How we ended up with Macaws, Part II:

At the Mickaboo class, Brian and I offered to volunteer for transport and various fund raising activities. To make a long story short we volunteered to pick up a recently surrendered Blue and Gold Macaw from the vet and take him to his new foster parents up North. He was a spectacular looking Macaw. The whole 21/2 hour ride he was quiet, except for an initial Hello when he got into the car. He took one or two pieces of blueberry scone from me an allowed me to touch his foot. He seemed to be a really sweet bird, and I felt for him.

After dropping Noah off, we went down to see PePe for our approval visit. Pepe was staying with Ken and Diane, the original people who had rescued the bird. He had been found in the care of an eldery woman whose husband had died 3 years ago. The elderly woman was no longer able to take care of Pepe. Pepe was found in a very small dirty dark cage being fed a peanut-only diet. He was malnourished and dirty, but not badly handled. Due to the care of Diane and Ken he has regained some much needed weight and strength. He is a quiet, mellow parrot that likes to say "Rubber baby buggy bumpers".

After discussing Pepe our thoughts turned to Noah. He seemed like such a sweet bird and after the long ride up we had fallen for him. So we decided to try to pick both Noah and Pepe up on the same day, last Friday. That required a lot of quick execution to get cages, food, etc. ready for the birds.

We went down to Milipitas and got a pretty good deal on two large cages. I didn't know they were as heavy as they were, so it took a bit to get them in the door. We washed, sanitized (with a Novasan solution), and assembled the cages until 1:30 AM.

Pepe
We picked up Pepe from his foster home on Friday 7/27/07. Upon pickup he presented very relaxed behavior: talking, sitting comfortable, etc. Diane (one of his foster parents) perched Pepe on a dowel and easily moved him to the carrier. During the ride home, Pepe investigated his carrier. Pepe was easily moved into his new cage at 5:00PM. He did not make any attempts to move around the cage or go to his food bowl.

Noah

Upon pickup he presented very aggressive behavior: lunging at the boys in the house, chewing up perch presented for step up and striking out when trying to close door to carrier. He would not accept treats at any point on Friday. Noah was put into his new cage Friday around 5:00PM; upon exit of the carrier, he immediately went to the cage wall and tried to climb to top; Brian used a perch to step up and move Noah inside cage. He immediately started eating from his food bowl.

Starting with Parrots.

Well I hope this blog can be an exchange with many people about their pet birds. I intend to share my learning experiences with our Macaws. I should say from the start, I have never had a pet bird until now. I have always had the more tradtional dog and/or cats. My husband, Brian, on the other hand has had birds and even bred them for a time. I came into the picture shortly before he stopped breeding...birds that is :).

How we ended up with Macaws, Part I:

Brian had been talking about getting a bird for about a year or so, but with our work load we just didn't see how we could fit it in. Well this summer we are re-vamping our business and have some down-time. Brian started looking online for parrots. He came across a Mickaboo, a parrot rescue organization in the Bay Area. He read the story of this sweet 51 year old Military Macaw named PePe. I saw a picture of PePe and read his story, and felt we should at least help. Pepe is blind due to cataracts, but has a very good chance of recovering most of his sight with surgery.

We have pursued potentially adopting Pepe with Mickaboo. As part of the process with Mickaboo we must take a class, have an in-home visit, and visit and obtain approval from the foster parents. I think the worst part of the class was finding out I must part with my Grill/panini maker and my teflon pots and pans. I checked out the enameled cast iron the other day and the one upside is I'll have great arms well into my eighties...who knew?? Well I have more to write...we now have a Blue and Gold as well. More later...