Update of Harley and Marley

[liz]

Not a problem, I now have them and they will get the care and the attention that they should have.[/quote]

Bless you.
I got them because she was plucked. I added fruit and veggies to their diet and put them in the sunroom. She would grown little fluffy feathers on her belly then pluck them out. That is when I decided she needed more than I was able to give.
I am not a quitter and do not give up. I have to think of it as upgrading them. Thank you so much Wolf.

[Wolf]

Liz, I am not in any way trying to infer anything bad about you, and am aware that neither of us have any information concerning their history, but The fact is that when we got them Marley was already naked. I don't think that any of us can even begin to imagine the kind and/ or amount of stress that she experienced for her to start plucking. My statement to the fact that she was plucked when she came here is only saying that this is a long time problem and that I am just the last link in this birds life and I will also be the final link in it as well. She will never have to be rehomed again.

[liz]

I was saying how much I appreciate you taking them. And they really did get a promotion from me to you. You have had birds much longer than I. Between you and Pajarita, I think you have read everything. The only thing I take time to read is what you two write.
Thank you.

[Wolf]

No Liz, I have not had birds very long at all. Just a couple of years, to be quite honest. I do have lots of experience with other types of abused animals and I always do a lot of research and know enough to be able to benefit from what other people have experienced, without having to go through it all myself. Hopefully some of it, I learn well enough to prevent from occurring and some of it I will have to go through eventually, and when that happens I will at least have some idea as to what to expect. But nothing replaces actual hands on experience, and in that area I am still very new at this parrot stuff.

[Pajarita]

I guess I am a bit ahead of you this time as I picked out the beans from the gloop and have already started adding a vitamin/ mineral supplement to the gloop that I am giving them.

AHA! Good for you! Brilliant minds and all that

Don't forget to give them methionine daily, it makes a big difference to the liver.

As to the people who promised to give them a good diet and then did not, welcome to the club! That's why I hardly ever rehome the birds I take in: because people have good intentions but always end up doing the 'easy' thing instead of the right one.

[Wolf]

Well, I understand all of this very well, and try to be very careful with regards to where any of my charges go t live. These are good people and they are very particular about their animals getting proper care, food, medical attention. They have dogs and a cat. However, somehow, they are having difficulties in making the jump to birds.
It was because they are so particular about the care of their animals that I took a chance on them. I had hoped that with a little guidance that they would be able to make the transition. I am still not sure that in time that they can't, but not with these two birds. These two have been through enough.

[Pajarita]

It's harder when they are older people because they are set in their ways and have always thought that seeds and fresh water is all a bird needs - but the young people are hard too because they think they know better than anybody else and tend to have a too busy life for the kind of work a parrot implies.

[Wolf]

Just about the first day or two of this month, August, I took a white birch log and cut of a piece of it and hollowed it out about 2 or 2 1/2 inches and about 5 inches in diameter and I put it in the budgies cage for a nest box for Marley. I purposely made certain that it was not large enough around or deep enough. I was thinking that as excitable as Marley was that perhaps giving her a nest that was not suitable would give her something to do and keep her occupied and perhaps help prevent her from plucking as much. She was the happiest little budgie that you could have imagined and worked all of her waking time on this nest. She was happy and not plucking, so I was happy as well.

Yesterday she started trying the nest on for size and would scratch around in it for a while and settle down in the nest only to stand up and scratch around even more and chew at the wood inside of the nest and then try it on for size again. Last night she did not go to her normal sleeping perch with Harley, instead she fit herself very carefully into the nest and went to sleep. At around 3 am she woke me up as she was chattering away and then this morning when it got light enough to see, I fixed their breakfast and when I gave it to them Marley was sitting on one nice little egg. I will wait for her to lay another egg and freeze this one and then do the same with all of them that she lays as I have no intention of raising budgies, but I don't want her to lay any more than she must to satisfy her egg count, which I hope that she will keep to no more than four eggs.
I thought that this was a good time to update this. My next thing is to find where I can order some dummies eggs for to replace any other eggs that she may decide to lay in the future.

[liz]

You are doing really good with the two little tweeters.
I know she liked the new nest area.
When Tweetle Dumb died I gave Tweetle Dee a hollow cocoanut. He was so busy with decorating I believe it helped him adjust.

[Pajarita]

Awww, how wonderful for her! I bet she feels she is the luckiest and happiest little budgie in the whole wide world! But don't worry about the count, budgies are, as far as I know, the only parrot species that is a determinate layer.