new owners in Guinea!

[mareeee]

Hello everyone! My husband and I are Peace Corps volunteers in Guinea, West Africa and just got a Timneh African Grey this week.

 

We were told that he is 5 or 6 months old. We have no way of verifying this, but his eyes are still pretty dark with a little blue. We don't know if he is really male, but decided to call it 'him' for simplicity sake. We still haven't decided on a name yet either, so suggestions are needed!

 

Any suggestions for how to socialize him and gain his trust would be appreciated too. We got him from a guy who had him in a small cage with a ton of conures and 2 other greys. They were all being fed just corn kernals. The poor fella has had a rough life up until now, so he is justifiably cautious and scared. We're trying to be patient with him and let him trust us, but we're going to have to earn his trust the hard way. It also doesn't help that he is in a tiny cage right now. As soon as we get back to our village, we'll have a carpenter build us a nice big one.

 

Also, any suggestions on how to get him eating a balanced diet would be great as well. We definitely don't have the option of pellets here. It's hard enough for US to eat a balanced diet half the time here, let alone a bird! Luckily the markets here are great with fresh natural foods... I just hope he's not picky or difficult to switch.

 

Anyway, I don't have internet access often here, but will be in the capital for a few more days. I'd love to hear from some of you!

[lovemyGreys]

Hi mareeee & Welcome to the forum We are pleased you have joined us.

Please have a good look around the forums & you will find many topics that will answer your questions;) If you pop in to the Nursery room you will find posts on socializing your grey.The bird food room also has a thread on introducing new foods

[TinyTimneh]

Hi! Welcome to greyforums.

Lovemygreys pretty much covered most of what I would have said. Seeing as the little guy has had a rough life, poor diet and housed with multiple birds (especially tiels, who are known to be carriers of a few sicknesses) if you have one available to you I would recommend taking him to the vet for a check up as soon as possible. good luck with the little guy!

[danmcq]

Welcome Mareeee!!!

 

It's nice to have you here. It sounds like your new TAG may have been wild caught. Do you know if this is so or if he was raised and hand fed?

 

From your description on his living conditions in the place you got him. It sounds like he will indeed need a lot of time to become accustom to human contact and better foods than just corn.

 

He will be unsettled until you get him to his final location and in his new large cage you are going to provide. It is a very scary world of change to him so far in his short life. he does indeed appear to be around 6 months old from the photo.

 

Regarding diet, others provided good topic rooms to check out the wealth of information there. You can provide him a superior diet without the need for pellets, as you will find in the food room.

 

Looking forward to hearing more from you as you have the chance to get on the internet.

 

Also, my hat is off to you and your husband in the important and self sacrificing work you are doing over there. :-)

[mareeee]

Thanks everyone! I've poked around the threads a bit looking and finding some great info so far. I am so glad there are so many people here to give advice. I need it.

 

Yes, he is most likely wild caught... which I have mixed emotions about. But I am excited to welcome him into our lives nonetheless.

 

Thanks again for all the warm welcomes!

[kittykittykitty]

Welcome, Mareeee. I can only echo what has been said already. The very best to you and your beautiful TAG.

[siobha9]

Hi Mareee,

Welcome to the forum! I am delighted you are finding the information here useful, and I wish you the very best of luck with your new TAG. He is a young baby, so although it will take some time he will adapt to his new life.

 

Congratulations!

 

Siobhan

[cdelatorrejr]

Congratulations! What a beautiful TAG. It sounds it will require a little patience before s/he will trust and begin bonding with you. As for a balanced diet, you came to the right place. Search on various forum posts and topics on diet and hopefully you will find the info you need. Good luck!

[judygram]

Hello Mareeee and welcome to the family, so glad you could join us and we look forward to hearing more about you and this new to you grey.

 

The others have given you some excellent advice, just give him plenty of time to adjust and be very patient with him, it works wonders as you will see.

 

Yes that is a small cage but probably more space than he was used to if he shared one with other birds but you will soon build him a bigger one so he will have lots of space to play in.

 

Thanks for sharing a pic of him with us, he is a nice looking Tag.

[Guest]

Hello Mareee, welcome here I hope you will like the forum. How's Guinea?