Hello,

I live with my boyfriend and his grandmother, and she has an African Gray she's had for at least 21 years (that I could find in her records.) Her name is Merlin and she is always plucking her feathers. She plucks mostly the small down feathers on her chest that start to grow and before they get a chance to mature, she picks them off. She also occasionally will pluck a feather.

We've been here with the grandma now for about a year and a half. Since we moved in I've tried to make improvements to her environment. We've given her new toys and make sure her water and food is always fresh. She used to bite if you got too close. She occasionally attempts to nip at your finger if you come up too fast. When we are home, we will open her door and let her out. She enjoys climbing down and walking around on the floor when she wants, she knows she can come and go. She has a perch tree by the window that she'll sit on the weekends when we're home and the sun is out. She doesn't like to get on or off of the tree by herself. She's very picky also - she loves pistachios and crackers but doesn't ever want to try fruits or veggies. Her food is a gray parrot mixture of seeds that grandma buys, she only eats the sunflower seeds and peanuts out of it, despite me telling grandma that Merlin does NOT like this food and only eats half. Her favorite noise to make is a high pitched screech and a water drop noise. If you offer her pistachios, she says 'sure.' I try to talk to her and sing to her to expand her vocabulary but it doesn't seem to help

I attempted to talk grandma into getting her a bigger cage with more room, but she will not let me get her a new cage. I think her current cage is too small. Merlin is in this cage for roughly 8 hours a day, alone in the house. If it were my bird and my house, she'd have a bigger cage and she'd get let out all day, but that isn't going to happen. Grandma is stuck in her ways so it's hard to accommodate.

Any advice would help. Thank you!

TL;DR: Since we've moved in, Merlin is less aggressive, has more attention, and enjoys roaming around the house when letting out..but still plucks. Grandma won't let me make upgrades.