Pet Forum / Birds / Birds / April 2008

In my case my seven parrots (1 scarlet, 2 B&Gs,  1 U2,  1 CAG, 1 Conure
1 Amazon) have the run of the house.  None are clipped and are free to
fly if they wish.

After 20 years I hardly  notice the birds  unless I'm trying to talk on
the phone.  Then the person on the other end may have trouble hearing
me.   No, I'm not deaf.   My wife's talking and television shows are
much more annoying than the birds squawking.

My wife chose to have birds in our house.   I can't stand to see them
caged and not able to fly.  The result is a compromise.  The CAG sleeps
on the footboard of my bed.  The Amazon on a perch next to my bed, and
the Conure sleeps on my pillow cuddled against my head.  The larger
birds sleep in the living room with my invalid wife. '

I've just built a new house I'm about to move into.   12600 cubic feet
of it (a little over half the living space,  is a single "bird room"
which will also serve as our living room.   It's all steel and glass
construction.  There's  no wood (except for several large manzanita
perches, no plastic, and no Sheetrock for the birds to chew on.  It can
be pressure washed and the floors are epoxy finished concrete with
drains.    I expect it to  work out well.  It's on a 5800 ft mountain in
southern Arizona with lots of sunshine.

Jester (bare-eyed cockatoo) has his own bedroom. This is where he sleeps and,
sometimes, spends alone time.

We have 3 floors to our house. Jester has a cage on each floor.

He spends his days in the cage in the busiest part of the house, beside my
hubby's home office, which is next to the open plan kitchen/dining room. He has
constant human companionship.

When I work from home, Jesse's "bedtime cage" is wheeled out and located next to
my desk. On those days, he spends his time with me.

Cockatoos are a flock bird. We are his flock. We rarely leave him alone.

If noise was a problem, we would never have had a cockatoo.

We deal with it by accepting it.

Jester is a member of our family. His living arrangement reflects that fact.

Tara J. Ballance
Montreal, Canada

The e-mail of the species is more deadly than the mail - Stephen Fry

We have a dedicated bird room.  We've tried sharing common
quarters over the years and it was always a nightmare.  And a
daymare.  And a morningmare and eveningmare.

As for noise, I deal with it by ingesting huge amounts of blood
pressure and migraine medications.

Pet birds need a lot of human interaction. Our Macaw sleeps with us on a
small perch. The rest of the time he spends in or on his huge cage and a
stand that sits in front of it. He is only locked in the cage when we are
both gone, or I have to sleep during the day. Noise and mess are part of
having birds. Both can be controlled to some extent, but if you are going to
have birds you have to be willing to live with it.

Like Louis, above, my wife chose birds.  We were married 11 years ago,
(I was 52, she was 44) and I'd never had birds.  Now that our last
child has left, taking his bird with him, we're down to a 10 year old
TAG and 4 small dogs.  The TAG is a great talker and usually is
content to yell at the dogs, NO, BAD, KENNEL UP, and to yell each of
their names in a threatening tone.  He's in a fairly large cage right
out in our living area, and we've never covered it.  He has been
content, until the last few months.  For fun, he's worked and worked
until he finally is able to make a very loud noise that is ear-
piercing.  He plays the game by doing this until one of us reacts.
Then he "laughs" in my wife's voice, and starts over.  Over the week-
end, he did this non-stop one night and I rewarded him by wheeling his
cage into the study, which was dark, and leaving him there until we
went to bed.  He has been eyeing me thoughtfully since then, but
hasn't played the "game."