Living with an African grey...

[Jane]

Thank-you Mike All your birds look so relaxed and happy out & about. I really hope they Greys do breed for you there, that'd be awesome.
I have just bought & read 'A Guide to Grey Parrots' mainly out of interest

[rajasmom]

I have had my African Grey for 9 months now she turned 5 yrs old on Feb 28,2008 She has been passed from owner to owner her whole life Iam her 4th owner and her last she will never be rehomed again when I pass on she will go to my daughter who she knows and loves. She was very abused in her last two homes and locked in a cage with a heavy blanket over her most of the time. I can't blame her for hateing humans I would also If someone did to me what they did to her. She choose me from the day we met and she basicley leeped out of her cage and on to my arm as if to say get me out of here now. Its taken months and just the last month she has allowed me to give her a scritches on her neck before going to bed at night. she will not step up from her cage on to my hand but will step up onto a perch and once off her cage I can the transfer her onto my arm where she will sit and happily talk away and have a conversation with me she is extreamly Intellegent and since coming to me her vocabulary has exploded. because she had no human contact for at least a year before I got her she could only imitate the sounds that she heard ouside the small window in the room she was in. After she came to me it was as if someone took the blindfold off and the earplugs out because she went from a few sound effects to a vocabulary of more than five hundred words and phrases she no longer does any sound effects if she has something to say she says it if she wants something she asks for it by name like fresh water or when she knows I'm making chicken for dinner she will say yum yum chicken want some there you go yummy for the tummy its very cute. She also tells the dogs no barking go lay down. when I got her she was exstreamly off balance and would fall very hard on her keel bone I thought for sure she was going to slit it open the person that had her said that she had a birth defect and one of her wings didn't develop properly. I took her to the vet and the vet told me that she had been barbering every flight feather on her left side which was why she was so off balance so I had her clip the other wing to match and I'm pleased to say that she is now fully flighted and doesn't chew her wings any more. Iam sad though because she has no Idea how to fly I am guessing she was not allowed to fledge as a baby. I am hopeing that she will learn to fly from My Amazon they have become friends sort of over the last year. Another thing that I find trully amazing about Tyco is that when I got her she was afraid of anything new but now that has all changed she has found her confidence and If I say to her be brave its okay I won't let anything hurt you she takes my word for it and will except anything I give her. I bought her a new very large cage and it only took one day for her to except it and go into it on her own. When I got her she had been living in a cage that was made for a Cocateil it was 18'x18'x30' she was in that cage her whole life apperently she now has a cage that is 40'x 36'x 64'and that is not including the play top She is my baby and if you ever get the chance to own an African Grey jump at it because there isn't another bird out there that compares with them I wouldn't give mine up for love or money she has my unconditional love for the rest of her or my life which ever comes first.

[rainbowfeathers77]

;D ;D ;D....Mike I had to laugh....that is so funny - Ernie and his calls ;D ...."And of course he is bigger with a stronger set of lungs so can be twicw as loud. His really annoying sound currently is a smoke detector. He only heard one for around 10 seconds when I foolishly tested ours when he was in the house, but that was long enough. The only good part is he only makes the sound for the 10 seconds."

Clara, that is the cage I've been looking for for ages...or similar type, I love those huge 5 corner cages....I can't find any in Australia...or they are very expensive.

Mike, I like your set up with your family room. Those cages are similar to the one I have my rumps in except the door is one big long door rather than two little ones. I'm looking for more like these for my scarlets.

[clara]

Hi Birdlady, this cage is very well and good quality. It is a Montana cage ( USA product). I bought it by the net in Holland 500 euros . There are in Deutchland too. I tryed to by in the USA but in didn't found a site which delivery to France. Maby you can try to USA site they are very less expensive than in Europe.
Amicalement.

[Jane]

Patricia Thank-you sooo much for sharing Tyco's story she is a very lucky grey to have chosen you LOL about the chicken dinner ;D

[rainbowfeathers77]

Hey Clara...yeah I've contacted heaps of USA companies about the cage....some didn't freight overseas others did but the shipping cost would cost more than the cage it self.

[rainbowfeathers77]

To Rajasmom
I'm so sorry, I totally skipped your post - I didn't see it when I first made a reply on here....not sure what happened ...but anyway....GOD BLESS YOU for saving this beautiful girl. Your post made me totally cry and that is the first on here How many, many, many other birds are quietly suffering like yours was before you rescued her....all over the world.....how many of these will be rescued by someone like you...will any? That is such a sad story! It makes me feel so helpless - I hate that feeling when I know there are animals out there constantly being abused and there's nothing I can do and the "big bosses" don't care - human comforts come first and that is all the majority of people care about!
Poor birds, poor animals - to any bird abusers reading this...I hope you rot in hell and all the birds peck at you till theres nothing left ...ok... so maybe I'm getting a bit emotional here but it just makes me so sad.
God bless you Patricia and please give that beautiful chicken lover a huge hug and kiss for me and tell her that we all love her and are very happy that she is finally able to be the beautifil bird that she is !!!

We love you Tyco!!!

[rajasmom]

Thank-you so much for you wonderful words I feel the same way about people that abuse animals and its seems to me that the birds have it the hardest because they can be shoved in a cage and stuck somewhere with no interaction at all They are so Intelegent and it just kills me to think that there are so many birds out there that need rescueing from stupid people that should never of had them in the first place. If I had a million dollars I would adopt as many as I could but we can only do with the finances that we have I have three rescues and I'm at my limit with 6 birds it is all I can do to keep them all in perfect health and get them all the things needed to make them happy healthy thriving birds They are spoilt rotten and I would spend every dime on them to keep them that way. After the years of abuse that they endured they deserve to have it made in the shade for the rest of their Lives and more Thank you again for your kind word Tyco says thank you also

[rainbowfeathers77]

I'm very glad there are people like you out there...I just wish there were more. Just the image of an abused bird cramped in a small cage somewhere in a basement, just aches my heart.

If the stupid governments cared more, they could put jail sentences on people who abuse animals - maybe that would deter some scoundrels.

[rajasmom]

Well you don't have to ever worry that Tyco 'will ever be stuck in a cramped cage again. I bought her cage off Greyhaven which is a parrot rescue organization out this way. The best thing about buying from them is that the money goes back into helping other birds that need rescuing. plus they gave me A deal I couldn't refuse. Right now they don't have a building to house the birds so all the birds are in foster homes and the cage I bought for Tyco was just to large to be moving from home to home so they sold it to me for $100. normally a cage like that would run me somewhere around $1000. to $1400. its a very large Macaw cage and Tyco just loves it

[Jane]

Lovely cage and great deal ;D Tyco looks happy on it

[rainbowfeathers77]

Wow...huge cage!! Tyco would love it!

[angelicvampyre]

Birdlady check ebay they always have these cages. I got mine (same cage) from ebay first time around and the second one I got from a pet store.

[robert]

new people might be interested in reading.
from Robert and Precious

[georgiesmum]

Thanks Robert for highlighting this thread

I found the info very interesting. Its really useful to hear about Australian african grey owners experiences. Most of the stuff on the net relates to the US and UK.

I feel myself sufficiently experienced with larger parrots to own one. Although I dont take it on lightly. Hopefully I should be taking home a young african grey in January. Can't wait

[vankarhi]

woohoo and congrats ;D

[avinet]

Congratulations for taking the plunge and getting a Grey - you won't regret it, they are incredible birds. And to wet your appetite I'll attach a recent photo of me with my two, with Jamila getting some preening from Ernie.

cheers,

Mike

[vankarhi]

Great pic Mike ;D

[georgiesmum]

thanks Mike for the lovely pic. Are they still tame with you even though they have each other?

Yes, its very exciting. I had a sulphur crest previously, he was so smart. I miss having a bird with a 'knowing' look in its eye.

[avinet]

Oct 30, 2009 19:15:00 GMT 10 georgiesmum said:

thanks Mike for the lovely pic. Are they still tame with you even though they have each other?

Very much so, they are two very tame greys, which live at home with my other birds in the family room, but also go into our shop (pet shop) 5 days a week and share the play room with other birds, and also spend some time on my shoulders around the shop.

Having each other means that when I am not around for any reason they do have each other for companionship and I have never had the plucking behaviour that can be a problem with single Greys. For instance I have spent quite a bit of time in hospital in the last couple of years, including one 3 week spell. That meant they got little more than cage clean and feeding since my wife had a shop to run as well as visiting me and all the other things to do. There was no problem with Ernie and Jamila - both were fine and in excellent feather when I returned home.

I hope when they are old enough they will breed, and am reasonably confident that they will. They are closely bonded with each other, and are well aware that they are birds. It will be interesting when they do breed to see what difference that makes to their behaviour to me - I do expect to see some aggressive defending of their cage and nest box when that happens, but since they are so tame with me and everyone else they have contact with I hope they won't change too much.

cheers,

Mike