Pets

Companion Cockatoos – Fun

I always had German Shepherds until I found myself living in inner city apartments ten years ago. When I met a couple who urgently needed to care for their two cockatoos for six weeks, I couldn’t resist the opportunity.

These birds, a female and a younger male, were difficult cases. He didn’t always sit on my shoulder when I left the room, but she did, and when she and I left, he would make a ruckus, then launch himself out of the cage and plummet, wings clipped, to the ground. to march him behind me, yelling at his girlfriend the whole way. They both had paper fetishes and would bite cute little beaks off any paper they gave me enough to put within reach.

I now have two male cockatiels, coriander and bergamot (B&C). Cockatoos, as members of the parrot family, fall into the category of pet birds. They want to be in your company and interact with you. They are affectionate, sensitive, surprisingly intelligent, and downright comical.

They are very messy though, and I constantly clean up after them. The mess consists mainly of shelled seeds that the parrots seem to enjoy throwing at least a meter around their cage.

All parrots are flock birds and in the wild, when separated from the flock, they call to each other. In captivity they do the same thing… only in captivity it’s me who represents the herd.

They want to know I’m inside cooee and periodically whistle at me to make sure I’m still around. As long as I answer, they are happy. If I take a little while to respond, they will come looking for me. I’ll be sitting in front of the computer typing like crazy when two little birds appear at the door, singing. They cluster directly above my feet and begin to climb up to my shoulder where they crouch, gurgling (like a cat purrs), content. If I sit next to their cage, they will come out and clumsily kick it over to sit on me.

B&C are free to be out of their cage when I’m home, but I lock them up to come out because they’ll occupy themselves, beak first, with the nearest interesting thing. Telephone cables and electrical cables are the main attractive items. They will destroy my plants for the sheer joy of pulling the leaves off them. If it’s metal, they’ll find the weak link in seconds. Jupiter, a male cockatoo I once had, would sit on my shoulder and play with my earring. He would then turn his head in front of my face to show me the piece he had just released from the hook that would still be in my ear.

I’ve taught this pair to say, you’re a tweet. Entertain visitors. I recently left them with the breeders for a couple of weeks. When I came back, they were saying Hello Darling. Both sing in tune with the waltzes of Strauss, under the direction of Karajan. He put a CD on repeat while I’m gone to keep him company and add to his repertoire. Bergamot has annoyingly picked up the screech of a Mynah bird and Coriander repeats the beeping sound of my cell phone. Have you heard the expression, ‘learning fashion from parrots?’ You mean repetitive. This is how you teach the birds to learn new words and sounds.

B&C loves arrowroot cookies with milk as a gift. They used to be crazy about broccoli, but now they prefer silver beets. They also like snap beans, manuka, bottlebrush, eucalyptus, pittasporum, and willow. They happily chop them into pieces which they gloriously shoot around the place. It keeps them busy and nurtures them. I pass a folded piece of paper through the bars of his cage and they tug on it for days. A small pine cone also keeps them busy.

In the wild, cockatoos spend approximately 80% of their time foraging, interspersed with periods of rest. B&C will be busy as summer bees, chirping non-stop, crawling up their cage, plucking branches and leaves, and then suddenly there they are with their heads thrown back, their beaks buried in the feathers on their backs, and their eyes closed. .

They love to be sprayed with water from time to time and will rub their heads along the perch, wings stretched out and up, leaning at crazy angles to get the most out of the spray. I used to take Jupiter in the shower with me. When he got fed up, he would climb up my arm and I would prop him up on the railing to preen while he washed me up.

B&C are still young at six months. I can expect to have the company of these charming feathered clowns for twenty years or more.

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