by Wolf » Thu May 26, 2016 8:10 am
If I remember right, Kookooloo was about13 yrs. when I got her. She was plucked naked and had chewed three large holes in herself and she would not allow anyone to touch her. Today, although she did pluck herself again, they are coming back in again, lots of pin feathers and some down feather growing back. She still does not allow anyone other than myself to touch her and if a single bite is not enough to convince them to leave her alone she resorts to full attack mode, which after seeing the beginnings of once, I sure will be more than enough to convince a human to leave her alone. She will actually attack me if I hold a phone or remote control in my hand and she can get to me, still, I think that she is holding back some because she just want me to leave that damned thing alone, she literaly hates it. The only other time that she actually bites me is when she get hormonal and from what I have read about Grey
s breeding in the wild the practice of mating can become a bit violent, but only have read that once or twice. So am not sure of it's accuracy. But they are not big on being touched. Greys and touching remind me of the old Brylecream commercials ... A little dab will do you. This is not to say that they don't want or crave affection because they do and are very loving birds and also very protective of their human, no one can touch me when she is on me, and if their are new people in the house she sees her place it to be on my shoulder, the one closest to the new person, so that she can defend me. It took me two years to get her to allow me to hand someone something when she is on my shoulder. And another year to get her to toss a plastic ball to the neighbor's nine year old kid. He knows not to try to touch her or even get too close because she will bite.
One last thing is that Kookooloo, accepted and appeared to have bonded with me upon first sight. It may not have been that actually bonding but, she gave me her heart as soon as she saw me and this has only grown stronger over time, despite my repeated infractions of handling these other parrots or her having less time with me when I get sick from my meds.
Now the point of all of this is to provide you with some insight into the mind of the Grey parrot via my experiences with Kookooloo.
All birds will eventually respond to the right treatment and Greys are no exception to tis. But it is best that the person in your family who decides to take this on actually likes this bird and is willing to respect and love this bird for the next 50 yrs or so. If they do not have this in their heart and mind, I can pretty much promise that you Grey will know this and reject that person. You might think that you can lie to this bird and you can, but the bird knows when you do, you are not fooling it.
If no one is ready to make this kind of commitment with this bird, then it is honestly better to find someone that will and only if this bird accepts them right away. It is not a matter of the human choosing this bird, it is letting the bird choose the person. I would watch the reactions of the bird when that person is there and of the best three or four that he appears to like bring them all together and let him out with them and sit back and let him again make his choice. This bird deserves to be able to be as happy as it is possible.
You do what you think is best and regardless of whether I agree or not I will be here and do my best to be as helpful as I can be, but at least you know what I think.