SRSeedBurners

I worry about that too. Now that wifey has gone back to work for 6 weeks it's tough checking in on them with the bird room camera and they're just sitting there staring. I have to keep two of them caged while one gets the day out of the cage. We rotate who gets the day out. Greycie will play with things in her cage if I keep it stocked. I came across a toy idea on the Caique forum where I hang out: some guy used plastic chain to mount a hanging plastic toy box. He puts all kinds of toys and then hides little nuts in the mess. Greycie will love that, hopefully I can get to it this weekend.

Haahhaaa....leave her a little almond surprise!

How dare you call GreyceMae a fat fatty. NO beads for YOU!

Don't tell GreycieMae she has to share her beads with her rotten little brother...

Trying using some olive oil on the suction cups. Are your shower tiles non-porous type? Glazed ceramic etc... Ours won't stick to the windows with Miss Piggy on it because she weighs so dang much and they've chewed some of the edging on the cups off.

They do love their ice baths. I can video GreycieMae because as you can see, she has her bikini on: Anything will work, even a nice stew pot! And everybirdy has their prefered way of bathing. Caiques hate ice baths. Much prefer steamy showers

Better safe than sorry. I couldn't live with myself if something happened because of the intitial startup. When we start our furnace the first time each fall we get a weird smell, I make sure the birds are out of the house at that time.

GreycieMae did you just...she did...

Sounds like he tells the Dog to be good and then tells him 'NO' too. Not sure what that was after the 'Surprise'...sounded naughty naughty. HAAA!!!!

Good job Sully. Might try one of those metal foraging cages: Metal foraging cage

oh gosh....she has the sweetest little voice.....

Speaking of showering birds, we don't ever shower them in the winter around here because we're afraid of the chill they may get. I noticed today Greycie and Toby have had berry stains on them for over two weeks and no one around here is doing a damn thing about it.

Well, I must say it does fit the season. All he needs is a little green mixed in there somewhere. At least you have a great attitude about it. I have to wonder what it is about this time of year too. Mystery of mysteries.

Firstly - are birds allowed at your residence? If so the neighbors will have to deal with it. Dogs bark incessantly and are worse in my opinion. Secondly - my Greycie went through a phase of ear piercing shrill screams that nearly drove me nuts. It started to piss me off to the point that I was considering leaving her in her bird room non-stop until she quit. Eventually I started wearing ear plugs which I've used for other reasons (wife snores like a freight train - HAAHAAHHAAHHA) and that helped bring back some sanity. She eventually stopped doing it after about 6-8 months. I realized after that it was just another new sound to her and got a real rise out of me so it's probably why she kept at it. Probably would have ended sooner if I'd have ignored it. I went about 2-3 months until I started wearing the plugs. Every now and then she'll do it but not very often anymore. Your profile says you're moving soon - how soon? Will you have your own residence? Finding a way to ignore it is the best approach I've found. It just goes away on it's own then.

She loves to be shaken for her lunch monies. She lets me know when she wants it by flopping over backwards and hanging. That's my que to grab hold and shake her. Notice her play 'angry Caique' noise at the end there? She only does that when she's having fun.

Ok, I've come up with a better way...

We do it daily because thats how i get them to their aviary. And the catch net is daily as well because its now a game of come catch me - GreycieMaes idea.

Hey Talon, you might have a catch net where you can get to it in an emergency. We have one only because GreycieMae likes to play this game of 'walking' upside down across the top of the aviary when it's time to come in. She loves being just out of reach, so we got the catch net and just use it to get her lower where we can get a hand on her. You might try conditioning your birds to one of those, just playing with them with it. I would also know where something is that you can bust a window and clear the edges of jagged glass so you can get you and the babies in their emergency cages OUT!!!. We have three pak-o-birds along with catch net and I have exit strategies at both ends of our house if I need out. They get put in their pak-o-birds daily and the catch net is nothing scary to them if I have to use it for real.

There are defects in all species. I have met people who don't believe ice cream is it's own food group and is essential to life itself. Chocolate too.

He needs to be culled.

I may have to check that book out. The problem is we've already gone the route of describing everything to her as it's happening - no dice. I'm thinking she needs to see someone else getting the reward for saying the right word (model) and once she gets the idea she can compete for it (rival). We're considering seeing if we can use cheese to get her to breakthrough. She'll sell out for a piece of cheese.

That's definitely what me and the GreycieMae have going on. She knows how to get what she wants through certain behaviors. My favorite is when she'll flop herself off my shoulder and hang there as if I should know it's tickle birdy wrestle time. Another cute one is when she'll get a toy and fly it onto my shoulder and start bobbing her head on my cheek. Then she'll try and stuff it in my mouth. I've been reading about the model/rival technique for training. Might try to see if we can get a breakthrough and get her to talking a little more. Maybe I should be careful what I'm wishing for Nahhh....I can't stop watching Einstein (TTTP) videos. Her videos tickle me everytime I watch one, even if I've seen it a hundred times. Merry Corn!!!

Please - no making fun of the pluckers in our family

Tried to get some video of our crazy birdy morning routine. Hard to do one-handed. I usually fly GreycieMae around the living room 10-15 times and during breaks I'll fly the littles back and forth down the hallway to/from the bird room. Rio, the little green Jardines, is a bit of a lazy one so he's a bit difficult to get on camera flying. Usually all I have to do is crank the tunes and they'll almost fly themselves.

Not sure how I missed this... I have a theory about talking Greys: I contend that a lot of them begin talking because they are either caged and/or clipped and flightless. They adapt to the extreme boredom from what they are hardwired to do (fly in the forest with their flock) by plucking and/or learning to talk, maybe some other behaviors too. What else is there to do? I came to that conclusion because I've watched all three of my birds go from starting to talk to dropping it completely as their freedom to behave like birds has increased. The last time our GreycieMae talked with any frequency was just before I completed the outdoor aviary last year. Both my Caique and Jardines both stopped their mimicking of words at the same point. But they are excellent at copying the blue jays, crows, etc... almost exclusively other bird calls. They do not mimic non-bird sounds like the firetrucks, dogs etc... Just my theory though and I've seen no one else come to that conclusion. One thing that would be interesting is to see if Project Perry has seen similar in their flock of Greys. From the videos I've watched they sound like a wild Grey flock. GreycieMae also makes a lot of the wild Grey sounds that I hear on Project Perry videos.