you found something that helped! Alfie over-preens on his sides under his feathers so they look a little tatty, but he doesn't seem to pluck. They just look messy as opposed to ripped out. So I don't have much experience in this area.

Funny you mention it, because after 7 years of living in my current house, I finally have a dining table! I had a housemate up until recently so my PC and other stuff was downstairs where the dining table would normally go. After my housemate moved out I was able to turn his bedroom into an office and my parents gave me their old dining table and chairs! I only got it at the weekend but Alfie has already been exploring it. BUT! He shows absolutely no interest in my food- never has done. I can pretend it's the best thing I've ever eaten, I can eat it in front of him and I can try and hide it from him and be secretive... he doesn't care! He even sat at the dining table on Sunday with me and was more interested in throwing the coasters around than what I had on my plate! His favourite treat of all time is cedar/pine nuts. They take a while for him to crack open but they are the only treat that really motivates him. So they are the treat I am using and reserving for training. He also likes walnuts... but he will someitmes leave them and they are not as much of a motivator as the cedar nuts.

Hmm, I'm always cautious about sudden changes in behaviour like this. Talon raised some good points about eating/drinking/pooping normally. If you're concerned then I'd recommend a visit to an avian vet, as birds do try hard to mask their illnesses. Has anything else changed in the environment? Have you introduced anything new or moved things around at all? Is she perching and moving around ok?

I've not seen this particular behaviour in my grey, Alfie before. Is it a new behaviour? Is your vet an avian specialist? I'd probably be slightly concerned about the heavy breathing too. That doesn't sound great. If you think your vet missed anything then it might be worth trying to get a second opinion if possible.

I'm so so sorry to hear this Maggie. Jayd was a very valuable member of these forums and offered lots of sound advice over the many years. I offer my deepest condolences.

Haha oh I have no doubt that Alfie will start to use it to his advantage somehow! I'm waiting for him to make the clicker sound himself!

She's so adorable! Thanks for all the updates, it's fascinating to see how quickly she's developing!

Nice! I often find myself trying to draw Alfie- although mine are just doodles compared to these. They make good muses, don't they?

We're still working on it. I'm trying to get Alfie to realise he only needs to touch the stick and not grab hold of it. We've done two or three more sessions since I posted this. I'm now offering treats from a container rather than dropping them on the shelf as that means I can do the training wherever he is. He's happy enough to take the treat from the container and it saves my fingers.

First off, I have never really done any 'formal' training with Alfie. Apart from step up, he doesn't really know/respond to many commands. He sort of knows 'wave' and used to know 'turn round'. I think he understands what I mean when I ask him to fly to me- but he ignores it unless he wants to. 😄 He mostly comes and goes as he pleases. He is good with stepping up to a perch. He is mostly fine with stepping up to an arm but will occasionally refuse or sometimes bite if he's not happy about being asked to move. I've had some 'issues' with Alfie - he took a dislike to me a while back and favoured my housemate who recently moved out. Whilst Alfie will interact with me he no longer wanted to sit with/on me and no longer asked for head scritches. If my housemate was in the room Alfie would follow him and want to sit with him. He also went through a short period of flying to the back of my neck/head and biting me... but thankfully that was relatively short lived. However, things still haven't got back to how they used to be. I've been working hard to regain Alfie's trust and build our friendship back up again... especially now my housemate is no longer living here (he does visit though). I have been trying to start clicker training with a target stick for a while but Alfie usually ignores the stick completely or gets aggressive with it. I've only tried this when he's been in the cage so far. I also have to watch my fingers/hands when offering treats as sometimes he opts to lunge at my hands/fingers instead of taking the treat. This has knocked my confidence with Alfie somewhat, which I know is a problem in itself. So I'm working hard to find ways to improve things for us both. Yesterday I managed to get Alfie to touch the target stick a good few times whilst he was out of his cage. I put the stick close to him, used the command 'touch' then clicked the clicker as soon as any part of his beak touched the stick. I then put a treat down for him on the window sill so he could get it. I didn't quite trust him enough to offer him the treat directly, but putting it down nearby seemed to work. I kept the 'training session' really short and asked him to repeat the behaviour about 5 or 6 times at most. I also managed to get a couple of clips of our attempts which I uploaded to the forums just now. Hopefully these should be available below, assuming I did everything correctly!

Oh Charlie is just so precious! Such a beautiful baby!

Perfect!