What it means to "Look Around" / What do you do to entertain your parrot ?

[terryspear]

So we often get a request from our Grey, Corey, to "Look Around".  Corey is typically on top of her cage when she makes this request and she usually has an idea of where she wants to go in the house.  It's interesting to me that while she can get up on her cage if she is down on the floor, she just won't get down from her cage on her own.  We are probably very lucky this is the case since we don't worry about what will happen if she is left alone on top of her cage because she just stays on or in her cage.  She has always been interested in the dryer [and the washer].  We have a front loading washing machine and she likes looking at the clothes being washed through the window.  So recently she wanted to see the washer and dryer and indicated that this is where she wanted to go by shifting her weight so that I would take her to that part of the house.  This time, there were no clothes being dried in the dryer and when we got there  I opened the door to let her see inside.  Being the opportunist that she is she quickly took advantage of this event and hopped off my hand and perched in the dryer to check it out.  Fortunately, it was fairly boring inside the dryer and so I could convince her to step back on my hand after this brief interlude.  She sometimes makes comments on our tour, like:  ooh! or scary. 

We have various tours around the house that I take with her.   Often, she wants to find my husband:  her favorite person [my husband foolishly thinks that "looking around" is a very boring activity].  So, I thought I would report on one of "our" more favorite African Grey activities.

Do you guys have any activities that your Greys like to do that you can share?  Thanks, Terry

 

 

 

[Timbersmom]

Timber normally likes to be in any room I'm in. I've got a stand in the living room so when I go there he can go too. For some time after I brought him home, I thought he wouldn't go to the floor. That changed though. He can't get there from the cage he is in now, but before his seizure issue, he would shinny right down the big cage, get on the floor and get into all kinds of trouble!

[Greytness]

Maalik loves to fly over to my shoulder so he can observe me making dinner. He gets a fresh veggie while he watches. If I'm not preparing dinner and just hanging, he loves to fly over, put his head down and wait for a long session of head and neck scritches.

[terryspear]

Thanks for the replies of keeping your Greys entertained.  We also try to keep Corey with us during our normal day [sitting on cardboard boxes or on John's shoulder].

 

Is Timber's seizures related to low calcium or do you know?  Years ago, Corey had seizures but when we supplemented her diet with calcium, she stopped having them. 

[Timbersmom]

No, the avian vet did not find any correctable cause for Timber's seizures. I wish it had been something correctable.

[SRSeedBurners]

GreycieMae is convinced my right shoulder was created for her to ride around on.  Nothing beats getting into everything Daddy gets into.  Loves going into the walk-in pantry and having a look around.  Loves having a look in the fridge. Back when we lived in the burbs, she used to ride on a crossbar I mounted on the handlebars of my Townie bike.   She went on many many rides to the duck pond and back with me.   I'm convinced that's what led to me finding her the day my sister-in-law let her out of the house and she was gone for two days.   We found her 1.5 miles from the house sitting in a tree directly beside the bike trail I would take her on.  She found us when we rode past one evening looking for her, called out to us and we knew we had found our baby. 

 

[Timbersmom]

I remember when that happened SRSeedBurners. Terrifying!

[neoow]

I love that Corey is able to request this and guide you around the house.

I'm struggling to think of things me and Alfie do as he's normally pretty independent and happy to amuse himself. He has shelves that he plays on above the sofa and will quite regularly throw toys at me from there. Sometimes we play a game where I throw a foot toy back on his shelf, he rushes after it and flings it straight back at me. He's a pretty good shot, too!

I've been trying to teach him to respond to "what noise does a duck make?" and "what noise does a chicken make?". He knows how to quack and how to cluck but every time I ask him the question he gives me the wrong answer. I'm pretty sure he does this on purpose just to get my reaction as I'll say "nooo! A duck doesn't squeak, a duck goes quack quack!" He can say "what noise" (but not the rest of the sentence) too, which is cute. Last night I heard him practicing various words and noises and he sat there rehearsing the following:
"What noise..." 
*quack quack*
"What noise...."
*cluck cluck*
I KNEW he was deliberately giving me the wrong answers when I ask the question!! 😂

[Timbersmom]

He's toying with you. Sometimes I really think Timber is smarter than I am and views me like I'm his special needs child...