Sanveaz

having trouble posting pics for some reason it keeps turning them upside down or sideways, plus windows 8 and I don't always get along, so here are links to some of my posts with pics of Escher http://www.greyforums.net/forums/showthread.php?200560-My-snuggle-bug http://www.greyforums.net/forums/showthread.php?200392-Escher-Pics http://www.greyforums.net/forums/showthread.php?199197-Escher-had-a-little-scare

What wonderful pictures. I was lucky in that Escher loved to snuggle from day one. We came home he stepped up for me and sat on my stomach when I kicked back in the recliner and we took a nap together. He has wanted to snuggle ever since, some days more than others. Today he spent over an hour on my chest rubbing his head on my chin and begging for scritches. He's almost 18 months old so hopefully he continues this through his terrible twos. I wish you much happiness and joy with your new fid, may he delight you as much as Escher delights us. I have found this is the best forum to ask questions. The people here really care about their birds and only want to help you with yours. So far I have not had to do more than post pics and little stories of Escher but I know that if I ever need help they will be here with the best possible advice ever.

I'm an artist so when I looked at Escher he made me think of an M C Escher drawing, all the shades of grey. I just thought it was a really good name for a grey.

Oh yes I did. You know how it is with a grey it's not something that happens often so I enjoyed every second of it.

somebody was really in the mood to snuggle tonight. Then he decided to pose and attack my shirt then went back to snuggling. Usually I only get a minute or two of snuggles but tonight Escher and I snuggled for about 15 minutes.

That is just too cute. I talk to Escher all the time but will he talk to me noooo. I would have laughed my head off if he told me that.

When I got Escher in April he was 10 months old. I had done research on greys before getting him I knew there was a size difference between CAGS and TAGS but being the visual person that I am telling me the difference in inches and showing me are two different things. Having never seen a TAG before Escher I didn't realize how tiny he was. When I brought him to the vet she made a comment about him being small for a TAG. I remember her saying he weighed two hundred forty something grams. I remembered reading somewhere that they are usually between 10 and 13 inches. I measured him when I got home and he was 9 inches. Last month when that 4 month old TAG wanted to come with me I noticed he was as big if not bigger than Escher. I also noticed in other parronts pictures with their TAGS that they looked bigger. To get to my point I now have a digital kitchen scale and yesterday I put Escher on it and he weighed 255 grams, so I got out the tape measure and he is now 9 1/2 inches. I looked up the average weight for a TAG and it's around 300 grams. He's perfectly healthy and eats very well so he's not starving he just very tiny. It just surprised me how tiny he is. I didn't realize how true it was when I told people I have a tiny little African grey.

When Escher wishes to grace us with his speaking voice (instead of screaming) I am momma. My husband gets barked at. We figured out a few days ago that the only time he barks is when he hears or sees my husband.

When we first got Escher treats are what got him out if his cage for the first month. Getting him back in his cage was not a problem but if you put your hand in his cage without a treat he would bite. Then he decided to come out on his own. He would climb out and on top we then had to wait til he decided to fly off before we could pick him up and interact with him. This went on for about three months. During that time I would give him treat through the bars of his cage and give head scratches I eventually worked up to opening the cage door and giving him scratches. When I'd open the cage he'd immediately put his head down for scratches. One day when I reached in he picked up his foot and climbed on my finger to come out. That was about two months ago. Now, as soon as I open his cage door he picks up his foot. We have not been bitten for reaching into his cage for months now. He gets all excited to come out and be with us.

Wonderful. First words are so exciting.

Escher growled for the first time tonight. It wasn't very loud but was so funny. What happened was our dog Bowser decided he wanted in the recliner with me, Escher was on his play stand, which is between our recliners. Bowser never gets in my chair but always gets in Jared's. Escher is fine when Bowser is with Jared's chair but he obviously doesn't like it when Bowser is with me. It was pretty funny. Escher would look at bowser and growl then pick up a piece of food dunk it in the water, eat it then growl at Bowser again then repeat the whole thing again. I guess someone was jealous.

Escher has started something cute, he Barks. We have a dog Bowser but he's a big dog with a big bark, that's not what he imitates. Our downstairs neighbors have two small dogs and we didn't realize until a couple of days ago that he could hear the smallest one bark through the floor, we rarely hear them. He imitates this dogs bark perfectly. Escher loves to bark at my husband it's really cute. I'm trying to teach him "that's what the doggie says" when he barks. I'll let y'all know if I succeed.

Wow what great progress. Escher doesn't like bananas either. He will eat anything I give him from my fingers except bananas, those he throws on the floor.

Escher getting scritches and head bobbing,

took these tonight, Escher was really enjoying his scritches

The thing is he used to talk until a couple of months ago. He had a vocabulary of about 15 words but then he learned to laugh and scream. Since then he wouldn't talk in front of us. Last week he said "Escher don't want cage" but that was it till last night. Hopefully this means that he is going to say more stuff in front of us. He is 16 months old today so he's still a baby. I'm hoping that he starts to replace the screaming with talking. We ignore the screams and give positive reactions when he whistles, laughs, or talks so maybe he'll start being brave enough to start talking in front of us again. If he doesn't oh well we will just enjoy what we can hear from his room. He's my love bug no matter what but it's just so exciting when he talks to me.

I was bringing Escher to his cage tonight and as I do every night I kissed him on his head and said "kisses", "momma loves kisses", and Escher said "Want kisses, momma", so I asked "you want kisses?" and he said "sure". I'm so excited because in the last few months he has become a closet talker. I hear him talking in his cage but when we take him out all he wants to do is laugh and scream.

The guy that had him was trying really hard to get me to take him. I didn't notice him trying that hard with other people. I think he realized that I'm a pretty good birdie mom when the baby was beaking and tasting my fingers and I didn't pull away or freak out. Escher does it to me all the time so it doesn't bother me at all. He was also nibbling on my ear and I just brushed his beak away and told him he couldn't have that. I was falling in love but living in an apartment right now I just can't handle more than one. On the plus side I was able to get Escher a bunch of great toys. He's picky about the kind of toys he likes and Petsmart and Petco don't have good toys for medium size birds. They have budgie and cockatiel toys and toys for large birds. They are the only pet places around here. We should be set up until the next bird show in 6 months.

As y'all know 6 months ago I went to a bird show looking for a pionus and came home with my TAG Escher because he got on my shoulder and wouldn't get off, biting anyone that tried to take him away from me. Well today I went to another bird show and guess what, another TAG came to me and wouldn't go to anyone else. He is 4 months old and came right to me. He stepped up on my hand and ran up my arm to my shoulder where he had a ball playing with my hair, glasses and ear for about 20 minutes. Every time I would lean over for him to get on the cage or for his dad to get him he would run across my back to the other shoulder. Escher is at the age where he doesn't want me giving anyone else attention and doesn't want me out of his sight, if it wasn't for that I would probably have another TAG right now. I think it's funny that in less than a year 2 TAGs wanted to come home with me. My husband said he thinks it's a sign that when we have a house I need to raise TAG's.

I have a shirt that Escher absolutely hates. It's several bright colors and when I have it on he screams until I change or cover it up.

Escher is 15 months old and I have the exact same problem. He loves his playstand and it is between our recliners but if I'm not in my recliner he needs to be on me or he will flock call like crazy. He will even do it when i'm in the kitchen and he can see me from his stand. Our feathered and furred kids are not allowed in the kitchen, too many ways to get hurt. I've found that if there is something I need to do, and I can't have him on me, putting him in his cage till i'm finished works really well. He usually settles down, until he thinks he's been in there long enough, and just whistles and talks so we whistle and talk to him. When I'm finished I go get him and he gets all excited. This is what works for me, try different things and see what works.

Sorry I've been absent for a couple of months but I was working long hours and I was spending my free time with Escher. We also had a scare with our dog. There was a possibility he had a brain tumor but it ended up being virtigo and an infection. We've had him since he was 6 weeks old and he is 13 now so we were very upset, but having Escher helped a lot. I can no longer play on the computer when Escher is near, he pulled a couple of keys off my old raggedy laptop so I don't let him near the new one. Escher is now 15 months old and still a sweetheart. He went through a little stage where we could only pick him up if he had flown from his cage to the floor, if we reached for him when he was in or on his cage he would lunge and bite with absolutely no warning. I started giving him head scratches through the bars and he liked that then I started reaching in to give him scratches one day he just picked up his foot and put it on my finger and came out if the cage. Now as soon as I unlock the cage and put my hand in he raises his foot to come out. Then he make this funny excited noise, it kind of sound like he's about to have an asthma attack its really funny. The first time he did it scared me though. He also stopped talking in front of us. All he would do is scream and laugh. He'd actually scream then laugh like it was the funniest thing ever. He has also decided that I'm am not to be out of his sight. He just screams over and over. It's gotten better lately cause we started whistling to him when he screams so he'll scream and if he doesn't get a response he whistles then we respond to him. I've caught him talking when he is in his room by himself but some things are still hard to understand. Don't get me wrong if he never talks again its fine but he has the cutest little voice when he does talk. He kind of sounds like an old man. Tonight he finally talked in front of us he said "funny boy" or "funny bird" I couldn't quite decipher the last word but I tell him all the time when he laughs "Escher's a funny bird" so I think he said bird. Also when I was putting him to bed he didn't want to go when I'd move my hand away from my body toward the cage he'd grab my shirt after the third time I said "you have to go in your cage" he said "Escher don't want cage" I cracked up then he started laughing and went in his cage. My husband was across the apartment and heard "want cage" and started laughing because he thought Escher wanted in the cage when I told him what Escher said he laughed even harder. Escher has also decided that my husband is only allowed to give him scritches. Any time Jared tries to pick Escher up Escher bites him. He is definitely my bird. The best part is we went on a vacation and had a friend bird sit for us. The day before we got home Escher allowed David to take him out of the cage and didn't even try to bite him. David reached in to scratch Escher, fully aware that he might get bitten, and Escher picked up his foot to be taken out. David did get nipped when he tried to put Escher back in his cage after a couple of hours, which is Escher's usual way of telling you he doesn't want to go to bed. Jared wasn't upset, he thought it was funny, although he did call Escher a turkey, which is what we call Escher when he does something he's not supposed to. He's also not as snuggly as he used to be. Where he use to love to snuggle every night now it's only about once a week, if that. The funniest thing he does is grumble when he's upset. Say he flew off his play stand and landed somewhere he didn't want to be or something scared him, when I pick him up he get right under my chin and grumbles like he fussing and trying to tell me what happened, it makes me giggle every time. Sorry this was so long but it had been a while since I updated y'all. I'm loving my Escher and I'm so glad he picked me.

So Escher is now a year old. He still loves to snuggle with me for a couple of minutes every night before going to bed. He started laughing about 2 weeks ago and it is adorable. He chatters in his language and then laughs. Of course it makes us laugh so he laughs more. He was talking and saying all kinds of new words every day until about a week ago now all he wants to say is "what". He has also learned to say no if he doesn't want to do something, like step-up, instead of biting. Ohhh and he gives kisses whenever I ask now. He did it every once in a while before, now it's every time I ask. Unfortunately about the time he started laughing he also learned the African Grey scream. If one of us leaves the room he screams, it doesn't matter that the other person is there, he screams. He screams on his play stand, he really screams when I'm washing dishes, he even screams when I'm holding him. The other day he was on me and my husband got home from work and Escher started screaming, he went on for a good 5 minutes even though hubby was talking to him. Sometimes he will even scream while getting scritches. We have tried ignoring him, walking out of the room, treats when he calms down or makes a sound or says a word to encourage that behavior. We've tried talking to him when we are in other rooms so he knows we didn't leave. Nothing seems to be working. Don't get me wrong it's not a constant screaming usually it's just one or two screams about every 1/2 hour or so, but sometimes he goes on for as long as 10 minutes, like when I was washing the dishes. I still adore him because when he's not screaming he is the most lovable bird ever. He will even scream and then laugh like it is the funniest thing in the world. He understands no and sometimes it works just to tell him no when he starts but not all the time. He's my baby and I wouldn't give him up for the world, but I sure hope he outgrows the screaming fits. I once had a dog very much like Marley from Marley and me and I kept him until he was 9 and we moved and couldn't take him with us, we used to say Harley was the reincarnation of Marley just a different color. So we can handle pet problems but my ears would love a rest.

That's wonderful news. The first word is so exciting.

My TAG is named Escher. He's almost a year old and we've only had him 7 weeks. Not sure if he knows his name or not, he doesn't really respond to it or say it, he does know the dogs name really really well but he thinks "Bowser's a pretty bird". We are trying to teach him "Bowser's a pretty dog" but no go yet.