lromanik@gldoa.dec.com (02/25/88)
Re: Paul Meyer's question about teaching his new African Grey
to talk.
I knew very little about parrots until this summer when I found
an African Grey on my apartment balcony. Max had obviously had
some training, but I am in the unfortunate position of not knowing
what or how much. I am fairly sure now though that Max was NOT
hand raised.
So with that said I will tell you what things I have had the most
success with. First of all, parrots seem to be fairly schizoid
about what they decide to learn and what they don't. Some phrases
Max has learned after hearing them repeated for only a few days.
His latest one ("Good Night") he had been hearing repeated every
night for the last 7 months. I didn't think he was ever going to
say that one, but then out of the blue one Sunday afternoon he
looked at me and said "Gu'night".
I don't know if your bird does this, but Max has the habit every
now and then of doing what I call his "gutteral mutterings". It
sounds like he's attempting to put sounds together to make speech,
but it sounds very garbled and indistinct. But I always listen
to them closely, and occaisonally he'll make a recognizable
sound. Then I use that to figure out what to teach him next.
For example, when I found him the only thing he could say was
"Hello", and sometimes he'd just say "Oh". Then one day in his
mutterings I thought I heard an "oy" sound several times. So I
started saying "Oh boy" to him. Within a few day's he was attempting
it. Another example. When we first found him and he'd do his
mutterings, we'd (my husband and I) always turn around surprized
and say "What?!". We weren't trying to teach him that, but one
day he started saying "What". I was trying to teach him to say
"How are you?" He still doesn't say that, but finally I noticed
that whenever I said it to him he'd repeat "oo", which I assume
he got from hearing me say the word "you". Then one day he said
"What oo", so I started saying "What's new?" He picked that up
in a couple of hours. So in summary, once your bird does start
trying to copy speech, listen carefully and see if you can't figure
out what phonetical patterns he seems to be tuning in on. Once
you can get the first few words out of him (it may take months),
his learning rate should really pick up.
Another tip, make sure he can see your lips moving when you say
things. That way he learns that it's ok to move his mouth when
trying to reproduce the sounds. Also, when you talk to him watch
him carefully. I can almost tell when Max is on the verge of saying
a new phrase I'm trying to teach because I start noticing that he
stares intently at me whenever I say it. Therefore, if I'm talking
to him and he gets that intent look, I always go back and repeat
whatever I just said.
I have read that parrots learn speech better from women and children
because their voices are closer to the parrot's range. So I know
of one man who said that when he first started teaching things he'd
use a high falsetto voice (but if anyone hears you it could be
pretty embarrassing!). So far Max has learned everything from me,
even though my husband is his favorite person, although I think I
have spent more time at it.
You might also try whistling simple tunes. Max loves to whistle and
often makes up his own tunes. I'm sure he could learn any tune
I wanted to try if only I could whistle better!
Have fun with your "baby"! I'd love to hear how you progress.
Laura Romanik
Digital Equipment Corporationjla@inuxd.UUCP (Joyce Andrews) (02/27/88)
> Re: Paul Meyer's question about teaching his new African Grey > to talk. > > You might also try whistling simple tunes. Max loves to whistle and > often makes up his own tunes. I'm sure he could learn any tune > I wanted to try if only I could whistle better! As I mentioned in e-mail to Paul, try singing, too. Madeira, my blue-front Amazon, loves to sing. The only word she knew was "Hello" when I started singing the first two lines of "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" in a psuedo-operatic voice, vibrato and all. She picked those up almost immediately, and now tries to sing lots of things (you should hear "hello pretty bird" sung like the fat lady in an Italian opera). She holds her notes out and sounds better than my husband does in the shower! Now, this is my third posting here this year, and the other two were about wild birds (or escapees) so don't flame me for a pet bird posting! Parrots are a lot of fun (and mess, but that's another story). -- Joyce Andrews King ihnp4!inuxd!jla AT&T, Indianapolis
enochson@milton.u.washington.edu (Gail Enochson) (05/28/91)
I am owned by a TIMNEH grey parrot, and would like to find out from others in the same situation the following: How long they've been owned by their parrot If their parrot is wild caught or domestic bred Has their parrot bred successfully Other information about TIMNEHS