Temporary +1

Nemo, Shade's brother and my mother's bird, will be staying with us for a few days, so of course this called for pictures!









This morning, he's been giving kisses to me non-stop; he's also been getting a little impatient and I think this means he's hungry so we better scurry on and prepare breakfast for the birds.

Nemo

Nemo hanging out on the Boy's shoulder earlier this afternoon (I was making a few bird toys - post to come soon).

This should be his last week-end with us, my parents are due to come back early this week.

He's quite easy to take care of, the only downside being he needs to come out on his own as he is bird-aggressive (much the opposite of his sister). Generally the Boy also gets bit a few times but he was quite well behaved this time around!

Mr. Bright Eyes

Nemo is back for a two week stay or so.
He arrived last Sunday, but I didn't get around to taking pictures until today so I didn't post until now.

He's already laughed quite a bit at the Boy's expense and requested his fair share of kisses and head scratches from me. Wonder who his favorite person is...

From 7 to 8 - Nemo has arrived!

My parents just dropped off their Senegal Nemo (Shade's brother) for a stay that will be a little less than 3 weeks.

This will be interesting as he's not a fan of other birds (he's been known to try and go after Cockatoos much bigger than him). He'll have his own time out in the evening, maybe in conjunction with Léa following the same method we do in the morning (someone with him while the other will be with Léa). Well this is while we'll be at work. As of December 23 I'll be on vacation for a few days and that will facilitate proceedings allowing every bird to have a considerable amount of time out of cage.

For Nemo, I have two cages set up - one in the birdroom mostly to be used for sleep (so I can close the door and not be worried about cat curiosity) and he has a bigger cage set up in our bedroom for during the day (I'll close the door to the birdroom and to our bedroom and allow the cat to have the living room all to herself during that time).

It'll be a juggling act but as in the past when this has happened, we always managed to find a routine that worked and I'm sure we'll be able to find something once again.

From 6 to 8 - Day 24

This should really be title "From 8 back to 6".

Earlier this evening I brought Nemo and Itsy back home.
They seemed quite happy to see my mother again. My parents do have a few birds and they were the first one back.

No more juggling for a little bit.

From 6 to 8 - Day 23

Day 23.
This should be the last night I have Itsy and Nemo, provided my parents flight leaves on time tomorrow.

I have to say, I am looking forward to downplaying the bird juggling (who goes where when) but it was interesting to have them around and it went much better than I first anticipated. Had I been able to have Zuri and Itsy out together, having gone from 6 to 8 birds wouldn't of been much of a difference, if you don't count on Shade's jealousy..

But time has flown by while they were here. Have a hard time believing it's been 23 days already.

From 6 to 8 - Days 17 to 22

6 days without any updates.

Things have continued to go reasonably well. Nemo has been coming into the living room with the rest of the flock more while Itsy had the birdroom to herself and would come out for an hour or so alone with us in the living room at some other time in the day.

Shade is occasionally giving me the stink eye though - I do believe she'll be happy when the visitors will be gone. I do keep offering her my shoulder first, but she just flies off to another place so I'll allow another bird to be on the shoulder - and that seems like it's too much for her. Tonight she looked particularly annoyed so after a little spat she had with Zuri, I just picked her up and put her down on my shoulder and she stayed. She even cuddled. Pixel kept trying to creep in but I kept her away and would scratch her head all the same.

Itsy pictures

Pictures of Itsy from yesterday.

Nemo pictures

Yesterday while I had Nemo and Itsy out I took a few pictures. Here are some of Nemo, I'll post some of Itsy later on.

From 6 to 8 - Days 11, 12, 13 & 14

I'm getting worse at these updates!

Nothing really to report. I wasn't feeling really good this week so we didn't take too many extra chances with incorporating Itsy and Nemo with my flock.

Yesterday, we did have both out in the living room after the others went in. Nemo was on me and Itsy chose to go on one of the atoms. Then, quite suddenly, Nemo flew to the atom and I ran behind him to intervene in the impending attack - because it was clearly his intention. I managed to separate them before they got at each other. The moment Nemo had landed Itsy had gotten herself in fighting mode as well - trust me, a puffed up Meyer's who is ready to lunge is not a pretty sight. Anyways, after this they went in their cages as well and were covered for the night.

I will be off work for the few days, in fact, my parents should be coming back on my last day off and therefore I'll probably be able to bring Itsy and Nemo back home on that day - as long as my parents are able to leave when they should.

From 6 to 8 - Days 8, 9 & 10

I have to say, I'm finding it hard to do daily updates when things are going relatively well.

Won't complain though, I rather it be quiet because I have nothing to say than having birds continuously attack each other.

So I have found myself, even during the week now, of alternating between leaving one of my mom's birds in the room and one in the extra cage to having one out with us and one in the room, to having both out with us just before they go in for the night (my guys having been put "to bed" previously. It's not a perfectly set in stone routine but it is working.

I do believe it'll be even easier to give them more one on one next week, as I'll be off from work for 10 consecutive days and then they'll be going back to my parents' house.

I have also started weighing my mom's birds with mine.
I have found with my guys that some of them tend to loose a bit of weight when they are being watched over by other people. I wanted to see if this would happen with my mom's guys. Unfortunately, I didn't think of taking a measure on day 1 of them being here, but I'm pretty sure Nemo hasn't lost anything, and I'll be watching Itsy a bit more. Mind you, I had weighed her in the past and she's around what she weighed back then and from the few measures I have collected recently, her weight seems rather stable (fluctuates by a gram or two, but as it comes down, it comes back up after).

From 6 to 8 - Days 5, 6 & 7

I didn't do daily updates for most of this past week - I do apologize.
I was rather tired and didn't think I could be as vigilant when watching them so for most of those days, I did have Itsy and Nemo alternate, as planned originally, between the birdroom and the extra cage in my bedroom. On Friday evening (day 7) I did start taking one out with us in the living room and having one in the birdroom again though.

Things have been going well that way.

Hand kisses

Nemo loves to give kisses.

I'm currently sitting at the computer, doing some reading on some forums and Nemo is on my shoulder. I was leaning on elbow and my hand is about the height of Nemo and he starts kissing it, leaning in and making the noise. Every so often he would laugh a bit.

Funny bird.

From 6 to 8 - Day 3

Things went relatively well today.

Monday equals back to work and although their time out is more limited during the week-days, it still seemed to work out.

Putting them in the extra cage while the others are out makes me feel bad so I did take Nemo out with us in the living room in the morning, Itsy when we came back for work and Nemo once again in the evening after dinner. Of course, while one is out with the rest of the flock, the other is in the birdroom.

So far, the problematic one is Zuri. I have to keep either of the visiting birds on me (not on the Boy when Petey is out) since I can stop them from trying to lunch at any birds (which they haven't been trying) or to shield them, specially from Zuri. He's a bit too curious at times.

From 6 to 8 - Day 2

Today we proceeded with some introductions.

In the morning, I kept it to my usual flock, Nemo got the room and Itsy was in the bigger cage. However, to make up for her time in the cage, I took Itsy out for about an hour after breakfast (which apparently was the right call because she dove in her breakfast bowl when it was offered to her).

In the afternoon I took everyone out at once..well after getting my own flock settled. Itsy was in my lap and Nemo was with the Boy. Things were ok for the most part, but I did have to bring Itsy in once she started getting a bit antsy.

Later in the evening I proceeded to having my flock out with Itsy, Itsy being on me so I could keep her under close supervision. At one point I had her and Zuri in close proximity and were scratching both their heads...and eventually got a pretty sharp bite from Zuri on the tip of a finger. I think he wasn't too happy with having to stay where he was, forced there by the head scratch, because he was very very interested in Itsy once again.

Itsy later became a tad too restless so in her cage she went and out came Nemo (he was in his cage since Zuri had landed in his cage for the bite and insisting to go where he shouldn't). Nemo was very well behaved and so was Shade. In fact, I had both on me once again without any trouble..from them at least. Piper kept trying to scoot on one shoulder, having been on me for most of the day at this point, and was getting dangerously close to one of the Sennies beaks. I passed him on to the Boy and from there Piper went to eat more pellets.

Ironically, the two Red-bellieds who usually like to create a little mayhem were the most well behaved, Petey having tried to dive-bomb me on a few occasions during the day.

From 6 to 8 - Day 1...Part 2

Apparently I'm a liar.
I did say I wouldn't do any introductions yesterday, but I did, with Nemo.
My regular flock was behaving nicely, none of them, but Piper, wanted to be on me at the time, all busy playing with other things so I figured it was time to go check on Nemo who was in the big cage. And I felt bad for the little guy so I brought him with me thinking it would be ok, since I could manage him and Piper on me at once.

I was somewhat wrong.

The moment I showed up in the living room with him, Shade started showing interest, but not the good kind. Pixel also flew right to me...so I ended up with Piper on my head, Pixel on one shoulder, Shade on the other and Nemo in my lap. Of course, the two Senegals wanted to get at each other so I had to keep them separate with one hand. Piper tried crawling down to a shoulder so I had to keep him out of harms way. And, to make things even more interesting, Zuri decided that this was an appropriate time to get his head scratched...And extra pair or arms and hands would have been practical at this point. Luckily, Pixel quickly decided she had enough of this and flew back to a perch to eat some pellets. Which liberated a shoulder on which I put Nemo. Apparently both Senegals having their own shoulder made them more happy and they stopped, for the most part, trying to get to each other. Zuri, having got his quota of head scratches also went somewhere else to play. All I was left to contend with was Piper who didn't want to remain on the head...and absolutely wanted a shoulder, which was out of the question.

Now they are out again - my flock in the living room, now it's Nemo's turn in the birdroom and Itsy's turn in the big cage. I haven't tried with Itsy what I did with Nemo since Shade is currently claiming my shoulder and seeing how Itsy went after Nemo yesterday, I can only imagine that she'll do the same with Shade (she hasn't differentiated in the past) so I won't tempt it. I might just take her out for half an hour once all the others go in for breakfast for some one on one time.

They are here!

Posting pictures right now, will post more about the day later on.

From 6 to 8..

Starting tomorrow..

My mom will be dropping off her two pois, Nemo (Shade's brother) and Itsy (possibly Zuri's older sister...assuming the breeder only had the one pair of Meyer's) for a few weeks while my parents go away for the Holidays.

I'll try to do like last year and have a collection of daily posts about how things are going around here, with the addition of two new birds.

New challenges?

-Well Itsy and Nemo seem to have only grown to hate each other more. Keeping them separate while insuring that they both also get some quality one on one time might be tricky;

-Shade and Pixel, although seemed to have calmed down a bit (should go knock on some wood), have started being a bit more open about not entirely liking each other. Not sure what throwing "new" birds in the mix will do;

-Itsy was not fond of Shade the last few time she was here (might be her not liking Senegals as Nemo is one..). She also wasn't very fond of the Meyer's but didn't seem to care too much about Joey. However, I'm not sure how Pixel will perceive this addition of another female bird here..

-Nemo and Shade always have a rough few first days together - hopefully this time it won't last as long and they'll get over the wanting to attack the other and just start ignoring each other faster.

Here are their temporary cages away from home:





I also have another larger cage in my bedroom in case anyone should need it (if I need to separate them a bit and a bird is already occupying the bird room).

And everyone is back home!

As I've mentioned before, I was gone this week-end at the Canadian Parrot Conference, which meant my birds were being watched by other people. I brought them over on Thursday and I have to say it was weird not having them around later that evening nor on the Friday morning. The apartment was definitively lacking something.

We came back last night so went to get the birds today. We've been all reunited for about 20 minutes and I have to say I enjoy having everyone together again.

Posts with pictures from the Conference will follow..

The importance of getting your bird well socialized and used to different settings

My boyfriend and I were gone for a week to visit some parts of British Columbia and of course, the birds had to be watched over. This trip also happened to be the longest time I was going to be away from them, if you don't consider my parents watching over Piper while I was off to University.

This also happened to be the first time I brought Pixel to be birdsat somewhere else. Up to this point, her only "outings" were the visit to the vet the day we got her (which was probably one of the worst days in her life) and a recent stint out at one of the local Parrot Club meetings. While I was worried I would have a terrified and nervous bird at the meeting, she proved she had some Red-bellied blood in her and was a total clown and showed off quite some bit. But...I was there with her the whole time. Had I not been there, I'm sure it would have been different, as we are still working on getting her properly socialized...

So I was still a bit worried when it came time for her to be left into my mom's care. I was worried about how she would react, a bit concerned as she might see this as some form of abandonment. I was taking a bit of comfort that maybe being with the other members of the Poi flock would help, but since she didn't seem to have quite a strong a bond with them here as she did with me, I wasn't entirely sure how that would go over.

Well...according to what my mom said, Pixel was true to her nervous self in a new setting, something I was expecting. After all, most of the other birds went through the same thing the first few times they went there when we were away (even Petey who won the title of "best bird" this time around, used to have my mom all concerned because he would barely eat at first). I'm assuming it'll take a few times for her as well to understand that going there is only temporary and that in the end, we'll come back for her.

I was also worried about her reaction when we would come and get her. Either she would be upset with us or she would be happy to see us. Luckily, the moment she saw me she reacted the same exact way as she does when I go to let her out of her cage here and made a few of her happy sounds.

It is obvious we still need to work on her getting used to new settings and new people but I do have hope that she'll get more comfortable as time goes by.