Anyway, that experience, along with reading other forums and watching Youtube videos of hand-tame lovebirds, parrotlets and budgies (including Duke), got me interested in getting a small hand-tame parrot.
After doing a fair amount of research and inquiring with various pet stores and breeders in my area I settled on a hand-fed, just-weaned-a-week-ago budgerigar from M&D Bird Farm (http://www.mdbirdfarm.com/), a very good bird specialty store in southern Delaware. I went up this morning to check out the budgies (there were 4 remaining from the same clutch, I think a couple had been sold already). All four were fairly friendly, but one noticeably more so than the rest. Totally fine with being held, will step up from finger to finger, and would fly to my shoulder or head instead of taking off and circling around the room a few times (all were fully flighted). So that's the one I ended up getting.
Say hello to...er...he/she doesn't have a name yet. Any suggestions? I'm leaning toward referring to it as a "he" for now, -- I didn't get it DNA'd and it's too young to tell by the cere.
He seems to be settling in fairly well. Just nommed a bunch of millet and is now sitting on his perch chirping happily (or calling out for his brothers/sisters, hard to tell really
). I'm really looking forward to starting some target and recall training once he's had a few days to get settled and comfortable.
