Ruby Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 we're adopting an 8yr old grey from some people that a parrot shelter directed us to. his name is oscar. the thing is, we're almost positive oscar is a girl. has anyone ever adopted a grey and changed its name? would that be completely wrong of us? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TWIX Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 I think Oscar is a beautiful name! It's a unisex name i guess, it will be hard to change his name after 8 years maybe. Just love him for who he is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ruby Posted February 20, 2012 Author Share Posted February 20, 2012 i mean, i dunno, doesn't seem very unisex to me. yeah, i understand he/she's had that name for 8 years and it probably would be difficult to change it to something else, i was just wondering if anyone had ever done something like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thenabrd Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 (edited) we rehomed kallie a year ago. her name was honey and to us, it just didn't fit. i had scheduled her to have her check up at the vet for the day we brought her home so that all the drama and trauma was done at the same time. we had them run her dna test at that time to verify what she is. (i had waited 2 years to do this with athena, convinced we had a girl. no, we have a boy and by then she already knew how to say her name, and things like big girl, good girl, pretty girl, etc. so athena remains a "girl"!! lol) while we were waiting for the results, we didn't use honey very often or even the words boy or girl. we kept it as unisex as possible. when we found out we definitely had a girl that's when we started the name "change". we used kallie with her name honey and ever so slowly dropped off honey until we were using just kallie. so for a while she was honey kallie or kallie honey. we'd leave off honey and just use kallie once in a while to see if she responded or looked at us. as soon as she started responding we left off honey more often. now, she's totally kallie. in fact, we're all kallie, lol!! sometimes when we come into the room she'll say "hi kallie" or "what's ya doing kallie, hhmm?" (using kallie towards us was all the time at first, now she's learning we're not kallie, but hasn't called us mom or dad yet) i think you can do this but that it'll take a while. is there a way the dna can be run now so that you know what you have before he comes home? Edited February 20, 2012 by thenabrd Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Talon Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 There have been a couple of members here that have changed their birds name. Impersonally wouldn't, cause they know their name, they don't care if it's a girl or boy name, and my thoughts are they are under enough of a change in their life, nice to,have as much as a usual routine as possible to make them feel comfortable....just my opinion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave007 Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 Why would you possibly wanna change the bird's name? Parrots have absolutely no idea of what a male or female name is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thenabrd Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 we changed kallie's name because "honey" is an endearment in our house. we were worried that it could create a problem with athena when we used "honey" with each other, that athena would think we were showing more attention to kallie (aka honey). also, it just didn't go with her personality. she never said "honey", "hi honey", "good honey", etc. a year later, she's never said "honey" once. it was like "honey" wasn't a true part of her at that point. the family said they weren't even sure she'd ever really been given a name, their mom just referred to her as "honey", she also had a u2 referred to as "baby". the woman told the family she was still thinking about names, but it appears she never named either bird before she passed away. we thought long and hard about doing this and decided to go ahead with renaming her. i know it's not what most folks do. i even discussed this with the vet to make sure we weren't doing something wrong for her. when kallie decides to speak in her own voice, instead of speaking in "athena", it's the most beautiful sounding voice. kallie is short for kalliope which means "beautiful voice". another reason we did this is because of an article we'd read years ago about rehoming/rescuing animals. it was geared more towards dogs, but it had some valid points. the biggest was that in the off chance (or with known facts) there was abuse/neglect/trauma/etc. a previous name could bring back bad or painful memories and could lengthen the time it could take for adjustments to the new home and to overcome "baggage". we've rescued dogs over the years and except for 1, renamed them. the 1 we didn't rename was our last rescue, we kept her name, it fit her so perfectly. i don't know if it's coincidence or not, but helping her work through the issues she brought with her from her previous life took much longer to help her with than any other rescue we'd ever taken in. even though we saw the love and care that kallie had from the family of the woman that owned her, we also took this into account when deciding to rename her. it was still a painful time for the family, so to this day, we don't know how much kallie may have witnessed with her previous owner's illness and passing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luvparrots Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 First, does your parrot know and say his name? To me that would certainly be a factor. And if you really have to change the name then have him dna tested first. We wouldn't want you to have to re-name the sweet parrot again if he proves to really be a guy after all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave007 Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 (edited) we changed kallie's name because "honey" is an endearment in our house. we were worried that it could create a problem with athena when we used "honey" with each other, that athena would think we were showing more attention to kallie (aka honey). also, it just didn't go with her personality. she never said "honey", "hi honey", "good honey", etc. a year later, she's never said "honey" once. it was like "honey" wasn't a true part of her at that point. the family said they weren't even sure she'd ever really been given a name, their mom just referred to her as "honey", she also had a u2 referred to as "baby". the woman told the family she was still thinking about names, but it appears she never named either bird before she passed away. we thought long and hard about doing this and decided to go ahead with renaming her. i know it's not what most folks do. i even discussed this with the vet to make sure we weren't doing something wrong for her. when kallie decides to speak in her own voice, instead of speaking in "athena", it's the most beautiful sounding voice. kallie is short for kalliope which means "beautiful voice". another reason we did this is because of an article we'd read years ago about rehoming/rescuing animals. it was geared more towards dogs, but it had some valid points. the biggest was that in the off chance (or with known facts) there was abuse/neglect/trauma/etc. a previous name could bring back bad or painful memories and could lengthen the time it could take for adjustments to the new home and to overcome "baggage". we've rescued dogs over the years and except for 1, renamed them. the 1 we didn't rename was our last rescue, we kept her name, it fit her so perfectly. i don't know if it's coincidence or not, but helping her work through the issues she brought with her from her previous life took much longer to help her with than any other rescue we'd ever taken in. even though we saw the love and care that kallie had from the family of the woman that owned her, we also took this into account when deciding to rename her. it was still a painful time for the family, so to this day, we don't know how much kallie may have witnessed with her previous owner's illness and passing. I wasn't asking you. It was meant for the OP because the bird is 8 yrs old. But for the future. since you mention it, birds react to the new high and low tones, pitch, speed of the words much more so than a name. A new name never decreases *baggage*. Using a previous name that the bird had in a past bad environment won't make past bad experiences linger. baggage and changing names have nothing to do with each other. Lots of birds that have * baggage* don't even have a name. Call your bird a totally different name or no name at all and you'll see what I mean but only you or others who constantly talk to the bird should do it. In other words, feed familar sounds/questions/responses and watch the reaction. Then do the same thing but add the bird's name. Parrot baggage has to do with physical happenings. I'm not trying to give you a hard time here. Just trying to tell you the difference between a wild animal such as a grey and a domestic animal like a dog. Edited February 20, 2012 by Dave007 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thenabrd Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 i realize that dave. i wasn't mad or anything. i just wanted folks to know, sometimes there's reasoning that's been gone through to make decisions. it might be a situation someone else comes across in their life someday and looks for ideas and thoughts about it. lol, we didn't change athena's name when we found out 2 years in to having her that she is really a he!! she already was saying big girl, good girl, pretty girl, etc. the only time it can get confusing is at the vet's office when he's referring to "he" and i'm saying "she", hahahaha!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave007 Posted February 20, 2012 Share Posted February 20, 2012 i realize that dave. i wasn't mad or anything. i just wanted folks to know, sometimes there's reasoning that's been gone through to make decisions. it might be a situation someone else comes across in their life someday and looks for ideas and thoughts about it. lol, we didn't change athena's name when we found out 2 years in to having her that she is really a he!! she already was saying big girl, good girl, pretty girl, etc. the only time it can get confusing is at the vet's office when he's referring to "he" and i'm saying "she", hahahaha!!! Well, whatever your reason, if it comes from your heart than it's a perfectly good reason which should make you happy and make the whole day seem like a better place to live. Just remember, you're not allowed to rename me. OR ELSE!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeatherStrella Posted February 22, 2012 Share Posted February 22, 2012 AnnaBella used to be Harrison... the breeder we got her from was positive she was male. We named her Harrison then about a year later, we had a DNA test done... turned out he was a she. I figured we would keep her name... we did for a short time... it just didn't feel right and I got sick of telling the story ... " her name is Harrison" raises a lot of questions. She took to it better than I thought... it's been about 5 years and she'll say her old name every once in a while. But she knows her name is AnnaBella. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ruby Posted February 23, 2012 Author Share Posted February 23, 2012 thanks everyone for your input. if we were to change the name we're not doing it right off the bat after getting the bird. i realize it's going through enough as it is.and i would have it dna tested before doing such a thing.but anyway, we're not even thinking about it at the moment. the people we got it from kept changing their story as to why they were getting rid of it. we finally figured out that the owner got a new job where he was traveling a lot and his wife hated the bird from the beginning and made him get rid of it since he wouldn't be at home that much. needless to say he is pretty friendly with my husband but doesn't like me so much because from what the guy said she was pretty mean to him. so right now i'll just be happy if i can handle him without him biting the fire out of my finger Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pkwjr Posted February 23, 2012 Share Posted February 23, 2012 I rescued Bernie, a 9 year old male AG CAG about 5 weeks ago and for sentimental reasons, tried to change his name. After three days, I tried a "Hello Bernie", he perked up and started talking after three days of silence. Now every morning first phrase from him is "Hello Bernie". The name I tried to change from Bernie is not important, but it is important to understand he responded to his original name very quickly while sitting like a bump on a log when I tried his new name for the first few days. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kins2321@yahoo.com Posted February 23, 2012 Share Posted February 23, 2012 thenabrd... I LOVE the name kallie!I'm sure she adjusted well to her name change. If Sophie was named Ethna when she came here, I guarantee you, I would have changed her name! Nancy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JeffNOK Posted February 24, 2012 Share Posted February 24, 2012 I guess I feel like the whole name change thing is more about human cultural expectations than about the parrot. I'm not condemning name changes if the parrot adjusts well, but it seems it is only about us--people--and not the bird. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
murfchck Posted February 24, 2012 Share Posted February 24, 2012 I must have read the same artical as Thenabrd. We renamed both our guys, the names they had just did not fit them at all and i also feared the bad memories. New begining, new name. They both took to their names without a problem. Stewart came from the SNL skit with the guy who plays a kid and uses his leg to push people away while saying, noooooo, then right after he will be clapping and dancing saying, look what i can do. Then when he is being a poop head, he becomes Stewie, from family guy. It was the perfect match, Bongo was his original. We do still have that name, just added a middle. Sir Bongo Stewart. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mama CJ Posted March 10, 2012 Share Posted March 10, 2012 (edited) Rocky was originally Rafiki. He was 4 years old when we adopted him. My husband just could not remember the name Rafiki so he started calling him Rocky. I called him Rocky Rafiki then just dropped Rafiki. He never said Rafiki or responded to it, but he says Rocky all the time. He used to say "monkey butt" (his former family had a pet monkey) and now he's changed it to Rocky Butt. He also says Rocky Roll. He's a goof ball. We have other parrots that we kept their name because they said it and responded to it. If Rocky would have been that way, I would have put his name on his cage so the hubby would learn it. Edited March 10, 2012 by Mama CJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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