Captain Jack Sparrow

Yes, its been a while since I have written a post. But I have a good reason. 3 weeks ago, I got this little guy and he has been keeping me and Anton super busy.

Jacks first day.

His favourite toy becomes the chopsticks

Looking back, its amazing how much he has grown up in the last 3 weeks.  He is getting more confident everyday with his climbing, has just learnt that he can fly (he still has many crashes but he is getting there) and I am sure that any day now he will finally realise that apples are food, not toys (I'll be glad when we don't have to spoon feed him porridge anymore).

Because he is a Congo African Grey, he will only start talking when he is about a year old, although he may say his first word around 6 months.  In the last week or so, he has started making the cutest noises though, like R2D2 imitating a monkey imitating a frog.  Sometimes it sounds like he is just about ready to start talking any day now, but I know he probably still very far away from that.

Jack learns how to hold something with his foot for a better grip. 

Jack has mixed feelings about the parrot in the mirror. Sometimes he likes to cuddle, sometimes he tries to bite. We'll see where the relationship goes.

Helping to choose a movie to watch

African Grey's need a lot of time out of the cage everyday - around 2 - 3 hours.  Being that Anton and I work full time, from the moment I get home until Jack goes to sleep, Jack gets his "out of cage time".  That also means that we spend our whole evenings hovering over him, making sure he stays away from wires and other dangerous goods. Parrots poop every 20 - 30 minutes, which means we have to clean up after him all the time (if we're vigilant we will notice his "poop dance" and get him to the newspaper first).  And now that he has learnt to fly, we can't even leave him unsupervised on his perch like we used to cos he will jump off and get himself into mischief.

No Jack, buttons aren't toys...

No Jack, knobs aren't toys...

Jack learns how to climb. On everything.

They also have sensitive respiratory systems.  Which means that we have had to replace all our household cleaners with bio-friendly cleaners.  I suppose this is a good change to make, but why does everything eco-friendly have to be so expensive?  

And did I mention how much extra dust we have now?  Hence we also bought an air purifier and I have to dust every second day. 

Jack discovers the craze of taking selfies.

   

But despite all the extra work and all the attention he needs, ultimately he is so rewarding.  Its amazing watching him grow and figure things out, seeing how confident he is becoming.