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Pajarita's update

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Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Tue Apr 10, 2018 10:08 am

She is doing GREAT!!! Eating produce [today was green beans and pears], stepping up without a problem [although my husband wanted to scratch her head and she lunged at his fingers -but, like I told him, it was his fault because he would not like a stranger touching him, either!] and, the day before yesterday, she got on my shoulder and was preening my hair and kissing my neck! What a sweetheart!!!! But, as it always is with new birds, she is like the song: hot and cold, yes and no, in and out and, so far today, she has refused to leave her cage even though her door has been opened since 6:15 am. And we are still trying to figure out what she calls herself because one thing I know is that it's not Gryphon! I started calling her Griffa or Griffy but it doesn't seem to 'register'... There is one sound that she makes often, it sounds like Keh koo and it is a common quaker vocalization so I might end up calling her Keku.

Zoey Senegal is sticking to me like glue, something she does every time a new bird comes in so I was prepared for it. And Davy Redbelly is fascinated by her -most likely because with her turquoise and grey coloring, she resembles a female redbelly a lot.
Last edited by Pajarita on Wed Apr 11, 2018 10:18 am, edited 1 time in total.
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby liz » Wed Apr 11, 2018 5:42 am

Myrtle would not let me touch her until she was able to fly again. When she landed on the floor she would come to me and climb up to my shoulder so I could walk her back to the top of her cage.
I did do a kind of flooding though. I would back her up until she had to step up. I would then say "pretty bird pretty bird ha ha ha" then set her back down. I don't know where I came up with that but she learned when I asked her to step up that she would get only that much contact from me unless she wanted more. She then started stepping off the top of her cage to my shoulder so I would give her a tour of the house and it's people. I did not keep her more than a minute before walking her back to the top of her cage.
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liz
Macaw
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 7234
Location: Hernando FL
Number of Birds Owned: 12
Types of Birds Owned: DYH Amazon Rambo
BF Amazon Myrtle
Cockatiels: Shadow Tammy Flutter Phoenix Jackie
Andy Impy Louise Twila Leroy
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Wed Apr 11, 2018 10:23 am

I was able to scratch her head and neck yesterday afternoon but, today, she came out when I first uncovered and opened her cage, rode my shoulder and spent some time on the canary hens flight cage while I was doing them. Then I put her on her stand on the table while I was doing the parrots cages in the living and dining room but, right now, she is still in her cage even though her door is open. It's OK, it's always like this with new birds, two steps forward, one back, two forward, two back, etc. It's just a matter of sticking to the routine and being consistent and, eventually, she will join in just like all the other birds.
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Fri May 11, 2018 9:52 am

Everybody doing great! A quick one because spring is super busy for me and I still have to figure out the digital camera so I can take pictures of the kittens I raised and have for adoption.

Budgie flock increased by two because my contractor asked me if I could trim the beak of his girlfriend's budgie and, as I explained that it takes more than just trimming and offered to do the liver treatment and switch to a better diet, he brought me the pair they have. One is an older female and the other is still a baby with black eyes. That poor hen did not stop eating the greens I gave them for two entire days even though I started them on a multivitamin supplement right away [they were being fed just budgie seed mix and nothing else!]. Both are doing great, eating gloop like champions and munching on fresh greens every day. My own are also doing very well but the babies still have black eyes and, although I think that I am beginning to see a change in their ceres color, I am still not 100 pct sure of their gender.

Paquita and Rajah Plet doing great. She looks like a duck with an almost flat beak because the flakes that she had from on top of it started falling off. I have a nest I had ordered made out for them and I might give it to her.

Codee GCC and Pablo PFC are also doing very well but I am thinking that she must be very hormonal because she has been chewing the paper at the bottom of the cage so I gave her an entire magazine for her destroy but I might give her the second nest I had made... we'll see.

Amazons are doing good, chewing up a storm, hiding inside the boxes, etc. Naida, as it happens every single year, scares the crap out of me because she spends almost her entire day laying inside a box and even sleeps by resting her head on the floor. I see this every single year and, although I tell myself not to worry, that it's not that she is sick, I still worry about her.

Senegals chewing the back of my curtains, magazines and boxes like crazy but all it's good, no aggression, no screams, no nothing but love.

Davy ARB is driving me NUTS!!! Lord, he is such a naughty, naughty bird! Gets into everything, chews wiress and cables if he finds one, steals food from everybody even though he gets exactly the same thing as everybody else, etc. But he makes the juiciest, bestest SMACK! kisses ever! :lol: Isis ARB is a sweet girl whose only naughtiness is to chew the edge of doors [sight] BUT because she is one of my husband's favorite, I don't get any grief for it.

Javi Caique and Keku Quaker are doing GREAT! I really lucked out with these two new birds because Javi ajusted in record time and Keku appears to be doing the same. She has been eating produce every morning and, although I had to teach her how to eat some of it [like how to open a sugar snap, etc], she has taken to it like a duck to water! So far, no screams, no bites, no nothing! I gave her a large bowl for her water instead of the little one she had before and she bathes almost every day now. I also changed her roosting perch because, although she had a beautiful manzanita one, it was way too large for her feet so I replaced it with a branch better fitted for her and will be giving the big manzanita to the Amazon ladies.

Linus Too and Sophie CAG continue their weird relationship to the point that when she flies to my shoulder, Linus screams like a maniac in jealousy :lol:

Finches doing good. Hen laid a couple of eggs but stopped. Quails are eating a large range of fruits and veggies now since I discovered that, if I chop things very, very small and spread them on the floor of the cage, they will eat them without a problem. But I think I have two males instead of a male and female because there has been no eggs whatsoever.

Cardinal doing good, eating fresh produce now that it's spring. He is incredibly attuned to the season, when it comes to his diet and, hardly ever eats any fruit during the winter but, come spring, he chows them down like there's no tomorrow!

And I got two wonderful surprises to celebrate my Mothers Day! I had gotten so busy with the too young kittens that I had to bottle-feed that I had not put the canary pair I wanted to breed together from lack of time and, one day, I found the hens had started to lay on their own. This, in itself, is not bad BUT the first clutch is the best one of the year and, as I only allow them one single clutch of four eggs, if they start on their own, you lose the 'good' window for it. So, I figured 'What the heck! I'll put two pairs together and see what happens' This way, even if I got a smaller second clutch from both of them, I would still end up with three or four babies. Maria started laying two days after I put her with Lucca and, as she had already laid two or three eggs on her own, chances were, these were all clear. Yesterday, when I was cleaning their cage, I noticed a single piece of eggshell at the bottom and thought she must have broken one by accident. This morning, remembering that broken egg, I put my hand and very lightly lower the tips of my fingers inside the nest so I could count how many eggs were left in the nest and LO AND BEHOLD! I touched warm little fuzzy heads!!! The eggs were not infertile and they all hatched! :hatched: I don't even know how many babies there are in there because I did not even look into the nest when she was laying them but there must be, at least, two of them because there was more than one little head. Magdalena was put with Luciano but, although he did not attack her, she did not make a nest so I figured the whole season was lost with them - which did not matter at all, actually, as I only wanted to breed Maria and Lucca although my husband was all enthused about Luciano [his 'son' because he helped handfeed him] having babies while I don't have a whole lot of hope for him because he was handfed. But she did lay an egg yesterday so we will see...

And, to put the icing on the cake, the white dove I had been feeding and had disappeared, which made me think she had died over the winter, showed up again in the pigeon flock. AND, the beautiful male that I had not seen for months and months also showed up!

Now, to adopt out the kittens!
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Sun May 20, 2018 9:19 am

Well, what I have been fearing and trying to avoid, did happen: Paquita lost her top beak. I am not going to write here my reaction but it did involve A LOT of cursing on my part! Little stupid bird would not stop attacking everybody! It happened last night and, this morning, she still came at my hand screeching and threatening to bite -even with no beak to do it with!
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Tue May 22, 2018 11:09 am

Paquita is doing well - so well, in fact, that she tries to bite me with no beak when I pick her up to feed her in her beak twice a day! I am putting soft food in her cage but I need to go to the supermarket and get some good whole grain flours and some steel-cut oats so I can make food that is nutritious but soft and easy for her to eat with only half a beak.

On another note, two pictures of the baby canaries. The first one is when they were three days old and the second one was taken yesterday.

Image

Image
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Navre » Sun Jun 03, 2018 6:18 am

My son is going to be stationed at Fort Dix starting this month. Maybe I'll be in NJ sometime soon. I'll let you know.

(Love the baby canaries)
Navre
African Grey
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is male
Posts: 1909
Number of Birds Owned: 2
Types of Birds Owned: Turquoise Green Cheek Conure
Hooded Parrot
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Sun Jun 03, 2018 9:17 am

Great! I would love for you to come visit me! The baby canaries are already out of the nest and look as big as the parents although you can still tell they are pretty young. And going by who left the nest when, I would say I have two males and one female but, of course, this is one of my 'off-the-wall' theories with no basis in science, at all.
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Sat Jul 14, 2018 10:47 am

I am sorry that I went for so long without an update but spring is a terribly busy time for me what with the feral kittens - I have 8 of them ready for adoption as I took them to the vet yesterday and almost $400 later [OUCH!], got all the health certificates for them so they are now ready to go BUT, just this morning, I brought in a teeny tiny one 9maybe a week old] that had been abandoned by the mother [we kept on finding two of them left alone and kept on putting them with the others but, this morning, one of them was dead and the other had been moved to the other end of the basement and was meowing desperately, all alone, cold and covered in wet mud and fleas so I brought him in, bathed him, took the fleas out, dried him out, gave him antibiotic and warm formula and he is now wrapped up in a baby blanket, sleeping in a box in my bathroom on top of a heating pad [let's hope he makes it because when the mothers abandon them like that, is because they are too sick to make it]. And now this means that, again, I won't be able to go out of my house for more than an hour or two at a time which is so very inconvenient for me because I was waiting for the kittens to grow up so I could go visit my 92 year old mother in law and to go to Connecticut with my husband for a day and a half so I could 'try out' my neighbor taking care of my animals [I am going back home for a family reunion in February next year and I wanted my husband to come so we could both attend the party and be together for 3 days -we haven't gone anywhere together for more than a few hours for years and years]. But I can't just let them die without trying. I will try to post pictures of some of them so you can see the little cuties.

Now, on to the parrots. Javi Caique is patrolling the kitchen counter while preening himself after taking a 'kitchen towel bath' - there is nothing he likes better than a clean kitchen towel that has been wet under the faucet, loosely wrung and left in a pile on a flat surface so he can rub and rub and rub his entire body on it -kind of what budgies do with leafy greens but he ends up completely wet while budgies don't. Aside from that, he is doing great and the big news is that I am pretty sure that I have [FINALLY!] gotten him over the soft molt [I've been trying since I got him in late October or early November]. He doesn't have any more pins around his face and his belly, which had such thin contours that looked almost grey [because his skin is dark and his down is a very dark grey] now looks a nice solid white. It would be great if he molted his primaries [his remiges are so worn out from not molting that they are literally half of what they should be] but I doubt it will happen this summer so his plumage is not going to be good for another year but, at least, we are on our way now and his wings have gotten stronger with the exercise so, even though his remiges are not whole, he can now fly better [took a perfectly horizontal 8 ft flight yesterday and landed on top of Mami's and Naida's cage]. He has also stopped having his 'angry fits'. He has never, ever bit me or even nipped me hard but he had this habit of making angry noises and pecking my hand over and over really quick-like whenever I would ask him to step up. I am pretty sure he was doing it because he thought that I was going to put him in his cage every time but as the months went by and he realized that this was not the case and that he would spend a lot of time out-of-cage [right now, they are spending 10 hours, from 5 am to 3 pm], he gradually decreased the habit until it disappeared.

Keku Quaker is also doing wonderfully! Her wings have gotten so strong [quakers are EXCELLENT fliers] that she can now fly up and down the stairs and make 90 degree turns without hesitating. She has such good vertical flight that, the other day, I couldn't find her even though I could hear her answering me when I called and I finally discovered her perched on the side of my living room ceiling fixture which is ten feet up! She is also on her way to becoming one of my best eaters - she has not only enlarged the range of produce she eats, she is even eating leafy greens now! AND, I think she is trying to learn to talk.

Mami and Naida Zon finally abandoned their nest for good and I saw some feathers coming out on their naked chests so here is hoping they will allow them to grow. I have been thinking of trying a tube collar on them but I haven't acted on it yet... let's see what happens with these new feathers. On a sad note, Mami's arthritis seems to be a bit worse so I think I am going to start her on flax seed meal and some glucosamine.

Zoey and Sweetpea Senegal are doing very well. This spring has kind of cemented their relationship. I see them perching and sleeping side by side and I saw Zoey preening Sweets' head so even though they don't have sex, they both seem quite content with each other.

Davy and Isis Redbelly are, definitely, not an item -but, of course, I don't lose hope and will keep on trying. They are still in separate cages and Davy is still the Casanova of the parrot world and tries to woo all females - including Keku who would, sometimes, ask him to fed her in her beak. Davy gave me a nip the other day when I tried to scratch his head after he had asked me for it -little stinker!

Paquita and Rajah Plet are doing well. I make sure she gets stuff that she can eat every day by not only giving her the special gloop but also by grating or mashing veggies and fruits so she can eat them on her own [the only thing I can't give her is leafy greens but she can eat grated broccoli and celery]. At night, for dinner, I give her a very plain birdy bread on which I smear a tiny bit of almond or peanut butter [the kind that is just peanuts and nothing else] or baby bird formula. I check her breast once a week to make sure she is not losing or gaining weight and so far, so good.

Codee GCC and Pablo Peachfront are also doing well. Poor Pablo looks to be on his last legs but he has looked like this for years so it's not anything that worries me overmuch although I do keep closer tabs on him than on the other birds. Everything comes hard for poor Pablo - it took him all this time to learn to use the ladders I put for him in the cage [he learned to use them to climb up fast but, for some reason, he did not seem to be able to learn to climb down until now]. But he eats like a champ, takes baths regularly, sleeps in his little hut with Codee and is no longer terrified of me so I guess this is as good as it can get for him, poor thing! Codee is, as always, the sweetest and easiest bird to keep: great eater, good bather, good flier and always and without exception, the sweetest things with wings!

The budgie flock is doing very well. I put the male I got last in with the others yesterday and, as soon as I did, the other males rushed over to check him out and talk to him [they are soooo cute!] while the hens pretty much ignored him -as it should be. They are eating very well and Duchess' beak seems to be beginning to take longer in overgrowing so we are good there. They also have started their molt so their endocrine systems are now in tune with the seasons [well, with the exception of Duke, which hasn't been here long enough]. Now to find two more males and we will be done. But I wanted to share a curious thing with you, guys. Susan, the budgie that came in with Duchess [the one that has the liver problems] is a puzzle to me because I don't even know if it's a male or a female. His or her eyes are all black [meaning no grey iris] but that can be because it's a recessive pied - the thing that puzzles me is that his/her cere is flesh colored [thus my thinking that it was female and why I named it 'Susan' as in Black-eyed Susan] and has not changed color at all -meaning, no brown, crusty cere. All the other females got their 'breeding ceres' but not this little bird... It doesn't seem to be sick or on any kind of stress though so I guess I will wait for next spring and see what is what then.

Precie and Zeus Zon have also abandoned any breeding behavior and are now molting. They are a very stable, very easy pair of birds to care for... always entirely predictable in their behaviors and exact on their seasons, they love one another and keep each other happy so it's just a matter of putting food and water for them and nothing else. Like all zons, they are excellent eaters and today they got all favorites: broccoli for greens, white cherries for fruit and sugar snaps for veggie so they did not know which one to start with :D

Linus Too is, I am afraid, a lost cause when it comes to make him stop plucking. He has gotten better because now, with the exception of his chest, his body is covered in feathers whereas, when he first came, he had more naked skin that anything else. But whatever feathers he has are a royal mess because of his severe barbering habit which has not abated much. He does seem to be quite content, he eats well [loves his 'salad' and goes for his leafy greens first thing every morning], doesn't scream, doesn't bite, watches over Sophie CAG and goes crazy when she flies to my shoulder [rushes to get as close as he can and screams like a maniac] so, all in all, he is a real good boy. Of course, he chews and chews and chews but that's what toos do. He is going to be very happy next week when my husband comes back home because a storm knocked down a LARGE [I am talking a diameter of 12 inches or more] dead branch from a tree in the backyard and I asked Robert to chop it into large pieces so I can give them to Linus for chewing -he will think he has died and gone to heaven :lol:

Sophie CAG is, as always, the best little girl ever. Never a problem from this bird... good eater, great flier, sweet-tempered, affectionate, perfect plumage, etc.

Dogs and cats all doing OK. Got two more cats to get spayed which will be done next month [too many extra expenses this one because both my husband and I needed dentist work and there's the kittens expenses plus I will start bringing ferals to get done before they get to breeding again in the late summer - gotta wait in between litters because you don't want to trap a lactating mother and leave the kittens to starve to death]. Baby canaries were put in a flight cage of their own so I can now determine which is male and which is female [I think I got two males and one female but we will see] and because their mother ppears to have decided to lay another clutch [two eggs so far]. I normally would not allow them to have a second clutch but I have a couple of people waiting for babies and I want to keep all the females and maybe one male. In any case, it might be too late in the season and the whole thing might turn out to be a dud so we will see.

I will post some pix tomorrow.
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

Re: Pajarita's update

Postby Pajarita » Sun Jul 15, 2018 9:55 am

I ended up bringing in three more kittens last night. At around 7:30 pm, I found two alone and dragging themselves covered in mud [?] and another one [that was meowing desperately] was inside my laundry sink with the mother nowhere to be found! I put all three in a box with a towel but, when I went back to check on them at 10 pm, they were still all alone so I brought them in, bathed them, got the fleas out, dried them out, fed them and put them with the one I had brought in first. But I couldn't find the sixth kitten no matter how hard I looked and listened for meows so, most likely, he is dead now.

They were all doing fine this morning. They got three hand feedings so far this morning and, Raya, the feral cat I brought in and ended up being pregnant and having her kittens in my house, got into the box with them after the last feeding and started grooming them - she is such a sweetheart and so maternal!
Pajarita
Norwegian Blue
 
Gender: This parrot forum member is female
Posts: 18697
Location: NW Pa
Number of Birds Owned: 30
Types of Birds Owned: RoseBreasted too, CAG, DoubleYellowHead Amazon, BlueFront Amazon, YellowNape Amazon, Senegal, African Redbelly, Quaker, Sun Conure, Nanday, BlackCap Caique, WhiteBelly Caique, PeachFace lovebird, budgies,
Flight: Yes

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