Good luck. Sounds like a bird seriously in need of a second chance and some proper care.

He really is. He hardly has any toys in his ferret cage, and barely any perches even. He's twenty years old, he deserves so much better! I don't know when people will learn that animals aren't just cool display things like paintings or statues...

Awh that poor birdie!!!!
I think if he comes home with you he's got a fighting chance. At least he'll be cared for properly and spoiled rotten ontop of that! (in a good way though, like attention and healthy treats!)
Good luck!

I'm hoping to have him out of his cage pretty much the whole week, cuddling. Maybe it'll help him regain his trust, and kind of make up for all the years of solitude. We're also considering re-bonding with warm food and spoon feeding. It's supposed to work, I guess?

I don't have very much experience with large parrots at all (just budgies and 'tiels but that's only cause I've owned, never rescued) but I would imagine that spoon feeding would probably be a really good bonding experience. Mine were out of their cages for at least 2-3 hours a day to play around..I would think with a big boy that the more out of cage time, the better!

I was always told that with larger parrots, it was good to talk to them calmly like you would an intelligent 2-3 year old. They get a lot of mental stimulation that way. If he's been pretty much ignored his whole life, I bet talking to him would be really good bonding and I know for sure that it would be good mental stimulation for him.

I used to leave the radio on for my birdies on a classical music station and they seemed to really like that when there wasn't anyone in the house to talk to them. They seemed less stressed that way. (they were all very social and loved to be around people)

I'm actually a bit nervous around larger parrots. I have a hard time reading bird language and I was bitten pretty badly a few times by an amazon with an attitude...lol.

An amazon can totally scar you against large parrots. They have one of the worst bites, and they don't WARN first. It's almost like their thought process is so fast that they bite before THEY know they're doing it, even.

Parrot body language is really complex, but I have the grey, and I've been reading up on cockatoos, so hopefully I'll be able to read him and hopefully he'll be desperate to communicate and BE read!

Parrots are EXCELLENT at picking up on if you're nervous around them. And since there's not one alpha bird in a flock (It's fluid, day to day it changes) they'll decide it's time for them to step up to the plate and be boss-bird for the time being.

I had to take Joey (husband Joey) to the bird store to hold an Umbie just to prove that he can do it. Cockatoos REALLY intimidate him, so I wanted to show him that it's totally possible to hold one if you really steady yourself and just open yourself up to the bird. He was giddy by the time we were done, lol!

I wish much luck to you and this bird D: I hate when animals are not taken care of properly!

Besides I know you could do MUCH better even if you don't have much experience with large birds <3

At least if I can't keep him forever, I know i can get him rehabbed, get him the help he needs, and get him to where he needs to go to live a good long life where he's treated properly!

I wish you luck! Cockatoos are awesome birds (best friend had one) and I think he'll grow on ya!

They are definitely awesome! A little too awesome, unfortunately, and I think a little too easy for people to get without doing research first : (

What kind of 'too did your friend have? There are so many kinds and they're all so gorgeous! Total individuals!

I'm not sure what type he had, but her name was Cinnamon. She was gorgeous! I was so sad when she passed.

Cinnamon is a great name! I'm so sorry that she died.

All good things come to an end eventually, sadly enough..

I think you're a whole lot of worried for nothing. :) You seem like a highly intelligent, empathetic, responsible person. And this parrot doesn't sound like a problem-bird at all! A lot of rescue 'toos have screaming problems, are pluckers, bite, have phobias, or experience seperation anxiety.

I wish you both the best of luck, and beg for photos. :3 I'm about to have LOL VET DAY for my birds and I'll be dragging four parrots halfway across Dallas just to find an Avian vet that was in-office today.

OH Vet day, so much fun, so much money, lol! My other birds are due for vet day in October. The little ones take it fine, but our grey is so sensitive he clings to me for weeks afterwards. Man, halfway across Dallas?? I'm so grateful that our vet is just twenty minutes away and takes our calls after hours. (Of course, with the snakes, parrots, rabbits, chinchillas, and goats, he's pretty understanding.)

I hope it's a lot of worrying for nothing! Because the closer it gets, the more "What am I getting myself in to!?!?!?" I seem to get. It's really amazing that he doesn't seem to have the major rescue bird problems. I sure would if I hadn't been let out of my cage more than twice in a decade! I'd be screaming myself silly and I'd definitely be bald, if not worse! I think it really speaks to his character. Hopefully a whole lot of cuddling and some proper vet attention will be just what the doctor ordered.

Let me know how Vet Day goes! I know how stressful it can be. On the birds AND the owner!

Well, I actually made it out of the vet's office without breaking 300$, so it didn't hurt my wallet near so much as it could have. (Ozzy went through a spell last year where he had a hard-to-be-rid-of sinus infection and I was pretty broke for a few months, plus had a bird that would have nothing to do with me due to me giving him the medicine.) That's really not bad at all for taking four birds, all of whom needed a nail and wing trim. Toledo (My Nanday Conure) was the only one with serious health issues to be addressed aside from me just checking to make sure Amontillado (Blue-Front Amazon) weaned properly.

Toledo turned out to have an undergrowth of the kind of bacteria he needs to properly digest his food, though, so he's on Pro Pectalin for a week. Also, Toledo is thirty-one and has some serious arthritis problems. He has difficulty perching and getting around his cage real well due to this and in the past everyone I've talked to about it has basically told me there was nothing I could do but have him put down once he could no longer safely perch.
I see three different avian vets for my birds, since they all work strange hours/days and it can often be hard to get anyone to see them (And once you notice something's wrong with a parrot they're usually on their way out) and after a bit of pressing the vet I visited today decided to try him out on a trial of Metacam, one drop twice a week. I'm really excited because this is pretty much the first time anyone's taken me seriously about his perching issues, and I'm really hoping it makes a good bit of improvement.

That aside, I got to watch Amontillado absolutely throw a hissy fit over being toweled to be trimmed. I've never heard him get so upset and while I felt a little bad for him, the pitbull-esque noises coming from his beak were pretty hilarious. Everyone else took it real well since it's just business as usual for them.

ANYWAY, that's a lot of rambling just for telling you about birdie vet day. XD I'm sorry, people don't usually ask about my birds and when they do their eyes tend to glaze over after a minute or two of me explaining my birds' latest antics. I'd talk about birds all day if allowed to.

But yeah, for a cockatoo, honestly? Your guy sounds pretty sane and balanced. They can be a ball of neurosis real easily and for him to be doing so well after being isolated and untouched for so long is really a testament to his personality and psyche. Plus, since you're getting him at the age of twenty he should be well past that painful hormonal stage, and old enough to where if you spoil him it doesn't inhibit his ability to be independant. He's still young enough too that with a vastly improved diet and enrichment you can still have him for a long time.

Gomez is beautiful, by the way. I'd love to have a Congo or a Timneh someday, they're fairly hard to come by here though. My favored privately-owned pet store has three of them RIGHT NOW being hand-fed, but they also have a 17-person-long waiting list of people that've already put deposits down. Plus, I already have four birds and given my financial status and amount of free time that's my limit unless I end up making something of a career out of Aviculture.

I wish I had an aviary, I'd love to breed various types of birds with a focus on sustaining endangered species within Aviculture in the U.S.. I've currently got all three of my vets and the aforementioned pet store's owner looking for volunteer and job opportunities for me with this in mind. (Gotta start somewhere!)

$300 is definitely not bad at all! And I'm glad somebody's finally taking you seriously about Toledo, I hope the Metacam works! You'd figure an undergrowth of bacteria wouldn't be too difficult to rectify, but with birds, nothing's ever that easy, is it?

31 is pretty amazing for a conure! My vet has a rescued Mitred that, according to his leg band is pushing 50! I always hits my soft spot because that was the kind of bird I grew up with. BAD choice as your first parrot, realistically, but I was 13 and the store wanted to make the quick sell.

My Gomez is seriously the same way as your Amontillado, when you're trimming his nails or wings, pit-bull noises included. He's SOOOOOOOOO sensitive, it's ridiculous. It's like he doesn't have a sense of humor, and then every now and again he surprises you.

As for the cockatoo, that's kind of what I'm thinking, too. He's twenty, so he's got to be pretty mellowed out by now. And we have a lot of connections if he doesn't work out here. Our vet is really good about rehabs and rehomes. He's picky, blunt, and straight-forward, which I like. :)

We're picking up Mr. Cockatoo this evening. We had to push the date back because we got a last minute call last Thursday that the Unique and Exotic Animal Expo in Portland (3 and a half hours away) was under-vended and they needed us to man a table, so we had to push the cockatoo extraction. So all weekend was basically torture, because there were the most adorable birds EVERYWHERE (including baby congos as that stage where their heads are fully feathered and the rest of them is down), and things like baby hedgehogs, and bunnies... Nevermind the fruit bats! There was a display with fruit bats! SO cool!

Hurr hurr, I wroted you a book.

It's okay, I likes books!