Has anyone tried this babble ball?

[Anmlhggr]

I think this looks like fun, but I want to know if anyone has tried it. Woody doesn't play with toys much, but I think he might like this one.

 

http://www.parrotworldusa.com/bibaba.html

[danmcq]

If haven't. But, your Grey will either love it or hate. ;-)

 

You may want to be careful on how many noises that thing makes, enless you don't mind your Grey copying them. :-)

[Toni]

I have the babble ball.Lets say it was fun for two weeks.Alcazar didnt care for it.Everytime he palyed or the cage rattled it went off.I got pretty annoying so now its in the basement in a junk drawer. Im going to donate it to my mom when she gets a bird.....haha

[Toni]

To me its NOT worth it.You WILL regret buying it

[Toni]

Oh I will say the best toy he likes is the telephone.Now that was a good buy. He loves it.It only works when he presses the buttons

[Anmlhggr]

That bad huh? lol :laugh:

 

Guess I'll try the phone..

[OtisMom]

I think it looks pretty cool too:) But i havent tried it.

[Toni]

Yea that bad!!! Get the large red phone.He will have fun with that. I played with it couple days in front of Alcazar he watched after that placed him in another room while I placed it in his cage.I brought him back to his cage and he found it right away and started to play with it.

[Mistyparrot]

I think it is a bad idea if you want your grey to develop word association. Greys find many sounds in their environment intriguing and will often mimic them but they are also very good at associating sounds and words with actions and objects. Having a grey simply mimicking words is a waste of their potential in my opinion. Learning word and sound association is a skill that will develop with encouragement. Misty has learned to use many words and sounds to communicate his desires and reactions to me. Some of his labels are idiosyncratic such as using the sound of water as well as the word "Water" to indicate his observation of water although he only uses "Water" if he wants me to actually give him a drink. For some reason I can only guess he uses "Stoppit" or "Stopwhat" when he wants to share food I am eating or preparing. He lables most fruit as "Orange" or "Want orange". If he wants a neck "skritch" he says "Yourallright" or "Tickle tickle". If I move my hand to his head for a tickle and he is not in the mood he responds with a sharp finger clicking sound and moves his head away. In the morning if I am late in letting him out he says "Come out" or "Can I come out".

He will use that any time I cage him if it is not bed time! If I cage him for misbehavior its " Be good boy...can I come out" I never cage him for more than a few minutes except for his own safety otherwise he is free to fly in the house. He lets me know it is bed time by saying "Bed time" or "Bedtime Misty" or "Bed time baby". When he flies he often says "Fly fly". He recognizes that when I put on my out door shoes or pick up my coat or keys that I am about to go out with " Got to go out" When I leave the room to go and close the door I can hear him say "Bye bye" or "See you later" or "Won't be long"

I don't believe that playing with a toy like that described would be of any use in that kind of development and might even be counterproductive.

I did not have to spend hours training Misty to learn all that. It's more a question of being consistent with him in how I speak to him and behave towards him. He picks up most of it himself. I simply offer him positive reinforcement. We also enjoy whistling tunes to each other where I copy back to him his phrases. In particular he has a contact call that I repeat back to him he then makes a subtle change to it and I repeat that back. He looks at me and is clearly expecting a response from me. It's a two way street. We need to learn their "Language" if we expect them to learn ours. They are so much more than just mimics.

 

Steve n Misty

[lynette]

i work in a pet shop and we sell the dog version of this its soooooo annoying. it dosent shut up.:angry:

[judygram]

I know what you mean, I have that babble ball and Josey was not impressed with it, now it is in the bottom of a box of other bird toys and anytime it is disturbed you hear a sound. The phone sounds like a better deal.

[hoodoowoman]

Oliver had a kitty babble ball for awhile till I tossed it. He loved it-it meowed but he kept it in the bottom of his cage and it only made noise when he went down and pushed it with his nose....so he had "control" over it. I don't think he'd like something going off that he didn't initiate. He loves his telephone-but again, he decides when it talks. Also, the telephone has different buttons and sounds, that he can control-the babble ball just "spoke" randomly.

[KimmieB]

Loki has a babble ball, she avoids it at all costs. Not sure if she's scared of it or finds it annoying. If its near her, she'll do everything to try to get away from it. Its now sitting in the bottom of a drawer, batteries removed.