Free as a bird or Lost & hungry

Up there somewhere - I can hear her! 

We were out and flying free a few times.  Twice I recall in Dubbo and maybe 19 times in Jimboomba..!  Sometimes she flew to other people for that elusive box of seed and sometimes she came home herself.  There's a difference in escaped and lost.  Lost is when you can't find your way:  Escaped is intending to run away from somewhere / someone & so you can be escaped & lost too!

I don't think " Bird" ever intentionally escaped..  She'd be flying to your shoulder as you walked out the door (as happened in Dubbo before we had hanging flyscreens because she wanted to come too), or she'd want to be with mum in the winebego just 10 feet from her, or she'd like the lillypilly berries or simply to bathe if it was raining.   And whilst she had free reign of the house the longest flight she could take was a straight 10 meters at 2 meters high.  Consider that when you find yourself 100 meters away and 50 meters UP!   Always she'd hang out and sing out to me - either saying "look at me!" or "come on catch up - this is cool" 

We always got her back and I believe that the zillions of signs I (we) always put up contributed and an add in the local paper worked once too. One lady was on her way across Brisbane with her when the saw the sign driving out of our street - she was only 4 door away.  I ended up making and keeping the emergency Find Bird box to reuse the signs, complete with staplegun! "Bird" also starred in a Lost birds article in RSPCAs Imprint one year. An old saying I remember when I was growing up - "If you own something set if free - if it comes back it's yours, if it doesn't it never was"  (Don't do this though - could be considered abandonment!) But I always said she owned me...  I considered clipping her wing or locking her up in a small cage and that fifth freedom just kept coming back..  "FREEDOM TO EXHIBIT NORMAL BEHAVIOUR"  so if I did either of these  I would take away that freedom - so I didn't!

I always gave a $50 reward for people being honest.  One woman actually said that they wanted to keep her and not tell me she'd found her.  She actually found the people.  Once she flew onto a farrier while he was shoeing a horse!  and in Dubbo she found some wildlife carers who rang me and said she must be your bird she's in my plate eating cake!  After 8 years in Jimboomba she learnt the terrain and if the seasons were okay and the wild birds didn't chase her off she'd come back herself. I'd take my office outside or sometimes my spaghetti bol (she was my best fan of my spaghetti) and she'd build up the confidence to get herself down.  It was pretty awesome to see her circling the house and contact calling from 100meters up there!  When I come back I want to be a Macaw flying the canyons of South America!

Human "Bird" and bird fosters....

Bird welcomes Eclectus parrot - or maybe not?

"Bird" was always interested in whatever I had in the box.  She knew that boxes usually had am animal that I was bringing home for whatever reason.  Mostly if they stayed in the box there were no issues.  But once they started flying she'd freak.  What is this thing?  Why is it following me?  She always thought she was a human - so birds were not her thing at all.  I'd have to come up with alternatives when my hand-reared birds got to this stage.

Most birds, especially parrots, once hand-reared have major psychological changes and we as the guardians are challenged everyday to address the issues and fulfill the companion role.  Birds are very social creatures by nature, but when they think they're a person they want to be with people - or often one people in particular.
 
The red bird in the photo is "Roseann" a female Eclectus parrot I was rearing at the time for Dreamworlds' Australian Wildlife Experience where I was Vet nurse / Bird keeper.  She was named after my mother because her and her brother were hatched on my mother, Roseanns' birthday, 28th Dec...  I think the year was 2002 and we were living at Coomera right next to Dreamworld and down the road from the pub (The Boat House Tavern).   

Roseanns' brother died but taught me a valuable lesson about round worms in birds. Transmitted from their parents the chicks were infected quite badly.  After drenching to rid them of the parasites the boy died as a result of a bolus of worms impacting in his gut.  Note to bird keepers - have a preventative medical program for your birds too - worm them as you do your dog!  Have a vet check every year. 

The eccies also taught me about mapping stress in feather growth.  As their feathers grew they had stress lines horizontally across them - like you have on your fingernails from time to time.  I could map when they were stressed.  A line that represented the growth stage when they were abandoned by their mum and dad and taken into my care.  A line that represented the day that I took them to the vet and drenched them for parasites.  And a line were they were weaned from their hand-rearing formula.  There were probably more but I don't remember now.   Bird never had any stress lines - I was always checking :). 

Birds have allergies too

King parrot in rehab.  Bird liked foster parrots until they started flying!

Birds have allergies too.  And by accidents, trials and errors we were to find a few of "Birds" peculiarities.  Apart from the usual things that birds should NEVER eat - like chocolate, dish-washing detergent, wine and avocado - the stop go tablets from my Brazilian trip!, we found a few more...

"Bird" encouraged me to cook from scratch so that I knew what was in our food.  In the early days she had absolutely terrible table manners and would land or jump right in the middle of a plate of food!  Geesh she even picked the bits out of Eddie Marfleets teeth once!  eeww!!  He thought it was great! Eddie was a mechanic at the zoo then..    

She would come to me on occasion acting irritated I used to think she loved me but what she wanted me to do was save her from the imaginary crawlies that were running around under her feathers.  I deduced she was having allergic reactions like hives that were itchy. Mum used to all them THE IRRITS. These episodes would last from 10 - 20 minutes and then subside.  I even discussed the options of treatment with friend & vet Peter Wilson but treatments would take about 20 minutes to be effective anyway so not really of any benefit.

Spaghetti bolognaise was a favourite in our house - it still is - but every time I cooked it she'd have a reaction.  What could it be - I use all natural - tin tomatoes & tomato paste the only pre made products....  So we started a trial by removing produce one by one.  Turned out to be mushrooms! So no mushrooms in  our fridge again..  This was in Dubbo I learnt this.  So powerful was her allergy that it recurred in Jimboomba after eating fresh spinach from the garden!  Hey what else has she got into I thought - but as we searched I realise that I had recently bought a load of mushroom compost from the local mushroom farm and had grown the spinach in it!  WOW!  The spinach had taken up the mushroom component that "Bird" was allergic too!

It was always awful when an episode occurred - sometimes I could trace it back to the kids red lolly she'd found, mums unattended wine, sometimes not.   There is one more message here and it's again with spinach.  I am a big believer in fresh greens for most captive birds - especially parrots.   I used a so called safe fertilizer on the spinach about a week before - we'd hosed the spinach - it had also rained, yet we had an episode after eating it!  A real eye opener about how chemicals and nutrients are taken up by the food that we in turn are eating.  Being human and a lot more robust than birds my guess is that a lot of episodes (like a headache - or an itch) goes totally unnoticed as related to something we ate?

I made spaghetti with Chloe yesterday for all of us and the chickens and it broke my heart that "Bird" wasn't there on my shoulder impatient to wait for it to cool down..  Still lots of holes in our world.  I took her perch out of the bedroom and that's going okay.  I'm having trouble with having removed the newspaper for catching pooh on the fridge though..  I might have to put it back for a while. 




 

Note to Self - Cupboard Doors!

As was her inquiring mind and need to be included "Bird"  tried to be included and involved, and usually was, in everything.  We were cleaning out the linen cupboard one day.  She was checking that the detergent was of animal friendly status, the piles were too neat & needed to be dishevelled (just a little) and she was checking that the elusive sunflower seed box wasn't hiding in there!  That's were sunflower seeds come from you know...  :)  the cupboard. 

When we were done I shut the door.   Squark! Squark! Squark! ....  What! What! What!!..  penny drops!!  OMG!  "Birds" feet are stuck in the door..  You know like when you were a kid and your finger gets stuck in the car door, and the double wammy when you had to wait for someone to find the keys and open the door again..  It was like that..  I was mortified!  I had images of ..  well you can guess.  When I caught up with her all was okay just our heart rates were racing.  We were lucky and not because of any good management. Needless to say we never lost sight of where bird was before anything - and I mean anything, was closed again.  Bird also became wary of moving doors, especially those that had humans attached.   

A Name? ... Grab - Flirt -- Bird!

A name... No-one did come forward to claim this very special parrot.  At the time I found this surprising but since my time at RSPCA & have seen first hand the numbers of unclaimed stray birds makes me think that generally - and not you guys because you're the converted, but for the most part, people find birds disposable!  Look at the stalls at the markets every weekend...  It means there IS a demand AND a supply!  Please don't buy from markets - it's like buying from a puppy farm!

Generally speaking most people have some trouble with their dog or cat behaviour and can't correctly interpret them.  Now bird behaviour!  Step up a notch or 3- Way to subtle for the untrained, uninterested mammalian eye - until it's quite obvious with that dreaded bite.. lol  ..We had a few of those...& then we misintepret that behaviour too What a horrible bird when in fact we missed the signal that said No! - No Means No! You just missed the signal.

Any way a name!  Let's see - Tried all the sylabyls & sounds looking for reactions...  nothing.   I had a dog at the time - a crazy misinterpreted & psychologically really messed up "Snatch" that had also come along missing a home  Thanks to Stewies new missus Anna!  - So "Grab" -  'Snatch' and 'Grab' - it didn't stick :(   Back to "Bird".


We have done some media where she required a real name - We've used "Flirt" for these occasions.  Flirt because if we were driving anywhere buckled up in her traveling cage in the passenger seat she'd chat up the fellas.   Summer with the windows down was always amusing & brought some funny reactions.  She was particularly attracted to the truckies (they were high up in a cab so she could see them better) and male pedestrians.  She'd chortle away and sing out to them fluffing her feathers - "Look at me!  Come over here!  Wanna have babies!"  I could see her say, lol.  But that name didn't stick either.   I ended up settling for "bird".  It worked - Where's Bird? You bringing Bird? How's Bird? Where are you BIRD!? - everyone knew who we were talking about - even Bird! 

Start at the Beginning of our Journey

Cuddles - African Elephant

We came about to meet when I was between elephant keeper and vet nurse at the Western Plains Zoo in Dubbo  - I can't remember the date or be sure of the year but Ros our record keeper at the time would!  "Bird" was one of 300 sick & injured animals that the then sponsored by NRMA, wildlife clinic treated each year.  A far cry from the 6000 at RSPCA in Brisbane.  It was either Jodie or Fiona with me?

Not endemic (locally native) to the Dubbo region we weren't familiar with the Superb parrot breed.  We had to take to the books for identification.  Not simply a green parrot - look closer... red feathered legs, a flat head, long tail, hues of blue and orange.    

It was also very apparent that she wasn't "wild" either!  She was particularly stressed in a cage and unlike a wild bird trying to get out a back way she showed real signs of distress at not being able to come out the front way & onto any shoulder.  I'm a sucker so I took her home for the night... someone MUST be missing her I thought!   

Zippy - Asiatic Lion in the Veterinary Quarantine Center

A Superb story: The Superb Parrot that owned me!

A Superb story: The Superb Parrot that owned me!: Superb parrot - AKA - "Bird" R.I.P. 19?? - 1998 - 2011