Georgie's attitude change...

Georgie's basic training for the first few days didn't go well.

I began with a basic bonding session - coming into her aviary to offer new toys, a few sunflowers, a head scratch. Each would inevitably end with a bite. I immediately cut off contact - drawing back the toy/treat, turning my back, with no eye contact, for ten seconds. She responded by immediately talking to try and get my attention and trying to climb around to 'my side' of the aviary.

After a few days of this - I'm seeing zip improvement. She's still not reliable and it snapping at me when I go for headscratches and though she responds when I turn away, trying to get me to turn back, this tact isn't working for her. I sit down and think about this. My 'punishment' is not working. Why not? Most likely answer I can come up with is that she's still getting the desired response... ie I am taking my hand away, even though that is followed up by ignoring punishment, she is still 'winning' because I take my hand back. Meaning she thinks she is in charge.

Monday, I go into her aviary with a different attitude. I don't smile and coo good morning - I march in, tell her a very businesslike and firm 'Hello, Georgie', and stick out my arm, looking directly into her eyes, and telling her calmly but insistently 'Stepup'.

Georgie grabs my hand, nips twice, throws it away. I don't back down, I stick my arm right back out. Georgie thinks about this for two seconds.

SUCCESS! I almost broke into a victory dance! And I tell you... the change in Georgie is unbelievable. With me she is now fully affectionate, stepping up, cuddling, allowing head scratches willingly - even coming up to me to ask for them - and nuzzling my face, even when sitting on a perch that was higher than my shoulder. She is accepting other girls as well - staff and customers alike. It's like she has realized and accepted where she fits into this new flock and her naughty nips have stopped.

This week, Georgie has now been enjoying all the benefits of working with staff - she comes out for playtime and walks around the store, she gets lots of toys, fruit, and attention, and she is settling in so well :) Really happy with the results here, if only every cockatoo were so easy to work with!

Playtime!

Mmm... cuttlebone!

Checking out the office!

Hey there, Georgie Girl!

Georgie has arrived! Meet the big gorgeous girl:

The bad news - she's what I call a 'guy's bird'. She's great when men go to handle her, they can pick her up and pat her and cuddle her and she's just flirt flirt flirt, but she's exceptionally intolerant and moderately aggressive with women. I've been working with her, trying to imprint in some basic manners. So far a head scratch and handing her something - a toy, a sunflower - is fine. But a stepup... still working on that.

Speaking of sunflowers, she is a very tubby girl (See the last photo on her belly, where the feathers part along her belly? That is the excess weight she is carrying!) and I would ban them entirely from her diet if I thought she would cope at all - which I don't think she would, she's just pitch a fit that would never end! So instead it's rationed sunflowers, and LOTS of fresh fruit and veg. From tomorrow I'm going to remove her seed for two hours to encourage immediate fruit/veg eating, and hopefully soon I'll be able to take her from her cage for playtime (instead of asking one of the boys to come get her out of her for me...!) and get some exercise happening :D

I doubt she's going to be with the store long though - she's the most outstanding talker and dancer and knows just how to wow an audience, somebody will fall in love with her sooner rather than later I suspect. Which sometimes is a shame, although I want to see all my kids go to a good home, I enjoy a challenge to work with and I would love to see if I could make a change in her anti-female habits and her diet!

Ah well, time will tell, and in the meantime - there are birdie salads to chop up, and photos to take :)

Spoiled things they are

It struck me today as I was chopping apple, pear and strawberries among other fresh fruit and veg, that I felt a bit like I was working at a Boost Juice bar. With the among of lorikeets in store I had gotten a little extra fruit in the weekly Birdroom shop, and they were making the most of it. The Kakarikis in particular are nuts about strawberry and tip their entire bowl of fruit on the floor of their cage in order to pick it out first.

The four Scaly lorikeets were particular entertaining today. The two olives have been playing in a large cardboard tunnel, and I was in stitches watching them roll it around while they were both inside. Heebie and Jeebie, the normal coloured Scalys, today decided the handraised Kakariki would make a good playmate. They followed him for ten minutes, trying to share all the pine needles he picked up to play with, then trying to groom him while he looked at them warily, unable to understand why these strange hoping green things were so interested in him. The Kaki is more independent and is happy to ignore the other handraised birds as he scuttles around exploring, and he was quite bewildered by their avid investigation of him!

Oh, and some good news - on Thursday I'll be meeting six-year-old Georgie the Sulfur-Crested Cockatoo! She's flying up from Sydney and I'm already excited to see her - photos can be expected, as always!

More photos of course

What else? Here's the Lorikeets at playtime:

Lunchtime:

(Lorikeets are such tidy eaters...)

One of the olive Scalys

A few aviary birds. Here's the Java Finches, who like to play follow-the-leader. If one jumps onto a perch, the others all have to follow!

A line of Bourkes - the first three are Rosa Bourkes, the second three are Pink Bourkes, then we have a White-fronted Blue Scarlet, and two normal Bourkes.

Two male parblue Scarlet-Chest Parrots. In real life they are even bluer than this, really stunning to look at.

Spring has Sprung in the Birdroom!

So this morning I did a quick prune around the yard, and since my own birds at home get pretty spoiled all throughout the year, I thought the residents of the Birdroom might enjoy the results...

Two big Nanday Conures inspect their Eucalyptus!

Olive Red-collar and Scaly hiding behind a Norfolk Island Pine branch:

King of the castle!

Mixed group of Loris:

Four Scaly Lorikeets, two normal and two olive!

[IMG]http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff254/RebelWolfChris/Pets/Loris4.jpg[/IMG]

Tired out, the Loris sit in a row preening:

Heebie, the Scaly Lorikeet, showing off his camouflage!

One of the olive Scalys

I hope the start of everyone's Spring is going well :)

Great news!

Alex the Alexandrine got the official okay to stay as our store mascot bird :D He's getting along very well with all the staff now he's had a chance to know us, and he's displaying mostly positive behavior to customers, even ones he has just met. Still a little nervous until he warms up to most people, I think he'll progress more with time and I'm really excited at getting the chance to handle and work with him :D

Happy Father's Day!

A VERY busy day for the Birdroom and the store alike this Sunday! Apparently, everybody wanted to shop for their pets this Father's Day :D The birds got very impatient with me when I didn't feed and deliver salad (fruit and vegies chopped up) until 2 in the afternoon! Sometimes it's difficult to keep to their schedule, and they just have to be a bit patient.

We have three new lorikeets, a Lutino (yellow) Scaly, A Rainbow and a very sweet little Red-collar. I love baby loris at that uncoordinated stage! Heebie and Jeebie, who I'm quite surprised are still with us, being such nice little lorikeets, flipped out! This was their first time out on the playgyms all together, and it was like Heebie and Jeebie didn't even realize the other three were Lorikeets! At first they kept as far away from the new birds as possible before I broke up the nerves with some nectar mix, and they all shared a little.

Archie has gone to his new home, where I hope he'll have an easier time settling down. Alex is still with us and we are looking at the possibility of him becoming the store mascot and staying at Petbarn - at this stage I'm still assessing his temperament to check that not only will everyone be happy with him, but that he will be happy with the situation. Some birds prefer to be handled by a small amount of people and others will willingly go to anyone friendly and Alex falls somewhere between the two from what I've seen - I'll keep you posted!

In the meantime, the Birds and I wish all the Dads out there a very Happy Father's Day weekend!

Double Alexandrine blast

Today I got lots of photos!

This is Alex:

He makes for entertaining poses :D

And this is Archie!

As you can see, Archie is a big fan of baths. He jumped in when he saw the Kakariki having a bath in the blue dish, although somehow, he managed his without wetting his head feathers at all! Here he is with Heebie the Scaly Lorikeet:

And here's Heebie with Jeebie, throwing out a beakful of his wet nectar mix!

Back to Alex and Archie, they found a budgie toy that proved a little too entertaining this afternoon...

Alex had it first (He is 'top bird' and he gets toys before Archie :))

Archie quickly noticed and quietly sidled over to see if Alex would share...

"Pleeeeeease, Alex?"

"This... is not what I had planned." Alex ran to the other side of the cagetop to aviod Archie, but as he did so, he managed to flip the ring up and drop it over his neck! I had to put my camera down to rescue him. :D I admit I may have laughed at him for a little bit... his expression was so baffled, it was priceless!

"Haha! Now' it's mine!" - Archie swooped in when Alex stayed warily back, and grabbed it from himself. Two minutes later he dropped it over his neck as WELL and I had to go and rescue him, at which point i told them the toy was not suitable for Alexes, and hid it away!

Alexnadrines... nothing but trouble!

Oh - my quest for Hahn's macaws was met with a no... for now! I'll keep trying :D