It is with great pleasure that I announce the
Celebirdy for the month of May 2018,
@Parakeet88 's Ben!
1) How did you acquire your bird?
I bought Ben from Petco mostly as an impulse buy. I'd wanted a conure for years and did the research but was going to be starting college soon and I knew I wouldn't have the time for a conure, but I did get a pair of parakeets in the meantime. Now I'm working and live on my own and I already had four birds before getting Ben so I had absolutely no intention of getting another bird, but here he is lol. My mom, my sister, and I went to get food for our dogs and of course I always go to look at the birds and supplies. Right away Ben was the first one I saw, I'd never seen a bird with colors like his. There were four little green cheeks, one of them was still new so we left him alone but the other three were loosing their little minds! They were rolling around, dancing, just doing anything to get our attention. I asked one of the workers if they were tame and if we could take Ben out for a bit. She took out Ben and one of the other nicer ones for us. I knew I was already set on Ben although the other little guy was hilarious. We must have played with them for close to an hour. I told the lady I'd be back for Ben later after getting a cage set up. As soon as I got him home he wanted to be out, and he demanded scratches until bed time.
I mean how could you walk away from these guys?! They're crazy!
2) What is your bird's name, species, age and sex?
Ben is a turquoise green cheek conure. I was told he was likely a male but not DNA tested, and at his most recent trip to the vet she said he could actually be a female based on his hip size lol maybe I'll get him DNA'd one day but I'm not worried about it right now. He turned one on January 17th.
3) Does your bird do any special tricks?
He already knew how to dance and give kisses when I bought him so that was fun but I haven't taught him anything new. He hasn't taken to formal training very well.
Here he is doin a little dance. He really likes this weird song....and he loves to yell about his dance. When he wants attention he doesn't scream, instead he yells “good dance!” because he knows I'll always look at him to watch him dance lol
4) What are some of your bird's favorite foods?
His first true love was dried green beans lol he loves walnuts and grapes but he really enjoys any kind of fruit and nuts.
5) What is the funniest thing your bird has done?
Ben cracks me up all the time but here are a couple of recent thing he's done.
My four other birds are in a large flight cage. My mom had this idea to put curtains around the bottom to hide the storage buckets on the shelf underneath. So now Ben loves to walk around on the storage buckets behind the curtains and look like a creep.
I also recently rearranged the toys in his cage. This was one of the first foraging toys I bought for him, not realizing how big it was. He couldn't figure it out and he was way too little to tilt it so I got some easier ones for him to start with. I decided to let him give it another try a few days ago. He was SO mad that he couldn't get to the seed! I couldn't even help show him how it worked, he was just going crazy so I left him alone. I turned my back for a second and when I looked back he was getting the treats in his own Ben way...
6) How has your bird enriched your life?
All five of my bird have had a huge impact on my life. They are the first pets I've taken care of totally on my own in my own apartment. They really help me a lot. If I'm stressed or not feeling great I go talk to my parakeet. He listens so intently and gets so close to my face that I can get a whiff of his lovely bird smell. I have some stomach issues which seem to be linked to anxiety so having the birds helps me keep my mind off things and they force me to get out of bed and get moving. Before having the birds I'd spend all day in bed with stomach aches but now I have a reason to get up even when I'm not feeling great. I have to clean cages, make breakfast, change water bowls.....and getting up and moving actually helps my stomach but I'd never be motivated to get moving on my own. I find taking care of them to be great stress relief even though you'd think having five little lives to take care of would cause more stress.
Ben specifically has changed my life in a lot of ways. He's the first bird I've had freely wander around my living room and he's my first tame bird so its been really different compared to having the parakeets and bourkes. He just always makes me laugh even though he's a butt sometimes. I love that he travels pretty well. It's not his favorite thing but he doesn't freak out about it. I'm used to driving three hours to my parents' house on my own but now that Ben comes with me it's so much more fun and the drive goes a lot faster. Once in a while we stop at McDonalds and I get apple slices for him. He's the little travel buddy I never knew I needed.
7) What would you tell people who are considering this species?
I think they can make really good “first birds” for the right people who have done their research. Ben has actually fit into my weird night shift schedule really well. He very very rarely wakes me up during the day and he's great at keeping himself busy. He is super entertaining and very smart. Ben is the only bird of the species I've dealt with so I can really only say what he is like specifically, I don't know much about these guys in general as a whole species, each bird is different.
8) What is the activity and noise level of your bird?
Ben is not very loud at all. He does occasionally scream but I personally don't think it's that loud and it's pretty rare (maybe a few times per day). He really only screams at the birds outside (just keep the windows covered) and he is guaranteed to scream if he sees a bug in the house lol this actually comes in handy because I can follow where he's looking and kill the bug. I think he's already helped me kill three bugs this month. He is very active but I wouldn't say he's super crazy. He likes to climb and fling his toys around.
Here he is screaming at a bug and this is tiny screaming compared to what he does sometimes
9) What are some of your bird's quirks?
I'm not sure if this is a quirk but Ben has to have this ritual every time I come back into the room after being gone for a bit. He says “hi Ben” and then I have to say it back to him and we go back and forth until he decides it's ok to stop. We always have to do it when I get home from work and when I get out of bed but there are some other occasions where he thinks it's necessary as well.
10) If your bird talks, what is the most surprising word or sentence it has said?
Ben talks a little bit. My favorite thing he says is “whoops” because he says it in context. Whenever I drop something and it's loud I say whoops to help calm the flock down and let them know it's ok. So now whenever I drop something or if Ben drops something he almost always says whoops and its scary how often we say it at the same exact time. He also says whoops when I catch him doing things he shouldn't be doing, like stealing seed from the bourkes. He'll say whoops with a seed in his beak as he goes to grab another one and it cracks me up.
Another good one is when I have my back turned to his cage while I'm taking care of the other birds. He'll hop onto my back, climb up to my shoulder, and right in my ear he goes “what're you doin?” and I just die laughing every time.
Here he is talking about “cute baby chickens”. This is the only clip I have of him talking, and I'm pretty sure my parakeet taught him this phrase. I never say it to Ben because I call the parakeets chickens, I call Ben by his name but he's now made himself a chicken too lol
I always use walnuts as training treats, he loves them. He also loves dried hot peppers, grapes and dried papaya and recently he's been into safflower seeds.
Here are a few of my favorite clips of Ben. In the first clip he's giving himself scratches with a toy part. In the second clip he's trying to throw his bucket off his cage. And in the third clip he's getting some really really nice scratches.
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Ben is awesome
Ben is adorable congrats!!
What a character!
Cuteness overload! 
He's so bright it doesn't even look natural! Lol 
Shes training me...
