Hi Maggie~
As you know, I have a new baby grey!! Little Kismet is 4 weeks old and such a little doll as you saw in his photo.
His breeder lives an hour away from me so I can only visit him on the weekends. I want to see him as often as possible so he will be familiar & comfortable with me before he comes home. I have also bought several toys for him & new carrier which I am going to take to the breeder when I visit him this Saturday so she can have them set up & let him get used to them before coming home. I figure if he has the toys & carrier ahead of time & has time to see them and get used to them, it will be less scary for him when it's time to put him in the carrier & bring him home. The toys I will take her will be the toys I put in his cage initially as he will be used to them. Again, to make it less scary for him. The breeder is also going to wean him onto the Harrison's food that I will be feeding him at home as well as the fruits & veggies he will eat with me so his diet will not change drastically.
My question is, what else can I do for him to make this transition as easy as possible? When I purchased Cupid, he was 10 minutes from my house so I was with him every day for a few weeks before he came home with me. Will seeing Kismet every weekend be enough? How much can they remember at this young of an age? I will certainally cuddle & love him as much as I can in the times I visit. Since I've had photo's of him from minutes after he hatched & get the pleasure of receiving pictures of him every week & get to visit him from such an early age, it makes me want to protect him even more since he's still so small and helpless.
I know new homes & surroundings can be scary. I'm hoping that giving him time to familiarize himself with his toys & carrier it can eleviate some of that fear and truly hope seeing me several visits will help too. Do you have any advice of other things I can or should do for him? When I bring him home (in several weeks) is it better that I leave him in his cage initially or cuddle him a lot? Cupids cage at home was so similar to his cage at the store and he was so comfortable with me that his transition was easy. Kismet is a little different situation since he's further away & the cage he will be in is not as large as his home cage will be.
Any advice would be appreciated! I've got a lot of time to prepare. OH - I did just order that Hepa Air Purifier from the site you recommended so that will be here long before he is.
I will send you some updated photo's when I visit this weekend. It's so great to watch how much he changes just in one week! Not a lot of people get to see them this young, I'm so lucky I get this priveledge.