Hello from S.C.

[Sekica]

Heya, just joined the forum because I found it extremely informative compared to other forums I've come across in the past.

Anyways, I've had for over half of my life, and I can't imagine not having a bird in my house. I currently have 3 awesome roaming somewhere... nah, they're napping right now. Boo-Boo is the oldest at 10. He's a special needs because he was mutilated by a previous owner when he was under a year old. He's doing great, though, and he's very happy, healthy and full of love and cuddles. Junior (Joo-Joo) and Zucko (Zoo-Zoo) are 3 years old. Even though it's an odd number, all three are best friends, and constantly create a triangle to chit-chat and play so that no one is left out.

I recently added 2 to my feathered family. I've had them for a year, and am having a bit of trouble taming them. Ben is very intelligent, very stubborn, and tends to hold grudges if you do anything to his disliking. Max, on the other hand, is a bit of an attitude dummy. I'm sorry, Max, but really now, you've been here for a year and still can't figure out how to go in your cage. I think he's just playing games with me here 'cause he definitely knows how to go in for night-night, and just doesn't want to. He'd rather I put him in 'cause he thinks he's special. Yes, Max, you broke your leg before I got you, but y'know it healed a year ago. Anyway, even after a year I still can't get them to step-up or anything. Max did have a huge break-through today, though.

All of my birds live in one cage because when I set the two cages near each other they had other ideas. The tiels simply snuck into the keet cage behind my back. I tried removing them, but the keets wouldn't settle down until the tiels were back in with them so one cage it was. It doesn't really matter, though, because they roam the house freely from 7:30 in the morning to whenever it gets dark every single day.

Anyway, I have MBS, please help.

[Red Moppet]

Welcome!

I can't believe what some people do to animals - it makes me sick! I'm glad little Boo-Boo and you found each other. Looking forward to seeing pictures of your flock.

[Sekica]

Yeah, I can't believe it either. I think it was a wing clip gone horribly, horribly bad. He has complete nerve damage on that side of his body. He twitches and shakes all the time, sometimes more than others. Luckily he's not in pain unless he gets too excited and starts flying around. It's amazing how forgiving he is. Considering what was done to him, he still runs into hands and steps up for cuddles and kisses all the time, and munches on his favorite veggies while rolling around in them before I even set them on his cage for him.

He's also extremely accepting of other birds, especially other special needs birds. He's very patient, and I've caught him teaching other birds how to do things he does because he can't do them the regular birdie way, and the others want to copy him. He'll repeat something until the other bird gets it. It really helped my tiel Max to learn how to climb after his cast was taken off. Boo-Boo and Max practiced using the special needs perch to come in and out of the cage until Max got it.

[Red Moppet]

He sounds so sweet! I think we can learn so much from animals.

[Pacobel]

Bless you for rescuing. It's extra work, and worth every minute.

[Sekica]

Yes, he is extremely sweet, except he has this thing about biting my nose. He just gets a bit too excited. Yup, I learned so much from him. In fact, I left it up to him to tame my other budgies, and it's working very well.

It's not really extra work in his case, just extra worries when his health goes down. Last year was really bad, and he was very close to dying pretty much every other day. He was just feathers and bones at that point. There's nothing we can do except make sure he doesn't hurt himself, but he knows his limits.

Max, the tiel, is also special needs. He broke his leg on the metal clip that holds the cuttle bone. It was just an accident, and the place where it happened no longer uses metal clips because of that. Max's leg is permanently bent wrong, and one of his toes is useless because it points the wrong way so he can't climb like the other tiels.

I really need to find a photo of them, but my computer keeps crashing so it'll have to wait 'till I fix that to be able to upload one.