I could have danced all night...

I was reading on the couch last night while Brian was playing video games. The song "Superhero" by Jane's Addiction came on the ipod, and I noticed, out of the corner of my eye, a dancing grey!

There are certain songs that just get them going!

Melon!

Thomas was cutting up a melon for dessert yesterday, and the greys flew over to the counter to check it out. Here's Max, on his finger, eating her melon, with Stella in the background. The melon came from our CSA and it was full of flavor!
Stella started warily watching the melon. She hadn't been exposed to it before in our house -- what is that strange looking fruit?
Approaching the fruit and investigating a bit... Taking the plunge...
Thomas noticed that she was mostly drinking the juice, so he scooped out a spoonful of juice and offered it to her -- much easier!

The rest of the parrots also had melon, but I was so intent on taking pictures of Stella eating that they'd all finished by the time I approached with my camera.

I need to stay strong...

I've mentioned many times that we have a new pet ban currently being enforced in our house.

So, why do I do this to myself?

I was looking at our local humane society's website, and they have a 6 year old female English budgie up for adoption. English budgies typically have lifespans of 6-8 years, so she's near the end of hers.

I really want to go and get her -- I was sure she'd get adopted over the weekend.

This evil voice inside of me keeps telling me that we should bring her home. But then the sane part of me reminds me that we have limits for a reason.

Sigh...

Hopefully I stay strong and you won't read a new bird announcement in the blog in the upcoming days...

How can it possibly be September?

I just can't believe how quickly the time has been flying! Stella's been with us for almost four months, and Rocky and Beeps have been here for right around two years.

Stella ate another pretzel snack over the weekend -- what a mess she leaves!
As for the race, Thomas unexpectedly had Saturday off, so he ended up running. I did beat him (by 58 seconds per mile!) I've been having a good running summer and I can only hope that it continues for the marathon next month.

I tried to get the greys to pose together, but wasn't particularly successful. Stella sure is feisty! As I've mentioned, she's a bit nesty, so she's been flying to the floor and then running into the corner to dig. We are not encouraging her (don't want to see any grey eggs!) and she'll readily step up when we go to get her. She's just so persistent!
With the summer weather upon us, we should be spending more time outside, but it's just been so hot. I don't do well in the heat and am looking forward to fall! Rocky decided to climb into the bottom of Stella's cage to forage for garbage...
When jealous Max saw me taking a picture of him, she had to go to the same place on her cage and call out "hello!" until I took her picture as well.
Of our parrots, the greys are the most observant about what's going on with the other birds, and also the most jealous. I still think Max would prefer to be an only bird so she could have us all to herself!

Here she is on her cage. I told her she looked like an alien with our TV antennae coming out of her back. Today is one of Thomas's days off from the hospital (September is another wards month which means he's almost never home) so Rocky got to eat breakfast with his favorite person. My ever-present stick, which has prevented an untold number of macaw bites, lingers in the background of this picture.And I'll close today's entry with a video. I think I've posted video of this before, but I think it is absolutely adorable. Max is eating yogurt off of a spoon. We didn't try to teach her this -- when she was first in our house, we used a measuring spoon to feed her soft foods, and she got so excited she'd try to grab the spoon out of our hand. We let her try to hold it, and before long, she was a master at feeding herself from a spoon! The black 1/2 teaspoon became hers, and whenever she sees it in my hands, she gets so excited -- dancing and lots of "want some!" ensue.


None of our other parrots have shown any interest in holding the spoon themselves. What I love the most is how she uses her bottom beak to scoop the food in Certainly not dainty!

I'll attempt to take some pictures of them, but I realize I've been neglecting Daphne, the caiques, lizards, and fish on the blog lately. They are just much better behaved and get into less mischief than the greys and Rocky! But all is well and I'll try to update with pictures soon.

Greys on the sink!

Thomas came home from work last night and poured himself a small bowl of pretzel snacks to tide him over until dinner. Stella made a bee-line for the food and helped herself. You may notice the shininess on her beak. That may or may not have been made by me giving her a kiss when I had chapstick on :)

As I've mentioned in previous posts, she has decided to claim the sink as her main perch in the kitchen. This can be troublesome when we're trying to cook! Last night, Max decided to join her on the sink.

I'm still somewhat hopeful that they will strike up some sort of friendship, but I'm not holding my breath. Shortly after I took this picture, Stella made a move towards Max who immediately flew off to the safety of her stand. Prior to taking this picture, Max had been inching away -- notice her foot on my salad bowl!Of course I have a couple of Rocky pictures!

Our new morning routine includes me putting him in the bathroom while I change foods and waters. The other alternative is to keep him in his cage during this time (where he screams) because he tries to attack me. He really likes the bathroom.

Yesterday, I noticed that he had backed up into a bottle I had on the curtain rod (to separate the parrots when I bring them into the shower with me) and was holding it in between his wing and body. He did this again today. It does not appear to be sexual since he's not moving at all and is no more aggressive when I have him step up and bring him back to the living room. (He's puffed up in the picture because of the camera, but normally is not puffy!)When I enlarged this picture on the computer this morning, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I could see his tongue preening Thomas. We rarely allow our birds on our shoulders, but Rocky was in a very loving mood last night and was insistent. Thomas understands Rocky's body language, and rightly surmised that Rocky didn't have any bad intentions.This week has flown by so quickly! I have another race tomorrow, but Thomas is working, so the pressure is off on trying to beat him! I wish everyone a fantastic long weekend!

Answer to questions in the comments

I got a couple of questions in my comments from yesterday, so I thought I would answer them in a post instead of the comments.

First, the easy one! Richard asked where I get the wood I use to make toys. Rocky and Stella go through wood like crazy, so I would go broke if I couldn't make my own toys! We have a home improvement store in our area (it's not national) that sells untreated pine 2X4s, 2X6s, 4X4s, etc. Untreated is the big issue. In my area, The Home Depot only sells treated wood. You might also have a family-owned lumberyard in your area that would be willing to sell you wood. Here is a list of wood that is safe and unsafe for parrots.


Then, we take a mitre saw and chop up the planks into bird-usable sizes. Thinner for the caiques, thicker for the others. Some we drill and hang on wire, but the 2X4s are perfect size for everyone but Daphne to hold in their feet and chip, and that's what they often choose to do!

You can just use regular food dye for the wood, but we've found that our parrots will chew non-dyed just as well and since we're trying to eliminate artificial dyes from their food whenever possible, we give them undyed wood.

If you don't have, or know anyone with, a mitre saw, you can purchase pre-cut wood. The place I would go is The Parrot Asylum, from which I've always received quality components and fantastic service.


I really like making my own toys because it allows me to customize for each individual bird.


Also, thanks for letting me know about the broken link. I will fix it as soon as I post!


Onto the less pleasant question, posed by Shannon, about plans for parrots since there's a good chance they may outlive their owners. Beloved Parrot gave some good answers, but of course I have to be a bit more wordy!


First, this is something that Thomas and I have thought a lot about, even though we're relatively young (early 30s). You never know what can happen! What scares me the most is the lack of control over what happens to your parrot once you're gone. Perhaps I'm jaded by being involved in parrot rescue, but I've come to the conclusion that the majority of people who own parrots shouldn't have them.


I'm not exaggerating when I say that we get at least 20 birds, every year, surrendered to the rescue where I volunteer that haven't been allowed out of their cages in over a year. My own severe macaw, Rocky, was kept at least 6 years in his cage, not allowed out (and that's only what they admitted to). The ridiculously small cages, lack of toys and perches, and filth that we see every week is enough to bring me to tears. The horrible things that come out of these parrots' beaks, and you know that someone was yelling those things at this helpless creature. I'm tearing up now. I could go on with stories of neglect and abuse -- thrown out of a moving car in February in freezing weather, an individual with suspected Munchhausen-by-proxy that plucked her own bird -- but I try not to think about specifics too much as my goal is to remain a relatively optimistic person.


Obviously, I think the best solution is to find a responsible, bird-loving person that you trust.

Good luck with that, especially when you have several birds you'd need to place.


Finally, after going off on my tangent, I arrive at Shannon's question about willing your bird to a rescue. My biggest concern about this is that many of these are basically headed by one or two individuals. What happens when the head of the organization dies? Ideally, as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, plans are in place to keep it going, but I know that's not always the case. Also, many organizations have issues with funding. If the organization is suddenly unable to bring in enough donations or the director is unable or unwilling to cover expenses him/herself, will they start selling birds (adopting into inappropriate homes) to cover the mortgage? Or skimp on food, toys, heating? With some of the bigger organizations, are the birds getting the one-on-one time they need? Especially in a sanctuary situation where the bird is there for life, so the number of birds keeps increasing but only decreases when one of these long-lived birds dies?


Beloved Parrot mentioned some organizations, but I don't have any experience with them. I do know there was controversy recently when it became public knowledge that one of the people on the Gabriel Foundation's Board of Directors is a large-scale breeder. Personally, I don't think I'd want to put any of my birds under the care of an organization with those ethics.


The organization that I like the best right now for long-term prospects is Best Friends Animal Sanctuary. Each of my parrots recently virtually adopted one of their counterparts at this organization (although there was only one caique, so Beeps "adopted" a severe macaw, and no budgies, so Daphne "adopted" a cockatiel). They are large, well-funded, and I have been impressed with everything I've read about them. We're hoping to go out there in the next few years to see it for ourselves.


I must confess that despite a lot of thought on our part, we've personally done very little action. If Thomas and I were to die tomorrow, Rocky would go to Birdlovers Only. I know the director quite well and I know she would find him a great home or keep him. He's just so difficult and I can't bear to think of him being abused or neglected again. Calypso would go to my friend who is great with parrots, but already has a full house so she can't take everyone. Her instructions are that her parrots be euthanized on her death so I feel confident that he wouldn't be neglected or abused again, either. My parents would take, at least temporarily, Max, Daphne, Beeps, and Stella. Obviously this isn't a permanent solution (Max and Stella are likely to outlive my parents). However, those four are great birds so it would be easier to find good homes for them. Not that Rocky and Calypso aren't great birds, but they are more challenging and therefore, in my mind, more likely to be subject to neglect and/or abuse.


Since we still have a fair amount of years to live out a natural life span, I'm really hoping that we outlive the parrots. I'm also hoping that my younger siblings will become bird people, or perhaps have children who are.


Probably not the succinct answer you were hoping for, Shannon, but what else did you expect? Brevity is certainly not a strong point of mine!


I guess the bottom line is that I don't think there's a perfect solution, and it's nice to know there are other people out there thinking about things like this :)

Washington trip recap

Since I forgot my camera (again!) and didn't really have any great pictures on it anyway, I thought I'd share some pictures from our recent trip to Washington, DC.

On our first night in town, we walked around the monuments at sunset. I really liked the way that this picture turned out. You can see the famous Lincoln statue in the background, and the sunset was unbelievably colorful!If anyone will be in the Washington area, I would highly recommend a trip to the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery. In addition to seeing fantastic art, they recently enclosed the courtyard and this was one of the most pleasant places we found to hang out for a bit. It was extremely peaceful, and we loved lying on the benches and looking up at the ceiling.

Thomas joked that he may start a career in insect photography. I will spare you the pictures of flies and bees, but here are two of his favorite butterfly pictures. I believe one was taken at the zoo and the other at the botanic gardens, but I can't be sure.This goldfinch was pretty well camouflaged by the sunflowers near where he chose to perch! We saw him while sitting outside of the US Botanic Garden, waiting for it to open.We did quite a bit of hanging out in gardens! Much of our previous travel has been in off season, when the gardens are nowhere near their peak beauty, so we really enjoyed this aspect of our trip, even though it did mean that we were there during some pretty hot times!

These birds were taking turns cooling themselves by bathing:There is a rose garden right outside of the Smithsonian Castle, and I think these were my favorites (although there were many beautiful flowers to choose from, so let's just say they were near the top!):Because we're Smithsonian members (which I would highly recommend to anyone as you get a fantastic monthly magazine -- that's actually the main reason we decided to vacation in DC!), we got to take a behind-the-scenes tour of the Castle, which is the visitors' information center and where some administrative offices are located.

This tower of taxidermy was in the behind-the-scenes section. This was the only parrot that I saw in that tower. I like to think he died a natural death and then was preserved:We had a wonderful time at the National Zoo (another Smithsonian entity). We took tons of pictures, but I'll only put a few of them here.

They have a wonderful Amazon exhibit that starts on the lower level with giant aquariums. Although I'm not sure why they were in the Amazon exhibit, we saw some Australian Rainbowfish......just like what's in our aquarium at home.I did feel a bit bad for our guys that they have nowhere near the options in their lives as these at the zoo (or those in the wild, for that matter).

Then, on top, there's a replica of a jungle, with free-flying birds and a few other creatures. Of course it was the birds that interested us most!

I found this guy to be exceedingly beautiful, and he kind of seemed to be following us around. He reminded me a bit of a cardinal.And this guy was sitting on his nest -- I don't think this was in the Amazon exhibit, though. Even though it's only been a week, my mind is starting to get fuzzy on the details!Every night, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts has a free concert at 6:00 pm. We had a great time listening to an artist we had never heard of before and ended up buying his CD. We went up to the terrace, which had lovely views. Here is the Jefferson Memorial -- we never made it there, unfortunately!The morning of our departure, we had a few hours to sightsee, and we took a trip out to see the National Cathedral. Woodrow Wilson is buried there, the only president buried within the confines of DC.

I was struck by how beautiful this statue of Washington was with the light streaming in filtered by the stained-glass windows.Once again, we had a fabulous trip. I do love traveling! Even though I miss the parrots, and I think it's a bit unfair to them to leave them for so long. I'm glad to see that they're starting to understand the routine that takes place when we leave. It now takes much less time for things to return to normal once we get back, and they're starting to feel more comfortable with our bird sitter. Since you never know what will happen in the future, we're trying to travel as much as we can now while we have our health and the means to do so!

Another short entry

It's taking me a bit longer than I thought to get things settled after our vacation, both at home and work. Even though I was home last night, I took only two pictures! Also, I've been too busy to go around and read everyone's blogs, which means I'm 2 weeks behind. Argh!

In any case, Max amazes me with her dexterity. She is folded almost in half in order to preen her stomach!
Rocky climbed up on our plant stand last night. He has a way of posing in such an adorable manner. Something about the way he cocks his head!
That's all I've got for today. Perhaps tonight will be a bit more eventful.

I went to the farmers' market today and bought salad mix, onions, tomatoes, and a few other things. I've been going through salad withdrawal the past week and a half without our farmer's wonderful mix. I told him I have no idea how I'm going to get through the winter! He told me that he'll be low on salad mix for next week, so I'm going to make sure that I get there right when it opens. What an addiction to have -- something that's unavailable half the year. (And not to sound snobby, but grocery store greens mixes just don't do it).

If I get really crabby in October and start having mood swings, you'll know why!

Back into the routine

The humans and animals in our house are getting back into our routines.

For Stella, that apparently includes eating my breakfast! I left the room briefly to give Rocky a piece of apple (he was hanging out under his cage) and returned to find this.
I was amazed at how much she ate, and how quickly! Max won't even lick apples -- they're that undesirable to her.

As I mentioned yesterday, Stella's flying improved exponentially while we were gone, even though she apparently didn't fly at all during that week.

She is in a rather nesty mode, and has been flying down to the kitchen floor and then trying to squeeze herself in the space under the dishwasher. While I'm pleased that she's able to fly down (that is one of the harder flight skills to learn but so important in case you need to call an escaped parrot down out of a tree), it can be frustrating to have to interrupt my breakfast 10 times to pick her up off of the floor. I don't want her getting too comfortable down there!

I don't have too much else to report as I had a meeting last night after work and returned home after Thomas had already put the parrots to bed for the evening. I really regret agreeing to volunteer for certain things when it takes me out of my house for the evening.

But I should be home all night tonight and will hopefully have more pictures!

I'm back!

We're back from our vacation and had a wonderful time! Hopefully I'll be able to post pictures in the next couple of days; I don't have my camera with me right now. I also should have time to go around and read everyone's blogs by the end of the week, after I get situated at work again.

The morning of our trip, Thomas received bites from the three usual suspects: Beeps, Rocky, and Stella. I'm not sure how they think that will make us want to spend more time with them :)

The parrots survived our absence. I got their report from the wonderful lady who watches them when we're out of town; I'll call her S.


S said that every day, Max came out, flew to Calypso's cage, and then carefully supervised S's every move. She'd fly around the house a bit towards the end, but wouldn't leave the living room until all of the food and water dishes had been changed. S had a bit of a problem last time with Max not wanting to go back in her cage when S had to leave. Always thinking, S told Max that she'd get a shower once she got back in her cage, so Max looked forward to going back in because she loves showers!


Calypso loves S and her daughter, so he had a good week. As usual, he was too excited to be handled when we got home, but was back to normal Monday morning, so he recovered in about 60 hours this time.

Daphne jumped to the back of her cage when S opened the door and wouldn't come out.

Rocky didn't swear at anyone this time, so an improvement! S had one issue with him towards the end of the trip. He went under his cage and wouldn't come out. I told her next time to wave a towel in front of the cage. He finally did come out, but this delayed her departure from our house by several minutes.

Beeps, like Calypso, loves S and her daughter, so he had a good week as well. He was only too excited to trust for about 12 hours this time, and Thomas and I were both able to avoid post-trip bites.

Stella wouldn't come out of her cage for the first four days or so. After that, she would come out on top of her cage, but didn't fly around and resisted attempts by S to handle her. She must have spent the week plotting future flying maneuvers as she impressed us with her skills this weekend! She's made many living room to kitchen flights, made U-turns when choosing a different path mid-flight, and has been flying to the floor regularly.

I don't think that the lizards or fish even realize when we're gone!

So, we had a great trip but are very happy to be back. The parrots are definitely getting used to us leaving and returning.