Pickles The Parrot: A Humorous Look At Life With An African Grey (8 page)

So, that worked while we were in the room but
what about when we were off doing something and Pickles was bored?
He could stay quiet for only so long before he’d revert to
screeching for us to give him some attention so we developed a
little whistle. Neil couldn’t join in on this plan because he can’t
whistle but I started waiting until he was quiet for a moment, then
I’d whistle. Within an hour, he had the whistle down pat and we
whistled to each other from separate rooms. Later, it became him
asking “Anybody home?” and we would answer back “Everybody’s home!”
which resulted in a “Woo hoo!” and he’d either keep chatting with
us or go back to whatever he was doing until the next time he
wanted contact.

When we were busy, we would often make a
point to stop and visit Pickles briefly to hand him a snack or toy.
This would not only keep him busy or entertained, he was also being
rewarded for good behaviour, all the while making him feel he is in
control.

Positive Reinforcement not only works well on
all kinds of pets, it’s especially effective on children, bosses,
employees and even spouses! Of course, Neil is better at using it
on me, than I am on him. He’s got more patience and I’ve got a bit
of a short wick.

Our whole life consists of trying to outwit
the little fellow. It usually works, but often we pay a price for
it. His ‘step-up’ is basically bomb proof but he has moments when
he insists on staying put. Pickles likes to be involved in the
supper making process. Even if he’s hungry, he won’t always step up
to go home (his cage) for supper because he likes to watch the pond
and birdies from the dining room. If I suspect he’s not in the mood
to leave, instead of asking, “Wanna go home for supper?” I say,
“Wanna help mommy make your supper?” and he’ll trip over his own
feet in haste to get on my hand. Now, this is a good plan to get
him home, but a major pain in the ass in the meantime.

To get his supper ready, I have to take a row
of birdie bread out of the freezer, unwrap it to get a square, wrap
it back up and put it back in the freezer—all this one-handed while
Pickles perches on the other. All the while, Pickles is reaching
for everything in the freezer and trying to rip the food out of my
hand or trying to help remove the saran wrap.

I put the square in a small bowl and walk
across the kitchen to the microwave, which is in a little pantry.
While we wait a few seconds for it to warm up, Pickles is loosing
his balance on my hand from trying to reach for shiny objects on
the shelves and usually ending up upside-down. I can’t place him on
the counter yet, because I can’t trust him alone for a second while
I’m doing the other things but once the supper is ready, I set him
down while I break up the square, stir in the Hemp Seed and put it
into his cage bowl. While I’m trying to do this, Pickles is trying
to get at his food before it’s ready, running for the soggy
dishcloth, inspecting the soap container, sprinting for the sugar
bowl and tossing the cage bowl on the floor—all at once. He’s just
a little grey blur who’s harder to catch than a mouse.

He loves the little jar of Hemp Seed and one
day, manages to rip the lid out of my hand. He made a mad dash for
it and grabbed it so fast that he was shocked he actually got it
and his beak hadn’t been prepared to hang on to it. The lid went
flying, my hand flew after it and Pickles was determined to beat me
to it. Nobody got it before it landed in a soap filled pan in the
sink. Pickles had a full head of steam so by the time he stood on
the brakes he had too much momentum. He slid feet first into the
sink, grabbed on to the rim of the pan and flipped head first into
the soapy water.

Soap and water were flying through the air as
Pickles flapped his way out. Now he’s livid and he takes it out on
everything in sight. Both dishes go flying and as I bend over to
pick up the bowls and the spilled food, Pickles managed to drop the
wet dishcloth smack dab on my head. I came up in slow motion,
giving him the evil eye as he snickered uncontrollably. When he
finally stopped laughing, he asked, “Arncha hungry?”

Pickles definitely understands what’s funny
and he has a sick sense of humour. He has 3 laughs—one is an evil
snicker, one is a nose laugh and the other, a chuckle—and most
times they are accompanied by head bobs. He likes to tease, and he
likes to play practical jokes. He hates to be teased himself, but
is sometimes good-natured about being the butt of a practical joke.
The guy is warped.

Most African Greys are known to be fearful of
change and fearful of new items. Pickles is actually pretty good
but when you least expect it, he freaks out. Changing furniture
around can be scary for Greys and they like things just they way
they are, thank you very much, but Pickles doesn’t care a rat’s ass
what you do with furniture. We can usually bring a new sofa in the
living room, a big scary item, but hand Pickles a nail file and he
screams bloody murder.

He understands the word ‘scary’ and will tell
us when something is scary to him. But he also likes to
pretend
that things are scary—screaming and flapping his
wings in mock terror—he thinks that’s hilarious.

Fortunately, loud noises don’t bother him.
Sudden noises—bad, loud noises—good. The first time we ever had a
thunderstorm (and we get them a lot) I jumped up going “Woo
hoooooooo!” and danced around until Pickles decided, what fun! One
time, a thunderclap hit with no warning and Pickles was so
startled, he fell part way off his perch but while hanging upside
down, he shouted “Woo hoo!”

As far as change goes, he demands his supper
on time and he demands to go to bed at the same time each night.
Supper should be served at 5:00pm precisely, bedtime is 6:30pm and
if he doesn’t get his beauty sleep, he’s a very cranky boy the next
day. After we cover him he doesn’t usually go to sleep right away,
he prefers to hang out and eat some pellets, play with some talon
toys and read a book. Okay, I’m sure he doesn’t have a book under
the covers but he will drone on and on with his words as if he’s
reading out loud. I think mainly, he wants to be locked in his cage
and covered for some alone time. He probably figures it’s us that
are locked out and behind covers, not him.

But when it gets right down to it, all the
food, toys and freedom, still isn’t good enough. Pickles gets tired
of some of his favourite foods sometimes, or maybe they’re not in
season or just not a good product so we’re always looking for tasty
new items. He has hundreds of toys but will tire of some quickly so
we are constantly rotating. Sometimes just moving a toy to a new
spot makes it more interesting but sometimes we need to put it away
for a few weeks or months and when we bring it back out, he’s
thrilled with the ‘new’ toy. All the freedom outside the cage isn’t
good enough if he doesn’t have enrichment or attention.

Learning about parrots and learning how to
adapt to them is an on-going process, a lot of work and every day
there is a new challenge. There is no other pet in the world that
requires as much work, attention and patience as a parrot does. On
the other hand, there is nothing more rewarding than a happy
parrot.

Chapter 5

Working & Living at the RV Park

A couple of years after getting Pickles, we
got out of the fly shop. We had owned and operated it for 10 years
and it was time to move on to something else. An opportunity arose
for us to operate the RV Park, part of the Wildlife Park in
Kamloops so we took the job for one season—from April until mid
September.

We were provided with an RV, large enough to
provide an area for Pickles. We set up a smaller cage, a new play
stand, a bunch of toys and a boing (a coiled wire, wrapped with
rope for climbing and swinging). The entire RV Park could be seen
through the windows, so this provided all kinds of activity and
entertainment for Pickles. He could watch us working outside or
coming and going to the registration office/convenience store so
Pickles was quite happy with his new digs.

We took a tour of the Wildlife Park the first
chance we got. It’s amazing with all the animals and birds, and we
even took in a Raptor’s show. Vultures, owls, hawks and eagles were
paraded one at a time and some flew through the audience on recall.
All the animals, with the exception of the Peacocks, were
indigenous to the area and were provided good habitat and lots of
room to live out their days, as all had been rescued and unable to
be rehabbed back to the wild.

There were a lot of birds hanging around the
RV Park, many we were unfamiliar with because of the difference in
elevation. Crows were in abundance so Pickles was in his glory
talking to each and every one. Now and then the Peacocks would
escape and they were beautiful in the RV Park surroundings. The
campers were thrilled to see them but during their mating period,
we had to watch the kids for fear these big aggressive birds would
hurt them.

Pickles learned many, many more bird songs
and he was happy to share the songs with all the people in the
Park. Most visitors were not aware of Pickles and some were
confused about the bird sounds coming from our corner of the
grounds. Pickles would do his Nuthatch impression and people would
look around for the bird. Their eyes would look skyward at the
screeching of the hawk and we were asked if a lake is hidden in the
woods after the haunting sound of a loon fills the evening air.
Pickles began to answer the Peacocks’ mating songs and I had to
wonder if that’s why they were escaping—in search of this new,
potential mate.

Across the river, along the valley bottom,
there are cattle grazing and bellowing. Pickles learned to moo,
which was quite embarrassing when we’d go for our evening walks
through the RV Park, with Pickles in his backpack. He’d moo the
whole way and of course, him being in back, it appeared as if we
were the cows.

Once again, Pickles became a draw for
customers. He had a play stand in the store, he went for walks, got
to socialize and everyone was fascinated with him. Soon, new
customers were arriving and having heard about Pickles through the
RV grapevine, had decided to make a stop on the way to their
destination.

Pickles isn’t very talkative while in his
backpack outdoors, preferring to caw at the crows, sing to the
birds and mumble like a little old man to himself so that you can
only catch the odd word. When curious people approach us, it’s
sometimes difficult to get him to speak, he usually just laughs at
them. One night, we were cornered by a group of children who kept
asking Pickles to talk. “Speak Pickles, speak!” they all chimed.
Eventually, Pickles responded with a deep “Woof!” The kids thought
this was hilarious and tried to get him to do it again. “Speak
Pickles! Bark! Speak!” until Pickles ordered them all to “Go
home!”

Sometimes people want to hold him and Pickles
is willing to sit on anybody’s hand but we’re careful who we allow
contact with because sometimes he will run up an arm to the
shoulder. If we think people can deal with this and not freak out,
we’ll hand Pickles off to them. We don’t usually allow Pickles on
our shoulders because sometimes he refuses to leave and it’s too
easy to get a nipped ear if he’s irked, or he will hide right
between your shoulder blades, where you can’t reach him.

All too often, for some reason, people like
to poke their fingers in his face. Are people really that retarded?
One time, I set Pickles and the backpack down on a picnic table to
chat with a couple of women. One of the women started to poke her
finger through the bar and I told her that he doesn’t like fingers
in his face and won’t hesitate to bite. She couldn’t resist and
while my back was turned, she went for it. I turned around just in
time to see Pickles with a firm hold of the tip of her finger. His
eyes glazed over in ecstasy as he held on tight and began to grind.
Anybody who owns a bird from the parrot family knows how painful
the beak grind can be, and Pickles was giving his all. I watched in
horror as blood appeared and started to pool on the bottom of the
cage.

The woman pretended it was no big deal as I
banged on the cage, desperately trying to unbalance Pickles but all
that did was make him grab on harder as he flapped for balance.
Crap. The woman was about to drop to her knees in agony but she
maintained her composure as I worked at getting her loose. Finally,
I poked my finger next to hers and Pickles went for the new meat
just as I yanked my finger back. “SCORE!!” he announced, through a
bloody beak.

I turned to inspect the idiot woman’s finger.
She had quite the wound but still maintained that it wasn’t a big
deal. “It doesn’t hurt” she said, through clenched teeth. Tears
were forming but she insisted, “I’m okay.”

Just then, Neil joined us and I told him what
happened. It was obvious what he was thinking…“What kind of
hair-brain DOES that?!” but all he managed was “Huh.” He then asked
me to come with him and he showed me a nestling crow, lying beneath
a 30- foot pine tree. He looked basically full-grown and at first
we thought he was, and that he’d been injured. All he could do was
lie on his side, mouth gaping, and shuffle his feet in the dirt in
an attempt to get away from us.

I knew there were 2 nests above, because I
walked past this tree often and had been watching the baby crows in
their various maturing stages. The nests weren’t very high, just
feet above my head. I glanced up and there were no other babies
left, just adult crows cawing and dive-bombing us in protection of
their young one. We weren’t sure what to do but in the meantime I
went and got some water soaked bread in case he was hungry or
thirsty.

It was difficult to get the bread in his
beak, even though his mouth was open. If we did, the crow wouldn’t
swallow it. Neil went for pliers and we fed him with that—like the
beak of an adult, feeding it’s young by getting it deep. By getting
the food to the back of his throat, he was able to swallow. He was
obviously hungry or thirsty, and he took quite a bit.