New African Grey

Question
Hi, I am getting an African Grey tomorrow from a home that leaves her outdoors all day except for really cold days.  (we live in texas btw) and I know its really short notice because I'm getting her tomorrow evening, but I was wondering what I could do to make the adjustment from that home to mine as stress free as possible for her. I want to be able to get her to trust me and am thinking about buying leather gloves so she can step up. Also, I want to feed her a mix of pellets and fresh food (free feed the pellets) and was wondering what a good brand is.  And is the packaged dried food you can buy at pet stores okay?  I petsat a Macaw for a few months and fed her Zupreem pellets.
One last thing!  I have cats that aren't really use to birds and was wondering if the bird would be okay in the living room.  I'm certain my cats will be curious but won't hurt her.  Any suggestions?  Thank you!

Answer
What a good home she's going to!!!!  You're already doing the right things in asking for suggestions for food and location.

Pelleted diets are ALL good. Whatever she'll eat and whatever you can readily find.  Some people prefer to steer clear of the colored and highly 'scented'/flavored kinds, but if the bird shows no problem with it, just go ahead.  Sometimes there's increased incidents of fungal or yeast infections in birds with the slightly higher sugar products.

Fresh foods are vital as you know - but if she's not interested very much during the first few days, as long as she drinks regularly, give her time to adjust.

The cage should never be outside all day and I'm very glad you're getting her out of that environment. How awful it must be for the bird to see all that freedom and not be able to be part of it.  Plus, unless the humans are there all day, every day, every season - there's no way to know about the intensity of sun exposure.  Let's not even talk about the predatory birds that might terrorize this little guy - or neighborhood pets.  

Never be certain about your cats. They are still driven by instinct, no matter how nice they may seem.  We've had cats who were around birds for years - suddenly decide they wanted a snack (of that bird). It took only one mistake for us to never be so confident again.  Of course that one mistake is forever lost to us and we'll never get him back.

Take a look at our site for more about how to ideally care for your new companion.  Everything is free and you can ask me anything, anytime  

 www.4AnimalCare.org