Thomas took Rocky downstairs with him last night to supervise his workout (Rocky as personal trainer?) I told Rocky I was going to take his picture, and he turned around and gave me his back. You can see that his wings have almost grown out. He has flown at me three times in the past two days, so we may have to clip his wings. We're currently in discussion about this. However, in this picture you can see all of the different colors that Rocky is. He is so incredibly gorgeous!

I found Max pretending to be a clean dish the other day. I'm not sure why she decided to start hanging out here after two years in this house!
Of course Max has this desire to explore and destroy. I was content to leave her hanging out on our dish drying rack, but then she had to try to eat the cabinets! So she was removed.

And here she is "helping" with our preparation of bean burritos. We've already had to cover the onions and cheese due to her help -- is the lettuce next? She likes to fly over and throw the pieces of lettuce on the floor.

Thomas and I first ran into the movie "Dick" while on our honeymoon. We loved it so much that when we returned to the States, we had to seek it out. This was in a time before the Internet was ubiquitous, so we stopped in several stores, trying to convince clerks we weren't looking for porn, before we found it. Anyway, I just rewatched it and still love it! It's even funnier if you've recently seen "All the President's Men" or if you have some background knowledge of Watergate.

Have a fantastic weekend!

All about Rocky, or How long would it have taken me to get to my 100th post if we hadn't taken this guy into our home?

Being the playful macaw that he is, and living with a playful mate, Rocky often is carted around by one foot like this. He loves it! He always reminds me of those posters from the 1980s with cute pet photos and some sort of saying like "Just Hanging Around!"The next photos and video are an illustration of what happens in our house almost every night. After work, we are in the living room, and Rocky wants to be near us. The rest of the parrots are generally ok with just being in the same room as us. They do get physical interaction with us, but do not want as much of it as this guy! Even when Thomas isn't home, Rocky will climb up on the couch to hang out with me.
I swear that we sweep up our floors every single day (sometimes more than once)! But Rocky chips up wood like his life depended on it. That's why you'll often see flipflops in the backgrounds of our pictures. I wouldn't want to risk walking barefoot in our house!

If Thomas is feeling charitable, he will help Rocky in his quest to get to the couch by putting his leg down and letting Rocky climb up. I love this picture because you can see Rocky's left foot grabbing on to Thomas's big toe for leverage.

However, last night, Rocky must have realized that Thomas was wearing pants with an opening large enough for him to fit into! (Thomas was still wearing hospital scrubs from work).


Is Thomas's leg really that large, or is there a macaw in his pants?Thomas was shaking his leg and trying to get Rocky out for a while, and then I decided to take a video and call him out -- it worked! Luckily, a quirk of his is that no matter where he is or what he's doing, if you call his name, he has to come over to find out why.

Max strikes again!

I have written on several occasions about the trouble that Max finds. Here, for example. And here. And here. Sense a pattern?

On Sunday, we went to a local apple orchard and also picked up some popping corn. I left the bag of corn on the counter, partially hidden -- but apparently not well enough!

Max flew into the kitchen, as she often does, and when I next checked on her, found this mess, and Max sitting on her stand, asking for a kiss! When will we learn?

As I have written many times, I am unable to handle Rocky and must use a stick. Because I really don't want to get bit, I keep a stick handy to me at all times in case he decides to walk near me. He really is so compliant. He steps up on the stick as soon as I ask him to, and I can even put the stick at his level several feet away, ask him to step up, and he stops whatever he's doing, runs to the stick, and steps up!

A few days ago, I was on the couch and my stick was laying on the floor in front of the couch in case I needed to use it. I looked down and saw Rocky, perched on the stick, preening himself.

When I look at him in poses like this, it's hard to believe what his personality is like. I think he looks so angelic -- but I know better!

Yesterday was another beautiful day. A little on the warm side, especially for October, but I'm not complaining! Thomas had the day off, so we decided to go for a hike. There were so many people out enjoying what will probably be one of the last nice days of the year. As we walked by this tree, we were both struck by how beautiful and majestic it was.

This is the spring that we were hiking to see. Unfortunately, it was murky and we couldn't see any of the water bubbling up from the ground. Thomas loves springs, so we try to hike to them as often as we can. There are some beautiful springs that are a little bit further from our house that we will go and see later this fall (if the weather continues to cooperate) or next spring.

On our way back, we ran into two snakes. Thomas was walking slightly in front of me, and he almost stepped on both of these guys, about 15 minutes apart. Luckily, they moved in time and so did he! But it was still enough of a scare to get his heart racing. I know, they were probably more scared than he was! And yes, after the second snake, he did make me lead the way, which turned out to be snake-free!




Thomas was playing with Rocky yesterday as we were lazing, watching football, and I was also knitting. After they were doing this for a bit, I remembered the blog and ran to get my camera. Rocky loves this kind of one-on-one attention he gets from his chosen person. We would never do this to any of our other birds, as they don't enjoy it. But, when Rocky's in the mood, he will run up to Thomas and roll over, indicating that he wants to play like this.



Rocky had a great weekend, as he got to spend a lot of time with Thomas. Sunday morning, we were listening to the Beastie Boys. Thomas is a huge fan, and I like them too (although not as much). However, the parrots LOVE this music. I think it's the beat, but they all start dancing when they hear this music. Then, Rocky started rapping. I couldn't get it on video, but he was repeating, "Rock Rock Rock Rock Rock Rocky" along with the music. I will attempt to get this on tape at a later date!!!

We have a large wooden plant stand in our kitchen that is filled with plants. Beeps's stand is near the plant stand, but, until recently, he hadn't shown much interest in the plants. That was Rocky's turf. However, in the past week or so, he's started jumping to the plant stand and hanging out with the plants. Sometimes he bites off little pieces, but mostly he just walks around. Here's another picture where I caught some weird eye activity!

I went grocery shopping a few days ago, and picked up some hot peppers for the parrots. Here's Max, enjoying hers (notice her pinning eyes!) I always have to be careful about touching my eyes after having a parrot on my hand that has recently eaten hot peppers!

And here's a video that shows off part of Rocky's personality. Many parrots like to play a pick-up type game: they drop something and their human picks it up. Rocky is no exception! The difference with him than with any other parrot I've seen play this game, is the hostility he seems to show towards the objects he discards!

Elsa is going through another molt. I helped her take off a lot of her skin before thinking about taking a picture, but here you can see the excess skin above her tail and on her upper right side. She is finally starting to get her normal colors back after having her skin stained by the substrate at the pet store. We've had the lizards for almost 5 months now!



The lizards' tanks are in between Rocky's cage and the couch. He has decided to use their stand and Elsa's tank as a way for him to get on the couch. Here he is climbing up to her tank. Then, he runs across the top to the side by the couch, and hoists himself up on the arm of the couch. We do not like this because of the electrical cords and heat required for the lizards, so we have been supervising more closely and are brainstorming other ways to keep him off of the lizards!

A few weeks ago I had posted a video of a caterpillar and got a nice comment on it, so I thought I'd post this video of a bee crawling around on a flower. I had taken this during a hike in April, before I had started the blog. I just love seeing animals in nature and this bee seemed particularly interesting to me!

Thomas and I spend much of our after-work time in our living room, which is also where all of the animals live. I try to be aware of where everyone is constantly, but every 10 minutes or so, I visually make sure that all of the parrots are around and not getting into trouble. Yesterday as I'm doing this check, I notice that Rocky has burrowed under the newspaper that we lay daily in front of his cage to catch his poop. I could not see him at all -- just a moving bump. I did take a picture of this, but decided not to waste space on the blog. If you can't visualize what I'm talking about, put something parrot-sized under a piece of newspaper -- not all that interesting!


Whenever I call Rocky's name, he stops what he's doing and gives me his full attention, which is what he's doing in this picture. Notice the green plastic peanut he'd previously thrown out of his foraging bucket and the destruction he'd already wreaked on the newspaper!

Thomas has a glass of ice water with dinner every night, and yesterday he had Beeps perched on his hand when he went to make this. Beeps loved the freezer! He was trying to eat all of the ice cubes as Thomas deposited them into his glass and later lapped up the ice water as though we didn't give him a clean bowl of water in his cage. Of course, when he saw me with the camera, he had to focus on me instead of the ice!

As I've written before, Rocky loves to drink the leftover nut milk and cereal pieces from Thomas's cereal dessert. When Thomas is done, he places the bowl on the living room floor, and Rocky runs over to get his treat. When Rocky is done, Max usually will drink some of the milk as well. Here is a video of Rocky's routine. Of course, Thomas could take the spoon out for him, but it's more fun this way! On a side note, if Max is the first one there, she leaves the spoon in and works around it.

In April 2006, I was bidding on a budgie painting on ebay. The picture reminded me of a mixture between my late budgie Lenny and my current budgie Ethel. Unfortunately, between the time I placed my bid and the time the auction ended, Ethel had died. I was devastated, and hoped that I would be outbid. If I won the painting, I was going to donate it to the parrot rescue where I volunteer so they could sell it and make some money. It was going to be too hard to see this painting as it would always remind me of Ethel's death, given the timing.

And then I received the painting in the mail.

It took my breath away -- it was so beautiful -- and oddly, it made me happy instead of sad. I contacted the artist, Mary Hughes, to see if she'd be willing to do a commission painting of Ethel, and to my delight, she said yes! Here is Ethel:


Of course, I was hooked, and had to get portraits done of all of my birds! It sounds cliche, but the paintings are even more beautiful in person!

Max:


Calypso:


Daphne:


Rocky:


Beeps:


I am just blown away by Mary's talent, and feel so lucky to have found her! She is one of the nicest people I have ever known, and puts so much effort into making sure that each painting accurately represents the animal. I can see this very clearly in the two caique pictures. Looking at them, I don't have any question as to whether it's Beeps or Calypso -- she has captured their essence!

Thomas and I ordered paintings of all of my parents' birds, and of my sister's cat, as they make great gifts. We will have the lizards done once they have completed their molts so we know what they should look like.

The above paintings are all copyrighted by Mary, but she said that I could put them up on the blog -- thanks so much!

To see more examples of Mary's work, or if you would like to order a portrait of your own pet, visit her website. Here is the link to the custom pet portraits page. The process is so easy -- send her some pictures and answer whatever questions she has. Pretty soon, you have a wonderful keepsake!

Thomas had to work from 7 am Sunday to noon Monday again, which meant that I was home alone with the birds for most of the day. Calypso loves this, as he's not a huge fan of Thomas, but the rest of the birds miss him. Especially, as you might imagine, Rocky. After searching the house for him for a few hours, he realizes that Thomas isn't there, and settles into his cage.

Earlier that day, I had put a phone book on top of his cage, and you can see that he did shred it a bit. But, mostly, he sulks in his cage and waits for his mate to return.

All of my birds have foraging buckets on the outside of their cages. These are stainless steel buckets that I fill with toy parts and talon toys. I used to put some treats in there for them to find, but I found that they were just as happy to forage only for toys. Here is Max doing a bit of foraging in her bucket. This can keep her busy for hours as she'll toss things out and when she finds a special toy, she brings it to the top of her cage and plays with it for a bit. When she loses interest, she heads back to her bucket. I can refill the bucket with items she dropped on the floor and she has to start again! I do make sure to rotate the items in her bucket on a regular basis so that she never knows what she's going to find!

This is what the floor under her cage looks like after a bit of foraging. The talon toys in this picture are from TNT Toys. I buy many of their foraging components from Parrot Asylum and have placed an order that should arrive sometime this week, so I can show you more examples of their foraging at that time!

When Thomas plays video games, he sits on the floor under Max's cage. When she sees him there, she gets so excited, runs over to her foraging bucket, and proceeds to throw out all of the items in there -- directly at him! We think this is quite funny, so we laugh and encourage it. I'll try to capture that sometime!

I thought this was one of the cutest pictures of Rocky that I've ever taken. Of course, he has seed hulls on his bottom beak! But his pose and the look in his eye is fantastic!





Here is a video of an adorable Rocky. I love his little old lady voice. He will rarely talk in front of the camera, so there is a bit of dull space between words (and I say "Hi Rocky" a few times, so watch to see if his beak is open or not!) If you listen closely in the background, you can hear Calypso laughing. Rocky usually calls himself "Rock" and only adds the "y" when he's feeling particularly lonely.





I was thinking that I often post adorable (to me, at least!) stories, photos, and videos of Rocky, and I don't want to leave anyone with the impression that severe macaws are easy birds! Because they are not! Mini macaws are often sold as easier macaws because they are smaller than their larger cousins, but that is not true! They are often nippier and more challenging than the larger macaws. So, I decided to get a video of him screaming. This is not the true effect, as he stops during the screams to do his begging sounds, plus there's no way a computer sound file can replicate what it's like to be in the same room as this!

It's hard for me to capture him screaming on video because he screams for attention and when I point the camera at him, he's getting attention and therefore doesn't need to scream! So, I had to pretend that I was talking on the phone, leaving only one hand free for camera operation (excuses for the bad stability!)



And then there's my wonderful Calypso. I don't talk about him much because he doesn't create as much havoc in my life as the other parrots! He also doesn't like the camera as much as the others, so it's hard to capture what I want as he often starts puffing up and screeching when the camera is pointed at him.

The other day, though, he started doing this strange motion when he saw the camera, which I capture here. I've never seen him do this before, and I'm not exactly sure what it means. I'm assuming he's either showing off for the camera or threatening it? In any case, once the camera was out of sight, he returned to being his normal, wonderful self!