I Love My Parrot!

[Brielle LaLune]

So, I've never had a bird before - dogs, cats, hamsters, fishies....but never a bird. In January my fiance and I bought an African Grey parrot. Unbeknownst to us, our vet had a pair she'd been breeding for years.

We named her Nailah, which in African means beloved, or loved one. She has ridiculous amoutns of personality and I love all the noises and whistles she makes. Its almost her 1st birthday! She is still just a baby and doesn't talk yet, but she loves to play whistle games.

Just curious....anyone else out there have a parrot?

[halfwaynowhere]

My sister has cockatiels, which are technically parrots, but they aren't the same... I am fascinated by parrots, and would love to have one someday, although I'm a bit afraid of birds, honestly. My sister's tiels are sitting on a clutch at the moment, we should have babies in a week or two. hopefully hand raising the babies will help me get over my fear, and then one day when I'm ready, and can afford it, I'd love to get a parrot. I'd love a rose breasted cockatoo, or a blue and gold macaw. gorgeous!

[Brielle LaLune]

My sister has cockatiels, which are technically parrots, but they aren't the same... I am fascinated by parrots, and would love to have one someday, although I'm a bit afraid of birds, honestly. My sister's tiels are sitting on a clutch at the moment, we should have babies in a week or two. hopefully hand raising the babies will help me get over my fear, and then one day when I'm ready, and can afford it, I'd love to get a parrot. I'd love a rose breasted cockatoo, or a blue and gold macaw. gorgeous!

We have a little cockatiel, too, and a couple of budgees. :) Believe it or not, there are lots of people scared of birds. Things is, birds in particular, are really sensitive to peoples' energy and is you nren't comfy, they won't be either.

My fiance grew up with birds - his mom still has a blue and gold macaw named Ozzy. He really is gorgeous!! Cockatoos are pretty cool - but they shriek a lot and are ear shatteringly loud. (His dad had one for a long time and everyday at the same time he would shriek and you could hear him for blocks!)

[Rowan MoonDragon]

Aren't parrots wonderful!!!! Do you have a timneh or congo african grey???? I have 5 parrots - Merlin (congo african grey), Caesar (mealy amazon), Raeka (green wing macaw), Kiri (sun conure), and Merrick (cockatiel). They are my babies. They are so completely different than cats and dogs. I love cats and dogs, I have them as well, but my birds......they are something else. Their personalities are so different. My amazon, Caesar, is the oldest at almost 4, and I hurt myself one time and yelled out loud "ouch" and he asked me "you alright?". Merlin just turned a year old in January and he learns something new almost every week. His vocabulary is already bigger than Caesar's. He is ALWAYS talking and jabbering and making noises. My sun conure is actually pretty quiet for a conure and my greenwing, Raeka, is the baby of the group. She is only 10 months old and the biggest species and a TOTAL mommies girl. She does say "what" but thats it but she still is very young. My cockatiel is so sweet sounding. He doesn't like to be picked up or handled yet but I"m still working on it. I make all kinds of fresh foods for them and freeze them so they are pretty healthy. I also make my own bird toys. They really are my babies. I could literally go on and on about them. :hahugh:

[Brielle LaLune]

YAY!! Another bird fiend! :D Nailah is a congo. She is a mama's girl as well. Of course, I don't work (except for freelance photography), so I am always home with her. I take her with me wherever I am in the house - she cooks with me in the kitchen, hangs out with me while I do laundry, and on nice days she even comes outside with me.

I also feed her mostly fresh foods - fruits and veggies, and she also gets organic pellets. Her favorites, though, are grapes, berries and almonds. I use the almonds as rewards when I am working with her.

This is my first parrot though, so for all the books I've read and websites I've visited, I am still just a beginner when it comes to training them. Please do share any tricks you may have - I'd love to hear them. :)

I know greys in particular do better when they have "competition". But all of our other birds are bitty and don't pick up well on imitation and such.

[LavenderWolf]

We just brought home our Congo African Grey yesterday. We don't know his/her sex yet and haven't come up with a name. Our baby is a lot younger than yours though; it's only 10 weeks old and still being handfed three times a day.

[Rowan MoonDragon]

Fiend is definitely the word! LOL!! The important thing is ot keep them busy when you aren't spending time with them. My grey loves wood and toys that make him think. Grey's are extremely intelligent so the more the toy makes her think the better. Foraging toys are great. Get a couple of paper lunch bags, take some misc. wood toys (bird safe), straws cut in half, a couple of golf size wiffle balls, and her favorite treats, and put them in one of the bags. Then take the bag with the items, close the top of it and put it inside the other bag then hang it in the cage. My birds LOVE this foraging toy! Also, then have things things called a Wacky Whirly toy and what it does is makes spirals out of straws...my birds LOVE spiral straws and they are very easy to make and the toy is very cheap. You should be able to find it at Michaels or Hobby Lobby but if not you can get it online. Let me know if you cant find it and I can send you a couple of links of where to get it. I also belong to a couple of bird forums that are a wealth of information. As far as training goes, clicker training is the best!!!! You can get a clicker training for birds set online. It comes with the book and the clicker and goes through each step. With trick training, it gives you the opportunity to spend time together and the bird learns good behaviors so the chance of having an unhappy bird are less. There is even a clicker training yahoo group online to help if you run into problems. I highly recommend it.

WOW! 10 weeks old! That is young! I got nervous when I hand fed my sun conure twice a day. Congratulations on your new baby! They really are fun!

[Brielle LaLune]

We just brought home our Congo African Grey yesterday. We don't know his/her sex yet and haven't come up with a name. Our baby is a lot younger than yours though; it's only 10 weeks old and still being handfed three times a day.

Congratulations!! Its hard to sex birdies, being that everything is internal. This is one of the reasons it was awesome that our vet was also the breeder! Keep us posted!

[Brielle LaLune]

Fiend is definitely the word! LOL!! The important thing is ot keep them busy when you aren't spending time with them. My grey loves wood and toys that make him think. Grey's are extremely intelligent so the more the toy makes her think the better. Foraging toys are great. Get a couple of paper lunch bags, take some misc. wood toys (bird safe), straws cut in half, a couple of golf size wiffle balls, and her favorite treats, and put them in one of the bags. Then take the bag with the items, close the top of it and put it inside the other bag then hang it in the cage. My birds LOVE this foraging toy! Also, then have things things called a Wacky Whirly toy and what it does is makes spirals out of straws...my birds LOVE spiral straws and they are very easy to make and the toy is very cheap. You should be able to find it at Michaels or Hobby Lobby but if not you can get it online. Let me know if you cant find it and I can send you a couple of links of where to get it. I also belong to a couple of bird forums that are a wealth of information. As far as training goes, clicker training is the best!!!! You can get a clicker training for birds set online. It comes with the book and the clicker and goes through each step. With trick training, it gives you the opportunity to spend time together and the bird learns good behaviors so the chance of having an unhappy bird are less. There is even a clicker training yahoo group online to help if you run into problems. I highly recommend it.


oOoOoh! Those are great toy ideas! I will have to try them out. Which section would I find the spiral straws in at Hobby Lobby or Michael's? I love craft stores, but I can never seem to find what I'm looking for. :P

I am also going to look into clicker training. Thanks so much, Gaia!

[Semele]

:) Believe it or not, there are lots of people scared of birds.

LMAO! My sister, the pre-vet student working in a vets office managing everything, is afraid of birds. She used to hate to come over because Trey's little parakeet had free roam of his room.

[LavenderWolf]

Congratulations!! Its hard to sex birdies, being that everything is internal. This is one of the reasons it was awesome that our vet was also the breeder! Keep us posted!Thanks, we're getting the baby DNA sexed next week. So we should know for sure the week after that.

[LavenderWolf]

Also, then have things things called a Wacky Whirly toy and what it does is makes spirals out of straws...my birds LOVE spiral straws and they are very easy to make and the toy is very cheap. You should be able to find it at Michaels or Hobby Lobby but if not you can get it online. Let me know if you cant find it and I can send you a couple of links of where to get it. I'm going to have to do a search for that thing. We have a Hobby Lobby in town; so hopefully they carry it.