Every day, he opens up a little more and shares more of his personality. If Thomas is still sleeping or not yet home, Steve will frequently come over near me, instead of staying on his high, safe perch. If Thomas is in the room, he'll usually only come down to eat. With only one week to go, I am not attempting to get him to come out of his cage. I discussed this with his vet last week, and we decided the best thing to do is to continue interacting with him inside his cage, which should allow his wings a greater chance of healing.
His new owner will have all the time in the world to work with him on coming out of his cage. I suspect he'll make great progress and can't wait to hear how he does!
Here he is this morning, asking for some of my breakfast:
I was up early to run, so it wasn't officially time for him to get up yet. He decided to come over to the uncovered part of his cage for some beak rubs:
Last night, he was talking, whistling, and making so many grey noises. I actually thought there might have been two greys in my kitchen, but Max and Stella were within my eyesight, so I knew all noises were coming from him.I'm really going to miss having him around -- Thomas even agreed with me on that yesterday. I found that surprising, since Steve doesn't really like Thomas. Thomas was also quite resistant to bringing him home, so I'm glad things have turned out so perfectly!
I know I'm getting ahead of myself, but the question will soon be -- who to foster next? The woman who runs the rescue where we volunteer wants us to take in a severe macaw (the one that loves me, that I've talked about before.) This guy:
I'm hesitant. She wants us to take him in because he has special needs that we can take care of, but also because she hopes that he and Rocky would get along well and form a little bonded (same-sex) pair of severe macaws -- i.e. a permanent situation. I'm not looking to add anyone permanent to our house; in fact, due to the 2 amazons that we have willed to us, I do not want to add anyone permanent -- we have to make sure we have room for the guys we've committed to, should they need to come to us sooner than expected.I'm sure I'll be talking about this much in the upcoming weeks!
5 comments:
Is that tango? I have been talking with my partner, I badly want to have the little guy, I love severe macaws I have a 2 year old and my mother has a baby severe. . . . .so much fun.
I to have always wanted a severe , I kinda hope you get him . You deserve a foster that likes you from the beginning . What kind of special needs may I ask.
As a side note , I took my first trip to the bird trainer with Giggles the biting LoveBird and in 5 min she stopped biting . The trainer thinks I was to gentle . She held Giggles firmly and stroked her head and cheeks very vigorously and Giggles eyes went closed and she leaned into it . When I took her back , no biting .
Go figure .
I'm so going to miss your updates on each little Steve miracle!
I know the new Steve person will be updating us, too, and I'll be just as thrilled.
But right now it's like Steve is leaving home and there's the chance he'll regress for a bit until he learns that he's in a safe place with safe people. I worry, I swear, about every parrot I meet.
Steve will love his new home -- so many interesting things to see and do and he won't be forced into doing anything scary. But before the new beginning, there's the sad goodbye.
I'd also like to make it known that if things don't work out with Steve's new home he's to come to my house! ;-)
I love reading about Steve and his progress. Your tips of grey behavior are very helpful to me. I was wondering if could pose a question here, as I have seen other people do. We have a sweet CAG that we adopted about 1.5 years ago. She is about 8 years old, and there was no suspected abuse from the home she came from. She was quite mutilated when we got her---picked her tail completely off, and one wing had no long feathers left on it. She has grown to be very affectionate with us, and is the sweetest creature I've ever encountered. We adore her so much. She loves my husband, and will run over to him to get his affection any chance she can. I thought the new home would help her feather destruction, but it has not. She has plenty of toys to chew and destroy, which she does every day. However, if we are home and not giving her our undivided attention, she picks herself, chewing off more feathers. This happens more when my husband his home, and she seems calmer when it is just me. But, if he is walking about the house, just getting home from work, just getting up out of bed to head out the door to work, etc...she will hang upside down from the top of her cage, contort her body so that she can reach a feather to chew on, and pull part of it out. The only way we have found to stop this is to pick her up and give her attention. We just got back from vacation, and I was worried our absence would have made her feather chewing worse. But, I was shocked when we got home, and she had two large tail feathers fully grown in, and a few feathers on both wings that have started to open and grow. We have been home for two days, one of the tail feathers is gone, and she is continuing to chew on her wing. I feel terrible that it seems our presence is making his problem worse. Do you have any advice? Should we not pick her up when she starts to do this? It is so hard for me to watch, but I realize that I'm probably re-enforcing her behavior by giving her attention. Thanks for any input you may have, and thanks for a great blog.
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