Parakeet Journal

2007-07-22T20:53:00.000-04:00

I believe we may need to rename Peanut. We shall call him Pizzicato, because he cannot stop plucking.

2007-03-02T23:13:00.000-05:00

Soleil

2006-11-23T23:14:00.000-05:00

Last night I spent a few minutes with Peanut, and he got really happy.

2006-11-09T12:04:00.000-05:00

Over the last couple months I have been teaching Peanut how to respond with the answer "four" when I ask him "How many fingers?" I am holding up. He has gotten very good at this and consistently will say "four" when asked. This morning I began to teach him to say "one" when one finger is held up. I had started with four because it was a number he loved to say anyways, the trick was to get him to say it when given the proper prompt. He already knows how to say "one" so hopefully it will not take him too long to associate the new sign and question to the word "one." I spend a little time with him several times through out the day showing him the difference between one finger and four, and what each is called. It will be interesting to see how long it takes to learn this next step in the trick.

2006-08-31T11:43:00.000-04:00

Danny keeps Peanut company at the Petry family reunion.

2006-05-04T11:12:00.000-04:00

Peanut

2006-04-13T22:30:00.000-04:00

Peanut is having to teach us about himself. When he first arrived, he had to explain about his concern with stepping onto a bare hand. When I asked him to step-up from a secure location, like his cage, he would bite-pinch my hand with increasing force. Interestingly, he's willing to step-up to a bare hand when he's away from his cage, like when he goes "walk-about" on the kitchen floor. Since then we have discovered that he is more willing to step-up from his cage onto a towel-covered hand. If I take him from his cage with a towel-covered hand, he's willing to step-up onto my bare hand right away.

This evening he had to teach me that he likes scritches, and (so far) can be trusted to not hurt me. We came home late in the evening, and I sat at the kitchen table to check my e-mail. Peanut stood at the door of his cage and made clear to me, somehow, that he wanted to be out. It didn't seem to be enough for him to crawl up on his cage: I knew I was supposed to ask him to step-up. He quickly responded, and when I sat down with him he moved directly to my shoulder. To my surprise, his head brushed against my face once or twice, and when he had my attention, he put his beak down against my shoulder, clearly asking for scritches. He stayed like that for several minutes as I worked over the feathers on his head and neck repeatedly.

He has made it fairly clear that he likes to be on my shoulder and, unlike Charlie, he has not caused any injury from this position yet. After a time he took my finger in his beak and "looked over" my fingernail, perhaps indicating that he wanted the scritching to be firmer or more to the point.

There's so much yet to learn!

In the last few days we've begun to introduce some choice new phrases. He likes to repeat "You're a mess!" whenever the broom or vacuum come out. We use the opportunity to tell him "You're a treat!" We also say "You're gorgeous!" in a New Joisey accent, because that's something we had begun with Charlie just before Peanut moved in. He likes to say "What?", which is probably his favorite expression, and that gives us reason to think of alternatives. I'm hoping he can pick up "Where am I?" and "whatcha doin'?" and "Excellent!"

I feel so ignorant! My parents modeled parenting and being married for me, and so I came into those relationships with some expectations and skills that were learned behaviours from my childhood. I don't "know" how to take care of such an intelligent bird. I don't understand how to be the companion he needs, how to get work done while he's nearby or on my shoulder, or how to deal with poop rolling down my back.

Peanut, or Ping as I'm starting to call him, (he makes several ping-like sounds, including one like a smoke-alarm with a dying battery) is very different from Charlie. When Charlie is out of his cage he demands my attention in a very in-my-face way, and he is eager to get to my shoulder, after which I can expect him to lacerate my ear. "Attention" for Charlie means a continual sequence of posturing, pinpointing, loud whistles and words, interspersed with screeches. I'm pretty sure Charlie is jealous, and having the other birds in the house means that he wants some kind of behavior from me that I don't understand yet. It has gotten even worse this week, as I'm likely to bring Peanut out when Charlie wants to be. If I let them both out, Charlie will defend the spaces he has claimed, such as my shoulder and his play place. Charlie will fly at Peanut as if to land on his back, and Peanut gives ground. So in order for me to interact with Peanut, Charlie must be caged, even beyond his basic insistence on being in my face.

I have Peanut sitting on a cockatiel-sized play place. It's near to me, which is good, and the crossbar is rounded, rather than the tall/narrow bar he uses on his cage. However, the space is clearly not large enough for an African Grey. It's just got to do until we find something bigger and better. A moment ago Peanut climbed down the ladder of this play place and reached out toward a magazine William was reading. It was a long reach, and he didn't connect. But he overbalanced, and a second later he was lying flat on his back with the ladder in his feet. He looked like Soleil, who seems to enjoy playing like that. I said "Oh dear" in a soothing way, and took hold of the ladder, which gave him enough leverage to climb to a more dignified position.

One thing that surprises me is that when Peanut steps-up for me, he makes a gurgling sound that's hard to describe. It's not exactly water going down a drain, but somewhat similar.

I fear I could continue on this subject for hours, but sleep and other basic necessities must tear me away. Perhaps I can continue later.

2006-04-05T14:28:00.000-04:00

Charlie and Soleil have a guest for the next several weeks, and perhaps much longer. (Here's hoping!) Some dear friends from our church have an African Grey that they brought back from (guess where) Africa. Now that their children have grown and the house is empty all day, the bird needs companionship.

Peanut is already being fun for us. Our favorite interruption so far is that he says "What?" at the most perfect times. He also says "Hello?" and a few more words. He sits shockingly still, in contrast to Soleil and Charlie. And he is far more quiet. Both of our birds shriek for attention, but Peanut just sits on top of his cage and says a few quiet words now and then. What a contrast!

2006-03-27T13:49:00.000-05:00

Soleil

2006-03-13T17:21:00.000-05:00

Charlie has succeeded in learning how to whistle a fourth. Daniel has been trying to teach him to whistle a Major third, and perhaps he will learn in time how to do that, but for now it seems like a pretty good accomplishment.

2006-03-13T17:17:00.000-05:00

I've been teaching Charlie a new whistle, for no particular reason that I can discern. It's musical: I would describe it as two sixteenth-note D's followed by an eighth-note F-sharp, like this:

Charlie doesn't use this whistle in conversation yet, but we've heard him use it during his roll, which is typically part of the learning process. Interestingly, he often adds a third sixteenth-note at the beginning, making the call similar to the beginning of Beethoven't famous Fifth Symphony, but inverted. Perhaps more interestingly, he seldom whistles a real major third (D to F-sharp). He's much more likely to whistle a fourth.

2006-02-03T11:37:00.000-05:00

One of the (many) differences between Soleil and Charlie is in how their feathres look when wet. When Soleil bathes, she comes out looking drenched. For the next half-hour or more it is clear that she has just bathed, and she's still drying off. More than once we have rushed her upstairs for assistance with a hair dryer.

But when Charlie bathes, he never looks wet! He splashes around; we can see water running off his head, but his feathres never look wet. Perhaps he's part duck.

Is it partly because of their different ages? Soleil is still quite young: perhaps she doesn't keep her feathres as well-oiled as an adult conure would.

If you can contribute anything to our understanding of this dichotomy, please comment here!

Here is a movie of Charlie bathing.

Soleil all wet.

2006-01-10T20:33:00.000-05:00

Soleil showed us a few nights ago that she enjoys drinking from a quarter-inch stream of water running from the kitchen faucet. Tonight she also demonstrated that she's not afraid (well, not too afraid) of bathing under the faucet too. This has been a surprise for us because Charlie has shown no interest in these things.

2006-01-10T19:17:00.000-05:00

Charlie refined a new behaviour today: he has begun to recognize my finger as a good place to land. So far this has not extended to the other family members. Several times this evening he flew to my finger, and I think he's beginning to associate a standard wolf-whistle as an invitation to come.

It would appear that Soleil has had a significant impact on Charlie's behaviour and expectations. He cannot have failed to notice the time and attention that she gets, and the fact that she climbs all over our hands, arms and shoulders. Charlie is suddenly showing a significant interest in landing on our heads and shoulders, and is willing to accept the outstretched finger as a substitute landing perch.

He still has an anti-social interest in ears, however, and is still trying to peck or bite us. So when he lands on our shoulders, he generally sees only the back of our heads.

Overall, these seem like encouraging developments. Charlie obviously wants our attention, and he's beginning to find acceptable ways to obtain it.

2005-12-18T18:12:00.000-05:00

Last Wednesday evening (12/14) we fell in love with a Sun conure, and Thursday evening we went back and took her home with us. The storekeepers had named her Soleil (so-lay, according to at least one pronunciation resource), which is the French word for sun, and that name seems appropriate to the bird.

Over the weekend I picked up a book on conures, and this is what it says about Sun conures in specific:

These flashy little birds have been described as the Cadillacs of the conure group. A mature Sun conure is a brilliant blaze of orange, yellow, red and green feathers, while younger Sun conures have a mottled green plumage until their first molts. Mature Suns have black beaks, white eye rings and grayish feet. They measure about 12 inches in length and weigh about 4.5 ounces.
Suns are found in the wild from Guyana to northeastern Brazil, but they have been captive bred in the United States for many years. As pets, they are known for being content to be with their owners for hours at a time, sitting on a shoulder or the back of a chair. They can be noisy if ignored, but otherwise make fine pets.

The conures in the store grabbed our attention by hanging, dangling by one toe, from the top bars of their cages. Soleil went on to demonstrate the conure's characteristic rolling gait, and then rolled over onto her back repeatedly.

2005-09-26T09:55:00.000-04:00

Charlie has added "Peek-a-boo" to her repertoire! She says it softly with the sweetest inflection. :) She has learned it from Beth, who plays peek-a-boo with her whenever she opens the cabinet door to get her school books.

2005-09-07T14:42:00.000-04:00

When Charlie is playing with her bell as she is here, she likes to talk to it. She will say "hello", cluck, cluck, cluck, "hello". And, then she will make a sound that I don't really know how to describe in print but is a sort of an "ohhhhhh" but with more of an "r sound.

She has a real fascination with bells. I would love to see her reaction to a bell choir! I know she would love to see and hear the different sizes.

Charlie with bell movie.

[For any guests trying to download this movie (or movies in our earlier posts), have patience. Our server is on a cable modem, so the movie comes to you at about ¾Mbps at the fastest. You might want to right-click on the movie link and choose to download it that way, which would probably give you a status indicator showing progess as the download occurs.]

2005-06-06T15:58:00.000-04:00

Charlie was having fun with a small piece of rope on top of her cage.

2005-04-08T10:49:00.000-04:00

Charlie was in a very exploratory mood yesterday during playtime. She repeatedly got down off her perch and walked across the table to look at Beth, her Social Studies book, eye glasses, and glass of water. She was quite proud of herself when she managed to climb up onto the edge of Beth's glass.

Here are a couple of short movies I took of her adventures.
You drink your water, I'll drink mine.
A Little Explore

2005-04-05T12:39:00.000-04:00

There is some sort of digging/construction going on outside today. They are making a lot of noise. There are bulldozer engines, some sort of pounding machine, men talking, and of course over and above everything dogs barking. I am pretty sure that all this nonsense is stressing Charlie out. I know it is effecting me.

I was quietly talking to her a few minutes ago, just chatting softly, trying to calm her down. I asked her if she would like me to put some music on. She looked at me with her head cocked, and then nodded slowly! Needless to say I started her favorite play list right away.

2005-03-29T16:33:00.001-05:00

We had a nice long play time today. She seemed to enjoy getting very wet from the spray bottle, but later after I put her back in her cage she tried climbing into her water dish again. I filled the glass casserole dish and put it on the bottom of the cage but she wasn't interested. Danny had the brilliant idea that maybe I should try something that wasn't clear. I poured the water into a gray cake pan, and she went straight to it. She didn't climb in, but she leaned over and washed her face the way she does in her water dish, splashing water everywhere. It was wonderful. :)

2005-03-28T10:02:00.000-05:00

After a rough holiday weekend in which we were very busy, Charlie is happily chewing apart a new toy. She seemed to enjoy her bath this morning and wasn't content until she was dripping wet.

2005-03-20T15:40:00.000-05:00

I think I have finally figured out how Charlie wants to get her baths! During play time today I picked her up and decided to try squirting her with the water bottle while holding her. She actually liked it! Previously we had always just sprayed her while she was in her cage or on her play place, but she never really looked like she liked it. I guess the trick was holding her.

I have started teaching her what the color green is. She watched me very carefully through out the whole ten minutes we worked on it.

2005-03-19T21:35:00.000-05:00

Charlie was feeling very playful this evening.

This is one of her all time favortie toys.

2005-03-18T21:25:00.000-05:00

We were feeling rather guilty that we had been away so much today, and knowing we would be out all day tomorrow, we decided to bring out a small length of a shredding toy we got for Charlie last weekend. We had been saving it for an appropriate moment, and this seemed to be it. In this picture you can't even tell what it looked like she was swinging it around so fast. She had it torn apart surprisingly quickly and seemed to have a wonderful time doing it.

2005-03-16T21:01:00.000-05:00

I gave Charlie an ice cube today. I read that sometimes you can coax a bird into using a dish to bathe in by putting ice cubes in it. That sounded to me like a very chilly way for a tropical bird to take a bath, but I figured it was worth a try...

Well, the ice didn't get her into the water, Charlie is too clever for that. She managed to fish out a piece though, and took it up to her trusty perch to investigate it. She seemed to enjoy it very much.

2005-03-13T10:00:00.000-05:00

Charlie and I are getting some alone time today. I think this is being a good thing, but it is hard to tell. Before play time today I went up in the attic and got down three tiny FisherPrice strollers for her to play with. I brought all three because I was curious to see if she would show a preference for a particular color, but she seemed to enjoy all of them fairly equally. I showed her how to push them and called them "toy". For now she is content to pick them up and taste them. I think she likes that they have such a convient handle.

I tried to introduce the idea of the towel game. She already seems to be interested in the idea of peek-a-boo when I peek around a wall at her. She wasn't quite so sure when I hid behind the towel. When I just held the towel drapped over my head she was curious and came closer for a better look.

Towards the end of play time I started cleaning her cage, and as I cleaned and dried each item I set them on the table. She loved this! She climbed right down on the table and investigated everything. She picked up perches, and food bowls, and the rotation toys that I was going to put in the cage for this week.

2005-03-11T11:46:00.000-05:00

So many questions! I guess its like parenting in some ways, but the subject, (er, victim?) has (in this case) no grasp of English (yet).

Every morning while we eat breakfast Charlie calls/talks through her roll, and at the same time marches/paces back and forth on her perch. To me it appears that she is not agitated: she doesn't bob her head, and her roll continues, without fixating on any particular call (like obvious alarm, for example.) Yet I also have a strong feeling that she has more purpose and desire than simple calisthenics. Most mornings there's a cat sitting nearby, mostly ignoring her. I don't perceive that they're interacting.

What does it mean for a parrot/large parakeet to "be out" for a time? In our case it seems to mean that we set Charlie on her playground on the kitchen table with one or more adults and children sitting around working on schoolwork or other tasks. Charlie may sit very still, cautiously. Or she may climb down to snag a drink or a seed, then carry her morsel quickly back to the top of the playground where she can crack and drop it. When there are pens in a cup nearby she may decide to steal them one by one, dropping them after a thorough inspection. (What a coup it would be if she learned to put them back in the cup too.)

Our most interactive activities with Charlie are feeding her fruit (apple slices, grapes, banana slices, or small carrots) and telling her to "Step-Up." (What then?) My perception is that "out" time should be much more interactive, but we're so inexperienced and ignorant. We know how to sit with a cat, or how to "play" with cats: what do you do when you're interacting with a very intelligent, shy and bored bird?

2005-03-09T09:27:00.000-05:00

Charlie seems quite cautious about play time until the music starts. That seems to be her cue that it is time to start climbing, playing, and eating.

She seems much more interested in what I am doing than what she has to play with. She has discovered my pen cup, and keeps climbing down onto the table and snagging the pens and running off with them. I am watching her very carefully, I don't want her to chew on them and get hurt or sick. But I am just pleased that she feels brave enough to venture off of the jungle gym to investigate something.

2005-03-08T10:58:00.000-05:00

Charlie and Beth are playing "Drop the Peanut." Charlie loves to shell peanuts, but she never really shows much interest in eating them. She loves it when you hand her peanuts though, she drops them and looks at them until you pick them up and hand them back to her, Of course she drops them again as soon as you do.

She is being much more adventurous with what she is choosing to munch on today. Usually she ignores the corn and pellets in her bowl, but they have caught her interest for some reason today.

I am wondering if she will like the way I have changed her cage around. I haven't done much to it, just taken out the ladder, and added the Booda perch high in the cage.

I think that she has become comfortable with the jungle gym. She seems very relaxed on it now. She plays, eats, drinks,

2005-03-08T10:51:00.000-05:00

More questions: Charlie has been only slightly interested in the cuttle-bone. Does she not need it? Also, parakeets (at least the smaller ones) need a little gravel to aid their feeding. Does she? Should we remove that bottom grate? or provide gravel in a plate?

2005-03-08T10:42:00.000-05:00

Another question is about Charlie's flight capacity and training. It's clear that she's supposed to fly: she's a bird! It's also clear that flight is dangerous for her: cats, hot burners, windows and other indoor hazards abound. Her wings have been show-clipped (my assessment) and only the first flight feather is still long, so she doesn't gain altitude.

As she becomes more comfortable with us she's begun engaging in wing exercise in her cage, where the ladder provides a central perch with the widest available wingspan. She also likes to flutter when she's with us, on the finger or on her playground, and more questions arise: It seems like she's most likely to "fly" when she's frustrated with us and tired of where she's been. If she's on my hand, I can trigger her flight exercise by pumping my hand up and down. It's not clear that she likes this. What should we be doing? How can we take the best care of her?

2005-03-08T10:05:00.000-05:00

The last couple of days have been rough for Charlie, in terms of disappointment and disruption and similar terms of annoyance. For example, we can see that she wants to bathe, but her only water source is her water dish. As soon as we notice her behaviour we give her a casserole dish with a little water in it, but she doesn't connect that with the idea of bathing.

If we leave the dish in there for long periods of time, there comes a moments when the water becomes unclean. So we've rearranged her perches to create a spot where there's no perch overhanging this dish, so that we can leave it in for long periods of time without the water becoming soiled. We also placed her water dish in this pan.

However, we haven't got it right yet: it's not arranged to her satisfaction. This morning when I lifted the cover from her cage Charlie was perched on the top step of her ladder. It looked to me like she probably slept there. So this morning she's shuffling back and forth in an agitated fashion. And she clearly wants her water dish back in its usual holder.

2005-03-05T17:10:00.000-05:00

We were out of the house this morning, attending church with the Linthicum SDA congregation, where our brass group performed several numbers. We didn't get home until well after two o'clock in the afternoon, and followed that up with a nap. TMALSS (too late) Charlie didn't get her playground time until after four. But she seems to be happy with it anyway. She's certainly not the shy bird she was the first few times we brought her out of the cage.

We're still so new to the idea of having a companion bird that I have many questions. Charlie is very well trained to respond to the step-up command and prompt. It's a thrill to have her on your finger. But what then? I'm not seeing behaviour that suggests she wants a head-scratching. Usually it's most obvious that she just wants to go back to her perch.

We've provided two different toys that have a bell. Books seem to make it clear that birds like toys with bells. But when Charlie "plays" with these toys, it looks to me like she's angry, as if they are in her way, annoying her. Her eyes pin-point, and she strikes the bell with her beak open, violently. Is this normal? Or have we placed these toys in the wrong part of her cage?

These and many other questions come up frequently.

Tonight we covered her cage a little after sundown, sometime just before 7 PM. She's been pretty quiet since then.

2005-03-04T10:37:00.000-05:00

It is playtime so Charlie is out of her cage for a bit. She is appearing more relaxed and curious today. I have Corelli Concerto no. 8 in G minor playing softly. She seems to like it, and keeps tilting as if she is listening or thinking about things.

She is currently tearing a peanut shell apart. She never seems to have much interest in the peanut itself, but she sure has fun chewing up the shell. She is having fun playing with her little lifting toy too.

William is proving to be quite facinating at the moment. He is working on his book list chain. It is made out of paper strips and Charlie keeps leaning forward toward him as far as she can with her head cocked watching him.

She is playing non stop now. She is climbing all over her jungle gym to get to her toys. She even pulled the chew toy up that has the bell on the end and talked softly into the bell for a bit.

We just put some more peanuts and hot peppers in her blue toy/treat dispenser, and she is having a great time tearing them up. (She just climbed down and is walking around on the table!!!! She went over to Beth's spelling book, looked at it, and then went back to her gym.) She has gotten very brave and even went over to her food bowl for the first time (at the jungle gym). I wonder if the music is what has made the difference? And, she has now discovered the water dish. I should think after all those peppers she would want some!

2005-03-03T16:01:00.000-05:00

She tried taking a bath in her small dish of drinking water this morning. We quickly put some water in a 10x10 inch casserole dish and placed it on the floor of her cage, but although she drank from it, she wouldn't splash in it. She seems to be very cautious of new things (except new toys which she investigates immediately), so I guess we will just keep offering her the water in the morning to see if she gets used to it.

2005-03-03T15:22:00.000-05:00

I'm starting this journal Thursday afternoon, March 3. We've had this beautiful bird for ten days. She goes through periods of napping and chattering, and it seems it could be useful to make a note of these times. For the last few mornings Vicki has gotten her out of the cage, but she seems very frightened or cautious and sits quietly on top of her playground, although today she climbed down its ladder to retrieve a slice of apple.

Today after lunch I gave her the stick from a corn-dog, a piece of wood like a popsicle stick but thinner. I thought she might like to shred it, but after she carefully removed the miniscule remaining fragments of corn, she let the stick fall through the grating to the bottom of her cage.

She makes a wide variety of vocalizations, some squeaky-wheel sounds, some screams, some chortles and clucks. For the first few days we thought she was having fun screaming at Tashi, as he would run from the room when she did, but we haven't noticed that connection recently. Today during lunch I thought she might be meowing at Riker, who was lounged in the sunshine nearby. If she was, Riker did a fine job of ignoring her.