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Help -Grey without tail feathers, cant fly and has bad balance

cdesmedt

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I recently rescued an African Grey who pulled out her feathers and therefore cannot fly and falls if she loses her balance.

Are there any recommendations on cages for her to keep her from falling. Also any tips on helping her grow back her tail feathers, so she can balance again.

Her feathers have been gone for 4 years.
 

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sunnysmom

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Welcome to the forum. Thank you for helping her. Has she been vet checked? If she's falling from her perches I am wondering if she has trouble with her grip. Are her feet okay? How big is her current cage? I would switch out the dowel perches for natural wood or rope perches. If she falls a lot you can try lowering her perches. It's always a good idea to make sure that plucking isn't from a medical reason. If it's behavioral, you can try to teach her foraging and other activities to try to stop her from plucking. However, if it's habitual it can take some doing to stop. A healthy diet will help with the feathers. However, if the follicles are damaged they may not grow back.
 

cdesmedt

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Hello,

The vet near me is backed up for a while, so I am trying to make sure she is happy in the meantime. She doesnt seem to be picking her feathers anymore, and from pictures I have seen from before her feathers are growing back slowly.

Her feet look fine, and she walks and climbs with them. I am trying to make her comfortable getting on my hand, I think she is scared because she does fall easily. She isnt scared of me from what I can tell. I sing to her and scratch her and she coos back at me and even regurgitates her food and tries to give it to me haha. She also plays with her toys in front of me and knocks her beak on the cage to make noise. She is really sweet and seems relatively happy.

How long should my socialization sessions be with her? I dont want to overwhelm her.
 

Toy

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Her beak color suggests she is a Timneh Grey. The regurging is a sexual behavior. Only pet her head, beak, feet & neck. When she steps up on your hand grip a foot with your thumb to help her keep balance. Java or manzanita wood perches would be better than dowel rods. There should be at least one rope perch. Perches should be placed for easy access to food & water dishes. You should try to do weekly showers. That may help the feathers some.
 

sunnysmom

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Hello,

The vet near me is backed up for a while, so I am trying to make sure she is happy in the meantime. She doesnt seem to be picking her feathers anymore, and from pictures I have seen from before her feathers are growing back slowly.

Her feet look fine, and she walks and climbs with them. I am trying to make her comfortable getting on my hand, I think she is scared because she does fall easily. She isnt scared of me from what I can tell. I sing to her and scratch her and she coos back at me and even regurgitates her food and tries to give it to me haha. She also plays with her toys in front of me and knocks her beak on the cage to make noise. She is really sweet and seems relatively happy.

How long should my socialization sessions be with her? I dont want to overwhelm her.
Actual training sessions should be short, like 10-15 minutes at a time. As for hanging out with the bird, just gauge her reaction. It sounds like she enjoys having you there. I keep my birds in a central location. So they are basically with us all day or at least whenever we're home.
 

FeatheredM

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Is she plucking or a plucker?
 

Toy

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There are a couple thing that can cause feather plucking or nipping them off. Boredom, Hormones & fungal infections. I'd have the vet run blood tests to check for skin fungus & estrogen levels. In females if their estrogen is high it can lead to plucking/nipping. Boredom would suggest trying a variety of toys & more interaction. Birds are flock animals they like to be included. Birds are flock animals, they like to be included.
 

Birdguy202

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Do you talk and whistle to your bird? They love to communicate. I taught mine to say wanna come out and he stopped screaming. Mine loved the echo whistle game. He’d whistle and I’d echo it back. We would play this game a lot. My bird loved when I’d whistle songs to him. His favorite was To Sir With love. I miss him.
 

Snowghost

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Going to throw in my two cents. My CAG has no tail feathers, stinker chews and pulls out pin feathers too. He has no problem with balance. I would try and get bird to a vet.
 

Mrs c

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I recently rescued an African Grey who pulled out her feathers and therefore cannot fly and falls if she loses her balance.

Are there any recommendations on cages for her to keep her from falling. Also any tips on helping her grow back her tail feathers, so she can balance again.

Her feathers have been gone for 4 years.
Hi. I feel a bit cheeky answering you because I only joined today but I had a similar problem when I had our grey at first. He kept falling from his perch. I gave him a calcium supplement and that sorted the problem really quickly. I'm not suggesting that it's a fix all but it certainly worked for mine.
 
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