Nicknames

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Our birds all have names that were given to them either by us or the people they first knew. Some also have names that they either picked up from us or chose themselves. Spike mostly calls herself Spikey Bird or Spike Bird. Alex is either Al or Big Guy. Emelio has gone through several names, some still in use, others dropped in favor of new ones.
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When he first learned to say his own name it came out as Emil-yo-yo, which then turned into YoBirdie, YoYoBird, Mr. Yo or Young Mr. Yo. He would almost sing the last one, and I miss hearing it. Once day when he was about to get his nails trimmed Linda opened his carrier, he stepped onto the threshold and kind of held his wings up and back a little, stretched his neck out and announced himself by singing “Young Mr. Yoooo”, then just stood there looking proud of himself. Linda’s eyes widened and she said “What did he say?” Emelio obligingly did it again. We all cracked up. Emelio now calls himself Mister most of the time, and we’ve picked that up and use it often.
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Gideon was named by Linda at the bird shop and we’ve always called him that or just Gid. He has always called himself Baby B. We never knew why, we just accepted that he liked that name and started using it. I even made up a little song with that name and when I sing it to him he bobs his head, whistles and dances. (You quickly learn that the birds love to be sung to, they especially love having their own songs and they do not care if you can’t sing as long as you can put out some volume. I got over the embarrassment of acting like a fool long ago!)
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One day I noticed that Gideon’s foot was swollen. Somehow the band on his leg got stuck around one toe and it needed to come off right away. (This isn’t the first time this has happened to one of our birds. If you own a bird just make sure to check the band occasionally to be sure it moves freely on the leg.) We toweled Gideon and Mark cut it off (the band, not the leg!) All parrots bred in the US are required to be banded. These bands are slipped over the foot when the bird is 2 – 3 weeks old and are referred to as closed bands because they are seamless as opposed to open bands which were clamped around the legs of imported birds. All bands have a series of letters and numbers which help the breeders identify them. We had never looked at any of the bands closely and were quite surprised to find the letters BB on Gideon’s band. I have to surmise that the breeder must have called Gideon by the letters on his band and he didn’t forget; hence the name Baby B.
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Cathy