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Boris the menace!! Hi, my name is Marie, I'm 23 and I live in Toulouse, in the south of France. I'm the caring owner of Boris, a cute Senegal Parrot full of mischief!!! I once read Senegals were "brat-birds"... and I think Boris is the brattiest of all Senegals!!! Brat-bird, but still a great friend! 
| On this page I talk about how I tamed Boris with lots of love and patience, and I regularly add news. On my diary pages I have put : | Boris arrived in April 2002, he came from a pet shop. He was an untamed adult, and it took lots of patience, care and love to gain his confidence. Of course now that I know more about parrots, I know buying an adult parrot, especially a wild-caught one in a pet shop isn't a good thing to do. But little by little I managed to make Boris feel at home. Now, he can come out of his cage, fly around the room, do lots of tricks, etc etc, but it's quite a recent development ! It took several months of patient taming and teaching to gain his confidence, but it was definitely worth it as now our relationship is much stronger and he has a little more freedom. 
What a meeeeeeeeeean look!! Here is how his taming went : When I first had him, after a few weeks he got used to taking food from my hand, then he started to climb onto my hand in the cage to get his treat. I never even imagined letting him out of the cage as I was afraid he would panick, fly around without control and maybe hurt himself. Of course he was interacting with me more and more, he learnt to say "please" (it's a sort of "you-you-you" sound I taught him to do when I give him a treat), had his spray shower in the cage, etc. By the way do you know the French for Senegal Parrot? "Youyou"! I can understand why... His sqwark is so typical ! Then in summer 2005 I went to Mexico and there I met someone who had a small parrot that would come onto people. I cuddled him and he fell asleep in my hand... And then I thought : if this little parrot can do that, why can't Boris??  
This is the funny little Mexican parrot! I believe it's a orange fronted conure... So when I came back home I decided I should try to let Boris out ! And I was very pleased to see he was very curious to discover "the outside world", but he took his time!!First he'd stay on the cage and climb all around it, then he started to climb down the ladder onto the floor (he tried to open his food pots because he could see the food through the glass!! :) ). But I couldn't touch him!! Then he got more and more confident and found a great perch : the curtain pole!! But he never wanted to come down, not even for food or bed-time, so I had to catch him and that frightened him and stressed him too much, so I decided to try a different approach. I bought a little perch to attach on the outside of the cage, and I started teaching him to come there for biscuits, climb from the perch onto my hand, etc. 
Just look at that nice cage!! Notice the dustbin under his outside perch to catch the poo! From the outside perch he climbs onto my hand to fetch his treat, and progress is fast!! I'm hoping one day I'll be able to walk around with him and stroke him! Of course that'll take time though... AND!!! Since yesterday (02/12/05) he's now confident enough to let me carry him from his inside perch to his outside perch!! Doesn't sound like much but you have to imagine that he once used to be totally "wild"! Of course he puts his "what's going on" face, but he'll get used to it!! From now on I won't wait for him to climb out, I'll carry him out!! Here are some nice photos I took this evening on his perch. His outings are more and more interesting as he's gaining confidence with every new day! 
Boris loves making faces through the bars of his cage... 
Like all parrots, Boris is an acrobat, especially when it comes to scratching that little space so hard to reach... 
02/01/06 : Happy new year!! Boris has made lots of progress over the holidays as I've had plenty of free time to give him!! He now comes on my knee to eat seeds, goes exploring on the floor, and flies onto me once in a while!! I'm so happy... but I wish he wouldn't bite me. He tends to do that when he gets excited or if he doesn't want me to take him off his perch.   
23/01/06 : Boris now flies over onto me to fetch a treat or a toy. He loves to land on my head, but although it's fun, I try to stop this dominant behaviour. He's friends with my boyfriend now : he flies onto him too!!! This goes to show that patience and dedication is all it takes! 
Aren't those two just sooooooooo handsome?? 
When he manages to get on my head, he pulls my hair! 
Uh oh... Boris is about to take off!! 
Boris loves going crazy with his favourite toys!! 
9/03/2006 : Boris has now got a new table-top perch!! It was very hard to find one in France, but when I went to England last week I got one for only £19, less than 30€!! At first Boris was very wary, but now he's decided it's alright as it hasn't tried to eat him yet, hehe.  
Hey, look at me!!! I AM proud of my new perch! 
Here he's on my school bag! 27/03/06 : I took some photos of Boris flying, and they look quite good! He flies so fast though that it's difficult to take a good photo. 
He looks like an angel!! I love the way he tucks his little feet under his body to fly! I think his wings look a bit raggedy on this photo. That's probably because he's in his molting season now. 
Boris looks like he's having lots of fun on this photo! 09/04/06 : Boris is more and more comfortable with me : sometimes he stays more than half an hour on my arm when I watch a film on my computer. But he still bites once in a while, so I always wear a jumper when he's outside his cage! That way he almost never gets to my skin. But he's got to stop biting!! Especially as the nice weather is starting, jumpers will be too warm... Here are a few cute photos : 
Looking cute on my desk (he's too afraid of the soft toy parrot to grab the peanut I put in front of it!!)  
Boris likes to drink herbal tea or fruit juice from my cup! 31/05/06 : Here's a funny photo of Boris and me. He looks like a hen roosting on my head! 
10/09/06 : I haven't updated Boris' homepage for a long time, but that's because during the summer holidays I was very busy!! I spent July and August in Italy for an intership, and I really missed Boris... During those two months he didn't come out of his cage so he must have missed me too! Since 1/09 my boyfriend and I have moved into a flat together and of course Boris came too. To move the cage I bought him a small transport cage and I spent a lot of time getting him used to being carried around in it. The journey went well even if he was a bit frightened! 
Getting used to the transport cage... Now he's in the living room of our flat, so I can take him out much more often! Sometimes when we're eating I put him on the table and he eats his seeds there, but he always wants to taste our food. Once he tasted ice cream and loved it!! Of course I didn't let him eat much though... 
Discovering the table... 
Greedy little thing!! 05/10/06 : Boris has adapted very well to his new environnement. I can now take him upstairs when I have to work at my desk, he takes his showers in the bathroom, and he stays several hours outside of his cage when I'm at home. By the way he hardly bites anymore, only when I'm "looking for it", when I tease him too much. He's really making lots of progress... To think that he was still wild just a year ago! Here are some funny photos : 
I think there's a scary monster between those packets of cereal... Maybe I can scare him away if I blow my feathers up!!  Hey children!!! Look what happens when you play for too long on the computer : you lose your mind!!!! 
Yummmmy grapes!!! 22/10/06 : Boris loves taking showers!!! Before we moved into our new flat I gave him his shower on his outside perch but everything always got very wet after. Now I've managed to convince him to take his shower in the bathroom like a proper room mate!! He perches on the tap and then I spray him. He gets all excited, flaps his wings, sqwarks and sometimes almost falls off the tap in the excitement! It's so funny... Here are a few photos (none of when he's excited though because my boyfriend's presence tends to diminish his excitement!) :  
18/12/06 : Here is a photo of Boris on the bathroom mirror. When he's outside of his cage, every now and then he flies into the bathroom to perch on the mirror and for about 10 mins he just says there looking at himself in the mirror. I think he really needs a little friend... but unfortunately right now my boyfriend doesn't want another Boris... 
02/01/2007 : Another new year on Boris' homepage !! Let's hope 2007 brings me as much joy with Boris as 2006 did, with as much progress !! Who knows, maybe I'll be able to cuddle him one day?? Here's a photo of a shower/window perch I bought on Ebay. I was looking for one but I couldn't find any in France... This one comes from the US and was quite cheap ! Boris adopted it in no time... We'll have to try it in the shower next ! 
14/01/07 : Here are a few new photos! In the morning, when we make our fresh orange juice, Boris likes to eat some of the pulp! He looks so cute on these photos!  
And here, he's playing with his new toy I got him for Xmas. He loves bells, so with such a big bell he's really happy!!  
23/01/2007 : Hurray!!!!! Boris is a BOY ! I sent a few feathers to have him sexed and the results just arrived!! I would have been so annoyed if he's been a she!! I am so relieved... Last week I started to teach him some simple tricks and I as really surprised to see how fast he understood what I was asking him to do. In about 20 mins he was doing "turn around" and "wave", and then he mastered "shake hands". I've bought Tani Robar's book and as soon as I recieve it I'll try other things. I've tried to teach him to bring an object to me, and he picks it up on command but then throws it away instead of dropping it, so it's virtually impossible for me to put my hand under to catch it??!!! Maybe the book will help me out with that one. 30/01/2007 : Boris can drop the object in my hand now but I still have to put it directly under. I can't wait to get the book on tricks :) Today I've had very sad news about Minette, my cat. It turns out she has a tumor in the eye and she will have to be operated on to take her left eye out. It's very sad as she's never had any kind of problem before in the ten years we've had her... And she has such pretty eyes... 22/02/07 : Boris is making so much progress in his trick learning!! He can now do lots of things such as putting a ring on a peg, putting an object in my hand or in a little container, passing through a tunnel, and now he's learning to pull a little cart! I'm also trying to teach him to nod "yes" but he's finding it hard to understand what I want from him. He's really impressed me and my relatives, he's so clever! He learned to put a ring on a peg in only half an hour! I'm so proud of him, and some of my friends have even come just to see him do his "show"!  28/03/07 : This evening Boris learned to put a coin in a piggy bank! It only took him a couple to tries to understand what I was asking him. He is definitely learning faster and faster. And he's really starting to enjoy performing : sometimes if I leave a prop on the table he does the trick again and again to get my attention! He can also pull a wooden car and a toy cart now. I'll make a new video of him soon. Tani Robar's book has really helped me with these new tricks. And quite by chance when browsing on Internet to find new toys for Boris I found a website selling the same props as in the book! In fact the person who owns this site has made most of the props featured in Tani Robar's book. I was so glad to find this site, as it's quite difficult to find props for training a parrot, especially a small sized parrot! Here's the link for anyone interested : www.parrotprops.com By the way, great news from Europe! Since January wild bird importation into the EU is definitely banned! I'm really glad as I feel very guilty about having bought a wild-caught parrot. This ban will make sure that no wild-caughts will be sold anymore (at least not legally). 05/04/07 : Here are a few photos of Boris' tricks and a new video! I am now waiting to recieve his new toys from parrotprops.com!  
Ring on a peg and pulling a toy car  
Coin in a piggy bank and pulling a toy wagon  
Hanging on a stick and stepping up from one finger to another 
Putting an object in a box 15/04/07 : A few days ago I recieved Boris' new training toys from www.parrotprops.com !!! They are great and Boris can already play basketball and loves the stacking cups even if he can't get it quite right on his own yet! Teaching colours will probably take quite a while. As for the puzzle, I'll wait a bit before getting started. I also got a small table perch that's useful for when Boris sits with us at the table. It's too tall for him to climb off easily and small enough to be handy! Here's a photo of his new toys : 
26/08/07 : It's been a long time since I last updated Boris' homepage. I've been very busy with my new work, and although I still work on new tricks for Boris. He can now do the stacking cups, and I'm also working on rings on pegs by colour and the puzzle, but that's still a bit hard for him. And another trick I'm working on is the forward flip on my finger. That way I hope to get him used to touching my finger with his beak without biting. I still can't touch Boris, so I would like to use trick teaching to increase his "tameness". Here's a list of all the tricks Boris can do for the moment : - Wave hello
- Turn around
- Shake hands
- Ring on the peg
- Playing basket ball
- Putting a coin in the piggy bank
- Going through a tunnel
- Hanging on a stick
- Pulling a wagon or a little car
- Forward flip
- Ringing the bell
- Stacking cups
- The puzzle (still not perfect...)
- Ring on the peg by colours (far from perfect!!)
Not bad, heh?! :) 11/11/07 : A great recent development with Boris !!! I can now scratch him on the neck and head... I've been waiting for this to happen for AGES! Here is how it went : I started off scratching his feathers with his little bell that I would hold between my fingers. Then, still holding the bell with two fingers, I started to scratch him with my middle finger. Little by little I would hold the bell further away so that he started to understand that it was in fact my finger touching him and giving him that nice feeling! And at last last week I moved the bell to my other hand, still holding it close to his beak to distract him just in case. And with my other hand I could scratch and cuddle him from the top of his back all the way to the top of his head!!! It's so soft and warm... It's a lovely feeling, at last being able to touch him, especially as he really seems to enjoy it. He is such a fun little parrot! Who would have thought that we would go so far together and that he would be so confident with me??! ************************************************** Boris is not the only pet of the house... Here are his mates! 
Mysterious Minette 
Cuddle-loving Peanuts 
Todd the rescued tortoise  
Hitchcock : he's not mine but I ride him every week! ******************** ********************** Boris isn't my first bird : before him I had Payùn, a Pennant's Parakeet. He was really a beautiful bird, he was my present from my parents' for my 18th birthday (my choice). 
Payùn had a very sweet temperament and would sing all day long ("Too-dee too-dee too-dee"). Unfortunately after just a month something terrible happened : one morning I noticed that he was very quite, and soon it was obvious something was wrong as he was sneezing and trembling. I went to the pet shop and they said it was probably pneumonia and I should keep him warm. But when I came back he was having diarhea and he was a lot worst. Soon he stopped breathing and was dead. I was devastated especially as this all happened in only about 4 hours. It was so sad... A few weeks later I decided to have another bird and that's when Boris came into my life !! Of course now I can't really say I miss Payùn as he was with me for so little time, but it was very sad how he died to fast. He was a very sweet bird. Boris has always been a very fit bird but at the beginning I was always watching out for abnormal behaviour... and that lead me to misinterpret many normal behaviours, like yawning ("something's stuck down his throat??!!"), opening and closing his cloaca after a poo ("he's constipated??!!"), etc!!! :) Better safe than sorry?? ****************************************** More stuff to come soon!
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