Hello, glad to be here!

[soulharp]

Hello! I'm Laurie Cannon, a totally blind parrot owner. I have a Medium Sulphur-Crested cockatoo named Eleanor. He is a male but named Eleanor. I named him before I found out he was a male and he was already responding to his name. I will post in one of the forums here about being a parrot owner who is blind. I want to find out if there are other owners out there who are blind ro who know owners who are blind. Eleanor is nearly 14 months old. I got him at 3 months old and finished handfeeding him. Thank you! Laurie

 

[Flboy]

Hello and glad to have you here!

 

[Rival_of_the_Rickeybird]

Welcome.
If you'll find specialized help and support anywhere, it'll be here.
Also, Eleanor was a male name back in the day. I had a great great (great?) grandfather named Eleanor.

 

[Scott]

Welcome Laurie, so pleased you've joined. So many questions and would love to learn how you've surmounted challenges. I'll bet your parrots are quite aware!

 

[Ellie777Australia]

Hello! I'm Laurie Cannon, a totally blind parrot owner. I have a Medium Sulphur-Crested cockatoo named Eleanor. He is a male but named Eleanor. I named him before I found out he was a male and he was already responding to his name. I will post in one of the forums here about being a parrot owner who is blind. I want to find out if there are other owners out there who are blind ro who know owners who are blind. Eleanor is nearly 14 months old. I got him at 3 months old and finished handfeeding him. Thank you! Laurie

A warm welcome Laurie and Eleanor. I'm from Australia Laurie, we have heaps of Sulphur-Crested cockatoo's in the wild who are regular visitors. They are beautiful and very intelligent. They are also big babies at heart. I have a female Eclectus named Ellie. Eclectus' are also native to northern Queensland.

I'm adding a little more information here just in case your support program only reads encased text and not the side-bars or headers. As Scott stated, if you are willing to share, it would be good to know your challenges and how we are able to assist you. Please let us know how much is technically visible to you (your program) so that we can assist by sending information that is easily 'readable' for you.

I was born legally blind by definition, however I could discern shadows, shapes and colours, and most anything close up to my nose so to speak. I was fortunate in that I could see almost perfectly with what we called 'coke-bottle lenses' back then. We saved enough money so that I could have corrective private eye-surgery to improve my vision about ten years ago. I waited a long long time dreaming of the day that I could see as soon as I opened my eyes in the morning. That day finally came....it was like a miracle to me, a life-time dream come true. I wonder what it is like for you?

As a parrot companion, I rely on Ellie's body language to tell me heaps. I think that you are amazing in that you finished weaning (hand-feeding) Eleanor and that you are caring so well for him by using 'sound'. I'm eager to learn more about you and Eleanor.


Thank you for joining our family,
Kindest Regards,
Debbie

 

[Kiwibird]

Welcome. Similarly to Ellie777Australia, I have extremely poor vision without corrective lenses which was also discovered when I was a young child. I’m far too scared to have surgery on my eyes, so I wear pretty thick glasses all the time (modern lens materials make them much less thick and heavy than they used to be!). My bird is actually very sensitive to whether or not I have glasses on. He seems to have no preference as to frame style, color or whether they are clear or dark UV protective lenses. However, if I take my glasses off, like to clean them or take a nap, he becomes very upset, aggressive towards me, displays aggressive/defensive body language and starts making loud screeches. I am unsure if he doesn’t recognize my face without glasses or somehow perceived my inability to see him very well, but it is a very interesting reaction and one I really wish he did not have. When my glasses are on, he is very sweet and hardly ever in a bad mood over anything. He was rescued as an older bird from a less than ideal situation though and has some behaviors we don’t quite understand where they stem from. But regarding vision specifically, parrots can actually see more of the spectrum than humans, meaning they can see colors and perceive things people with perfect vision cannot. While my bird is undoubtedly a unique case with his issues surrounding my glasses, I believe parrots are sensitive enough to recognize disabilities and may even be more able to perceive a vision related disability due to their superior vision. How this would translate in specific behaviors displayed by any given bird is sure to vary by individual.

I will be very interested in how you and Eleanor come to work with each other over time. Parrots are very perceptive and intelligent creatures. They are also remarkably loving and loyal in a loving home. Getting him as a baby will allow you to form a special bond with him and develop your own unique ways of communicating.

 

[SailBoat]

Welcome to the Parrot Forum Family!

I also extend a very warm welcome to the both of you!
Parrots connect not only visually, but also emotionally with us. They are able to pick-up on very minor changes in our emotions and as stated above, variation we cannot on the visual side. Listen to your Parrot and you will begin to pick-up on variations in his calls that can define a bit more of the World around you, like people in the distance, etc...

Again a wonderful welcome to the family!

Best regards,
Steven (SailBoat)

 

[Inger]

Welcome to the Kindest place on the Internet. We are so glad that you found us! I’m looking forward to hearing more of your story.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Casper223]

Hey Laurie, and Welcome Eleanor.... I can tell your relationship with Eleanor is a very special relationship. I was listening to a seminar the other day, which one of the speakers was Lara Joseph, and she spoke on understanding behavior, and presented a lot of very good points. She spoke about her life with a blind parrot, and training the parrot around the disability. I almost wonder if some of that knowledge could be reversed around your disability, and put to good use. Lara Joseph also heads "The Animal Behavior Center" and they do a live facebook program Sunday Mornings at 9am. She often talks about different animals with different disabilities, but in her bag of tricks, I bet she would also offer some great ideas for you. You can find her on facebook if your interested, and she's a really neat lady, who has some very interesting talking points. She in the seminar talked about training a totally deaf Labradore Retriever, using sign language. Most duck hunters hunt with Labs, and wish they could just point and the Lab retrieve, however they all speak about how difficult that training can be, and yet Lara pulled it off, and isn't a hunter. If interested, you may want to look her up on facebook, as stated earlier, she has some pretty neat bag of tricks, and uses them on some special needs pets. Not trying to steer you away from here, because this forum is awesome, just food for thought as she is a professional. Hope to see you around the forum, and hear more about your interactions with Eleanor.