Hello from MN

[LynnAL]

Hi All. No birds I'm considering adopting a CAG that has been in rescue for 5 years. He's 17. I've been volunteering at a local rescue to learn more about parrots and Baby has taken to me. I'm learning as much as I can as fast as I can to make a good decision about our future. Other than my time at the rescue I have very little experience with birds (I know this is a detriment).

This forum is a wealth of information. Thank you to everyone for the informative posts. I've been learning so much.

 

[ChocolateChipCookiez]

Welcome to the forum

I've never kept CAG or TAG but there are members who've kept/keep them and I'm sure they'll be able to help you

Either way, welcome!​

 

[Flboy]

Welcome to you!

 

[Allee]

A warm welcome to the forums! We’re always happy to see someone asking questions before bringing home a new feathered companion. Working at a rescue is a wonderful way to learn about parrots. CAG’s are amazing, sounds like you may have been chosen by one.

 

[Scott]

Welcome, thanks for joining and considering an adoption! Greys are magnificent and intellectually gifted parrots. I'd encourage you to read threads of interest in the Congo and Timneh Greys forum. This in particular is enlightening: http://www.parrotforums.com/congo-timneh-greys/59366-cag-101-a.html

 

[GaleriaGila]

Welcome! Annnnnnnnnnnd...

WHAT ALLEE SAID!!!

I'm glad you're here.

 

[EllenD]

Welcome to the community! And thank you for your Avian Rescue work...it means a lot to everyone here and in the rest of the Parrot Community...

Just because you've never owned a bird/parrot before doesn't mean that you won't make an excellent Parront...Trust me, there are an awful lot of people who have owned many, many birds/parrots and who are extremely experienced, and who have yet to really bond with any of them and who don't care enough about their birds to educate themselves at all, and as such they still feed them horrible diets, they keep them locked-up in their cages all day long every day, and they constantly put their birds in dangerous situations and environments and expose them to harmful or even toxic and lethal substances every single day, simply because they either don't know any better, or because they know but it's just more important to them to be able to cook with Teflon-coated pots and pans than it is to keep their birds alive...I have been working at a large, private Avian and Reptile/Amphibian Rescue for over 8 years now, and trust me, experience as a bird or reptile owner does not make you a good or responsible owner, that's for sure...This is even truer for Reptile owners...Don't get me started on Reptile owners...Over 50% of them who have owned Reptiles for their entire lives have never purchased a UVB bulb once, just simply because they don't want to...So you're already way ahead of the game, you obviously care and are a responsible person because you've chosen to volunteer at an Avian Rescue BEFORE bringing a bird into your life...That's a very responsible thing to do...

I grew-up with a male CAG...I was 9 years-old when my mom brought him home, and he was a just-weaned ball of gray fluff of a dinosaur, lol...And now Jagger is 31 years-old (I just learned this the other day when my mom corrected me, I thought he was 32, oops!) and lives with my mom and my stepfather, and is every bit my brother. I am a single-child when it comes to human-siblings, but I absolutely consider Jagger my brother, and when people ask me if I have any siblings, I usually tell them I have a brother named Jagger...I live 10 minutes away from my mom, so I see him all the time, at least a couple of times a week, and my mom tells me that he knows that I'm coming the minute I pull in their driveway, which is about 1/4 mile long, he knows what my car sounds like...He starts yelling "El is here! El is here!" whenever he hears my car...He is bonded to my mom very, very closely, but he is also still very bonded to me as well, even though I haven't lived with him since I was 23 years-old and in grad-school. I actually went almost a year without seeing him when I moved to North Carolina for a while, but I spoke to him on the phone at least once a week, usually more, and my mom said he would ask where I was every single day...So now I make sure that I go and spend a few hours with him at least once a week...

So that's what you get with a CAG (or a TAG), they are incredibly intelligent and probably at the exact same level as most 4-5 year-old human children are...They use logic and reasoning skills all day long, every day, they can put puzzles together, they can make puzzle-toys work after only having them for a few minutes or hours, and if I had to choose what trait separates a CAG the most from all other parrot species I would absolutely tell you it's that while most species of parrots understand you when you say phrases they know to them, such as "Come here" or "Go Potty" or "Go to your cage" etc., all of the phrases you teach them and say to them on a regular basis they understand, with CAG's they understand the context of what you're saying to them because they really truly do understand what individual words mean, like they understand language...It's actually quite startling and bizarre the first time you're talking to your CAG and you say something that you've not taught them or you say something to them that you've not associated with a certain action before, but they actually respond back to you and you realize that they really did understand the sentence that you just said simply because they actually understood each word in the sentence and they put it together and got the meaning of it! It's quite amazing and very much like having a kindergarten-age child instead of a pet...

Unfortunately CAG's are one of the parrot species that are re-homed and surrendered to Rescues/Shelters the most, second only to all the different Cockatoo species (this is absolutely because most of the Cockatoos are extremely loud, chronic and continual screamers and people bring them home without taking how that will fit into their home and their life into consideration)...In the 8+ years I've been the Medical-Liaison at the Avian/Reptile Rescue I work for we've had hundreds of CAG's surrendered, dropped-off, or brought to us from other Rescues, I'm sure it's been in the hundreds (if you count all species of Cockatoos they would probably be close to 1,000 in the last 8 years, I know it)...The #1 reason why people surrender or re-home their CAG's, whether they got them as just-weaned babies or very young juveniles, or they adopted them as adults from a Rescue/Shelter or bought them from their prior owners who were re-homing them, by far, is because they didn't have enough time to spend with them every day, and as a result they became extremely bored, and then typically they started displaying some type of negative psychosomatic behavior, such as a Feather-Destructive Behavior, Self-Mutilation, severe aggression and/or violence towards the owners, or became extremely destructive to their cages, toys, dishes, and then everything in the home like furniture, appliances, window treatments, carpeting, tile flooring, etc. Some people understand that the reason their CAG's behavior changed is due to them only being home for 2-3 hours a day right before bed and this was causing them to be terribly bored 24 hours a day, and some people don't get it and blame the bird, summing it up to 'I just got a bad bird", and then they go out and bring home another one, and then the same thing happens...

It's important to understand just how intelligent these guys are and how bored they can easily become BEFORE you make the decision to bring one home, regardless of their age or gender (some people think that a female will be okay being bored all day long and they just don't want to get a male, which is ridiculous and just not true, and some people think that if they buy a hand-raised baby CAG from a breeder and get them just after they weaned and are still very young, that they will bond so closely to them that it won't matter if they don't have enough time to spend with them every day, that they'll love them unconditionally and they'll know that they can't become destructive, start screaming all day long, start becoming aggressive, or start plucking or self-mutilating...And again, this just isn't true. ALL CAG's need a good amount of your time every single day, a good amount of time outside of their cage every single day, and when you aren't home and they are inside of their cages they need to have a TON of toys and activities to do inside of their cages. And not just a ton of different toys and activities, but a ton or DIFFERENT TYPES of toys and activities. And this goes for all species of parrots as well, you shouldn't just buy a bunch of toys and fill their cages up with them, rather you need to carefully select a bunch of toys and activities that each serve a different purpose or function...Like one or two toys for them to chew on, one or two for them to shred apart, one or two that are active-foraging toys that you put treats inside that they have to figure out how to get them out, one or two for climbing on, a swing to swing on, some that you can connect together and hang across their cage and can climb across, etc.

So that's the best bit of advice I can give you about adopting a CAG, if you think you have enough time for them every single day, and you are financially able to provide them with a huge cage, play-stands, play-gyms, and tons and tons of toys, ladders, swings, puzzles, books, etc. (yes, they absolutely LOVE IT when you read to them; Jagger loves Dr. Seuss and he recites lines from multiple Dr. Seuss books), then by all-means, please provide this CAG at your Rescue with a loving home! Especially if you've already started to earn his trust and if he's actually chosen you, that's a very big deal when it comes to re-homed parrots, if they choose you and give you their trust even before you've taken them home and lived with them, then it's a very special thing that most people don't ever get to experience...

And more-important than anything else, please never hesitate to post here and ask any questions you might have about anything...

 

[dhraiden]

Welcome Lynn!