Young Grey picked out all his tail and wings

[poochbabe]

As some of your know I rescued a young grey a few weeks ago after my beloved Ruben died of fumes from an oven liner which became degraded and burned while I was cooking dinner. My new Grey is wonderful, funny, smart and is already talking and bonding well with me. His name is Ganesha or "Nesh" for short. I have posted some pix and he is now my profile picture.

 

The reason he was available for rescue at only 10 mos. old was that he had been sold and was returned to the breeder five days later with his tail and wings completely gone. He had shredded his feathers right down to the bare skin on his right side and his little nub of a butt was complete bare and raw. I have been working on increasing the humidity in my house, went to WalMart and got aloe vera juice and spray him daily and I have changed his diet to Harrisons pellets at the advice of my avian vet plus adding red palm oil to his food also at her advice. He has been checked for all biological reasons and none were found. One thing I noticed right away is that he doesn't like to play with toys and is actually a bit afraid of them, especially hanging toys. I have started to stuff toys with almonds and sugar snap peas, his faves and put them in foraging bags and small wicker baskets at the bottom of the cage. I got him a few foot toys and he loves to chew up milk bottle caps but he is still working on his back end and wings quite often.

 

Two questions: The vet and some of the literature I have read says to ignore him when he picks or walk out of the room rather than spray him then or scold him in the moment so as not to reinforce the attention getting aspect of his behavior. Do you agree with this approach?

 

Any additional suggestions for helping him to learn how to play? I think he is too young to not be able to get past this picking thing. Am I being too optimistic about it?

[danmcq]

Oh I am so sorry to hear of this babies plucking issue.

 

However, since the health has been ruled out as an issue, it is due to something truly bothering him.

 

It's great you have gotten the Aloe Juice and Red Palm Oil and switched him to Harrison's. Those are all big helps in helping him through this.

 

You should also purchase some Aloe Gel 100% and rub it into those bald spots to sooth the skin.

 

Your right, do not punish him or react to the plucking. Just remain normal and don't change you posture or normal habits of whatever it is that your doing.

 

It's going to take a long time to resolve this issue, but your on the right track with food, sprays, additives and getting that attention focused towards playing, foraging and shredding to entertain himself.

 

Looking forward to hearing more of how he is responding.

[judygram]

To copy a phrase of his I will say that Dan is "spot on" with his advice. You are doing what you should be doing to try to stop his plucking behavior now that any physical reason has been ruled out.

 

I know it is hard to ignore but you have to have no reaction to his plucking, just go on about your business and ignore it.

 

He does need things to occupy his mind to take the focus off plucking himself and foraging toys and objects are a good idea. Look thru some of the threads here for other foraging ideas you may not have thought of. You may have to show him how to play with his toys, sometimes they need us to pretend we are having the time of our lives with one of their toys to make them want to play with them.

 

I think there is hope for him to stop this behavior since he is still young but it may take much time and lots of patience to accomplish, stick with it and never give up hope.

[Tycos_mom]

i am so sorry this baby has done this what was so tramatic thhat it caused this wee baby to do this. i definitly think you must ignore the behaviour and do nothing that might enforce this. any kind of attention towards the plucking will only cause it to become a habit and harder to break

[Raposa]

You've gotten lots of good advice from people who know a lot more than me, so I won't try to add anything to that :-) Just a side note, my vet said that once a bird stops damaging their feathers it can take as much as a year or more for them to grow new feathers in, so this could take quite a while. I'm glad that baby bird has YOU!