Pajarita's update

[Pajarita]

I thought of making one thread so I can tell you if there are any improvements with any and all of my birds instead of adding to previous individual threads.

Mami and Naida (bonded amazon females) are both molting and, thankfully, they are getting all the feathers that Mami plucked from both of them but I fear that Naida's nape will remain plucked because Mami is constantly preening her there. Aside from that, they are doing very well. I took out their 'nest' out of their cage this week and they did not mind at all because they had pretty much abandoned it over a week ago.

Sunny is eating more produce and in molt which is fine even though it's the second one in less than a year. She is also coming out every day and beginning to fly a bit better and more often so YAAAYYY for Sunny!

Pookey TAG appears to be getting a bit better. She now approaches the front of her cage when she hears me calling her name in the middle of the afternoon and eagerly takes her treat from my fingers AND it seems to me that there is also the tiniest improvement in her scared screams when another bird perches on her cage.... we'll see what happens when I start giving her some herbal tranquilizers in her water (she is now getting theanine but I am going to the holistic store this weekend to get supplies for maybe a nerve tonic, maybe a nervine tea... I don't know, I have to sit down and do a bit more research about this).

Isis Redbelly has started eating produce in her cage (YAAAAYYY for Isis!). It's been two years since she came not eating ANY produce whatsoever. First she started by stealing fruits from the canaries cages, then she started eating her produce only outside her cage but she ate it inside her cage two days in a row AND she munched on a Romaine lettuce stalk for the first time yesterday.

But the gold medal for Most Improvement goes to Linus which is not only eating produce like a champ, he actually walks over to me to ask me for it before I have time to put it in his cage , has allowed a few feathers to grow and remain in one piece (he has also barbered some of the beautiful primaries he had gotten, the stinker!) AND (drumroll!) he is not only no longer afraid of Freddy, he actually goes after Freddy himself!!! This morning, as usual, Freddy climbed down and quickly walked out the door of the birdroom on one of his daily 'walkabouts' (me: "Where you going, Freddy?" Freddy in a matter of fact, don't bother me tone of voice: "Byebye" ) and, lo and behold, Linus went right after him, walking real fast out of the birdroom to get him!

Everybody else is doing OK except for me because I hate molt season (teeny tiny feathers from the passerines all over the place!)

[galeriagila]

Cool idea for a thread. Now we can keep tabs on you in one place.

[Navre]

Great news, especially about Linis.

[liz]

"Pajarita update" is a good thread. Wolf does updates and I have the thread "Rambo and Myrtle".

[galeriagila]

Rambo and Myrtle... gonna get on that thread.

[Pajarita]

I have to admit that, given the degree of plucking and barbering Linus had when he first came here, I never expected him to get any better so his improvement is big news around here. So much so that he has one single contour feather growing on his chest (he has allowed some down to grow there so there are now only two spots where you can still see his skin but he has only allowed a few contour feathers to grow in the back of his neck - he barbers all the rest of them before they are completely out of the sheath) and I check on it twice a day not only marveling in delight that it's still there but also telling EVERYBODY about it (one of my kids is now calling him "Linus Una Pluma" (One Feather Linus ). Furthermore, he now makes kissy noises when I do it to him, he laughs out loud and he has his own 'thing' to do with me which is similar to what Freddy does but not quite the same. Freddy likes to make his beak click by opening and closing it all the way so the top and the bottom hitting each other make the clickety sound (and which I have to do with my teeth while we look into each other's eyes and hold 'hands' -his right and my left). Linus also opens and closes his beak but the two sides don't meet so there is no clickety sound to it, what he does do is a noise similar to what we would make when we open and close our mouth making kind of like a smacking/semi sucking sound with the insides of our cheeks (some people make this noise as a 'yummy yummy')- and we don't hold hands but he has to be perching on my right arm. Cockatoos are the quirkiest of all the parrots, I think....

[Pajarita]

I kept on hearing Freddy screaming during the day and I was getting so worried about it because I thought that he was reverting to his 'bad screamer' days but lo and behold! it wasn't Freddy but Linus! And, in his case, it's real good news because this bird never made a peep for months and months when he first came which was one of the things that led me to believe that he might never bond with a human or even with another bird. People like 'quiet' parrots but no healthy, happy parrot is ever going to be quiet so, whenever I get a quiet one, I always worry about his state of mind. But, as I was telling you before, Linus has started improving and he continues to do so at a fast pace. This morning, one of my grandkids (a hyperactive, Dennis-the-menace 7 year old boy) insisted on standing at the open door to the birdroom while I was working in there and Linus screamed and screamed and screamed with his crest fully erected and standing his ground in front of the door like a little soldier! I tell you, you don't need a watch dog with this bird in the house! I could distract Freddy (he was displaying and, hanging on from the closest to the door side of his cage, kept lunging at my grandson) with food - he loves his greens so I gave him a leaf with long stalk of red Swiss Chard and the temptation was too strong for him to resist (they all love the red Swiss chard) but there was no dissuading Linus!

The other good news is that Peachy Lovebird started eating his greens three days ago. Fruits and veggies are still a hit and miss thing with him but he is eating his gloop and getting vitamins so he is fine for now.

I started Pookey TAG on theanine and valerian in her water, if this doesn't work out, I also got linden and passionaria but I rather start with little and work my way up so I can fine-tune the dosages to the smallest amount possible.

Sophie CAG is nesting again.

I was also asked to take in a single female zebra finch whose mate had died and I agreed to it as all I have to do is put her in the flight cage with the other ones after quarantine - besides, I had an unattached male in the little flock (3 males, 2 females), poor little Yaga, the handicapped one, so this might work out for the best, after all.

Ahh, one more surprise! Nadia, which, in my memory, had never said anything except "Hi, Nate!", is now she saying Hello and making unintelligible human speech noises after all these years!

[galeriagila]

Sounds like happy times at the Pajarita estate.

Here in Rickeybird Manor, we're nearing the end of THAT TIME OF THE YEAR, thank goodness.

Congratulations on all those good developments.

[Pajarita]

Thanks but, in reality, I take no credit for any improvement. It's their resiliency and huge aptitude for forgiveness that does it, you know...

[Pajarita]

Two additions: I stopped by ABBA to pick up supplies on my way to pick up the lonely zebra finch female in NYC and found they had ex-breeding lovebirds for sale so I got what I am 90% sure it's a female because she was a bit larger than the others and an opaline. For the people who don't know the mutation, opaline in lovebirds is what is called a 'patern' mutation and the first to be found in non-Australian parrots, it's sex-linked and, for a male to have it visually, it needs genes from both parents so, usually, when you find one, it's a female. It's called a 'patern' mutation because the basic colors of the wild phenotype are there: green body, red on the head, etc but instead of having just a band of deeper red on their 'forehead', their entire head is red, they have rectrices (the tail primaries) with a red 'root' and cheek patches that look a bit lighter as well as feather edges a bit lighter than the 'body' of the feather. Very pretty and quite striking, actually! Years ago, they used to be called 'cherry heads' so I named her Cherry (she is 3 years old, btw). She is a WILD thing and absolutely terrified of people! She freaks out every time I approach the cage and bumps herself all over the place when I clean it and put new food and water for her so it's going to take a looooong time to tame her. I put her in quarantine in the opposite corner of the living room from where Pookey and the cardinals are thinking that this would be enough... WRONG! Sunday morning (she came Saturday), I let Peachey out at 6:15 am, he stepped up (like always), went to my shoulder (like always) and, once I started washing the dogs and cats dishes, he flew off (as always) but he did not come back as he usually does and, when I went looking for him, I found him beak to beak with Cherry, trying to feed her! So there went my quarantine out the window and I haven't been able to keep him from her so I decided to risk it and allow them to be together... they are all due for an antibiotic treatment anyway.

The new zebra finch is a little cinnamon female called ZigZag (I don't know why people choose names without dignity for birds!). She had lived with another female that died of cancer and had been vetted -besides, passerines don't seem to have the same contagious diseases that parrots do- so I put her in with the flock this morning and they were all perching together without a single problem (finches are highly social and love been in flock).

Aside from that, Linus continues to do well and Pookey seems to be a tiny bit better... not that she has stopped screaming in fear but she no longer does it all the time now (she stopped doing it when the senegals are on her cage, for example), the tone has changed -it doesn't have the 'terrified' sound it had before- and she is now taking treats from my hand. I had upped her valerian to five drops over the weekend and that seems to have done the trick.