Polka Dots??

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I grew up in the 50’s and 60’s. I dislike formality of almost any kind and I hate to be told what to do. I love feeling comfortable and relaxed, so most of my wardrobe consists of jeans and t-shirts. I recently purchased new pj’s; basically a top and shorts. The shorts are quite comfortable and nice for wearing around the house – but obviously they’re not denim.

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I was wearing the new shorts and a t-shirt the other night when we went upstairs to hold the birds. I sat down in the Lazy Boy with Alex and began to talk to him. He totally ignored me. He was perched on my left arm, body arched out and down, with his face as close to my shorts as he could get, just staring!

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They’re called polka dots, I told him. He was fascinated, but eventually he stopped staring and returned to normal.

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Well, apparently Alex wasn’t the only bird shocked by the sight of the dots. Every time I held another bird we went through the same routine, each bird staring at the shorts like they were some alien being.

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Spike is usually the last bird that I hold – the line up usually goes like this: Alex, Rani, Peeper, then maybe Classy or Gideon (but they usually don’t want to be held, just petted at their cages), Emelio and finally Spike. Spikey was not content to just stare from her spot on my arm. Oh no, not that one – she had to get much closer than that.

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As she made her way down to my legs I began to get nervous. Spike is the reason I had the mole on my neckline removed – she will try to remove moles, freckles, stray beard hair. All week she’s been after a particular hair on Mark’s chin and she won’t be happy until that offending hair has been removed. The thought of a bite on my leg just gave me the willies!!

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I frantically scooped her up, almost yelling: “Oh, fer cryin’ out loud, they’re only POLKA DOTS!”

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Yeah . . . I think I’m gonna stick with that denim . . .
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Cathy

Morning Calling

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I woke up to the sound of the birds this morning – or maybe I should say to Alex yelling. The bird room is right above our bedroom so I can hear most everything without a problem and I could probably hear Alex if I was dead! He worked himself up into a deafening screaming session – it doesn’t last very long, maybe 3 or 4 screams, but that’s more than enough!
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Apparently Emelio thought so too, because I could hear him tell Alex to knock it off each time he screamed. When that didn’t work Emelio started to whistle a song. It took me a couple of seconds to realize that Emelio was doing exactly what I do when I want Alex to stop screaming; I distract him by singing – which he loves – and he joins in.
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I know I’ve said this before, but it constantly amazes me how much the birds pick up on what we do. Sometimes I actually try to hide what I’m doing so they won’t copy it. For example, when I was cleaning Alex’s cage the other day I had to lift the top to clean it and I didn’t want him to try to do the same thing. His cage is from a different manufacturer than the other six cages. It had to be assembled; the others did not – they’re welded. The top bars are one piece that just sets on a ledge, so if you move it too far one way, it falls in. I’m not crazy about that part of the design, but in order to get a cage that size up the stairs we had to have one that wasn’t pre-assembled.

Anyway, as I was cleaning it I pushed it too far and the damn thing fell into the cage. There was no hiding that from Alex – he was sitting on the t-stand in the middle of the room watching everything I did. I had to zip tie the top to the side when I was done to try to prevent him from doing the same thing. I’m sure Alex will remove them sooner or later – this isn’t the first time we put the zips on the cage – so this time Mark will have to come up with a more permanent solution. I’m afraid he’ll be injured if he knocks that top in. It’s not an unfounded fear – the lady that I got Spike from had a hyacinth macaw that did exactly that. Luckily he wasn’t hurt, but you just can’t count on that.

Cathy

Mysterious Happenings

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Recently Spike acquired a dark spot above her nostrils – it looked like she’d been playing in newsprint. The problem with that assumption was we never saw her playing with her papers. We just couldn’t think of any other reason for the dirty spot. I kept trying to wash it off her feathers and it would get lighter, then a few days later it was dark again. Weird.
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Finally Mark saw what was happening. Spike likes to chew rawhide. We take 6 strands of leather strips and tie them in to a huge knot ball and she unites and chews it until there’s almost nothing left. The knot ball is hung with a quick link to a plastic chain that’s in her cage. Spike had the ball down to just a few knots and strands and as she was chewing at what was left, she was leaning her head against the quick link – the metal was leaving a grey stain on her white feathers. Mark made her a new knot ball and hung it up a little higher. Problem solved.

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We went out to dinner a few nights ago, then did a few errands and stopped to visit some friends. We were gone about 4 hours. When we got home we went upstairs to watch TV and hold the birds. Emelio was happily strutting around on the top of his cage!

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I had been in the bird room just before we left to change water. Every time I do that Emelio has to come out of his cage and go to the counter until I’m done. It’s one of his favorite things to do. I know I shut his cage door, but I must not have put the latch down properly, which allowed him to open the door. He did stay on his cage – which was good – but it made me nervous anyway.
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There’s a ceiling fan in the bird room because the ceilings are high and it helps keep the room warm. The switches for the lights and the fan are on the outside of the door, so the fan gets turned off before we enter – some of our birds are fully flighted and a collision with a running fan would be awful. We try to anticipate these kinds of dangers and eliminate them, but man, sometimes you just can’t.
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Cathy


PS –If you have a bird please do not use regular leather for his toys. In order for leather to be safe for birds it must be vegetable tanned. It can be purchased on line.

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