Decision To Be Free

[Jewels95]

So, my little Lola is a bit of a demon when in her cage. Typical for parrotlets to be territorial, I know.

WELL, I've come up with a decision. Since it's a hassle to get her out of her cage (we were making progress,
but then I left for a weekend, came back, and progress was destroyed, and now she refuses all over again, and
has for the past month.) I am going to remove the cage.

I know it's not recommended that you keep small birds cage-free, so I have taken many things into consideration.
My idea to have her wings grow in is gone, I'm going to keep them clipped. No other animals are aloud in my room
at any time anyway, so they won't be an issue.

I have a desk that has an arm that extends out and I never use it - this is going to be her area. (Bonus..it's easy to
clean the poop off of! I know from first hand experience with her. ) I'll set it up with her food & water (a bowl will
be smartly placed below the seed cup to make for easy clean-up of the seed hulls.)

Her toys will be all around her..etc.

I am not making this a permanent move, yet. She loves her play-stand, and it's desk-sized, so I am going to make
that her "main-spot" to build on. (it's fairly small and wouldn't be ideal for her permanent location, should we decide
upon that.)

AND before I even start creating "her space" I am going to "bird-safe" my desk. I have a laptop, so there are rarely
any cords on my desk - from now on there won't be any - and I have nothing really on there over all so she won't
be prone to any immediate dangers. As for around my bedroom, there's also nothing really for her to get into. All of
my TV cords and such will be covered and there will be "barriers" around the back of my tv to avoid her getting in there.
There are boxes under my bed that disable her from getting under there, and there is nothing else for her to get under.

She's really well trained in a way that she doesn't leave the playstand if I put her there. I know if I add to the playstand
and have her own area, she won't leave unless I coax her over to me, or she wants my attention.

It's going to be a bit of a learning curve for both of us, but I'm excited!

P.S, I'm keeping her cage so that when I'm not home & she needs to be cared for by someone else (my parents), she'll
be in her cage upstairs. Or if we're all leaving for a couple hours, she'll be in her cage. No worries, I have considered
many aspects of the situations.

do you guys have any advice on what else I should consider?

 

[Jewels95]

[Edit] I'm also going to have her travel cage on the playstand with it's own toys/perches inside. That way come bedtime I can put her in there (since it's impossible for me to watch her while I'm snoring away, and she does have a tendancy to "glide" over to my bed to try and be with me..I don't want to roll over and squish her!)

 

[SandraK]

I can only wish you alot of good luck with all your very careful planning and I do mean that. I don't have a parrotlet, but from my experience with my own birds, if someone is determined enough to get into or onto or access something they will find a way to do so even if it takes several days for them to figure out how.

Plus, since both of us are girls, and so is Lola, keep in mind that no-one gets away with telling any female they cannot do something. It just doesn't work that way.

 

[Jewels95]

Haha, exactly! That's what it's like with Lola, sometimes. But she's a pretty good girl, 99.9% of the time.

it's that .1 percent of the time I need to watch for .

I'm going to go work on cleaning my room RIGHT NOW And the set up...pix 2 come!

 

[Explorer]

Can't wait to see those pics !!

 

[JLcribber]

I would reconsider clipping her wings.

 

[Milo]

I'd also reconsider clipping her wings. While you *think* she won't try to move if you put her on the playstand, I'd be willing to bet that at some point in time she's going to get curious and having her wings is going to allow her to get back up off the floor should she decide that looks fun. Plets are ornery by nature, and the fact that they're so little makes it all the more likely that they could get hurt in the wide world outside their cage. I'm not sure what the difference is, however, in her current living situation and you putting her back in the cage for sleeping and when you're gone? I'm not saying it's not a good idea to have her out while you're with her, I'm just not sure what a difference it's going to make if her cage is still in the equation somehow.

 

[Jewels95]

Well the overall difference is that usually I have her out for 1-2 hours sometimes more / day. Lately, I've taken away her regular cage, and have had her out the majority of the day. I've set up my computer in my room and the internet on it so I can do my studies in there and she sits on the desk next to me. I had an idea at first to completely minus the cage from the equation, but then reconsidered as I realized she has this tendancy to come onto my bed when I'm laying there and I don't want her to do this at night when I'm sleeping then me roll over and hurt her. I mean, we've taken naps together, she sleeps nuzzled up under my chin, but these naps are ones where I'm waking up every few minutes because I'm not dead-asleep. When I'm really sleeping, I'm dead to the world.

So, she's out all day from when I wake up until when it's her bed time. Then she's put in her travel cage (which is probably a canary-sized cage? 18x12x18ish) with perches, food, and her favorite toy. She seems to really be enjoying the larger amount of out time. The only time she really goes in her large cage is if I'm away and she needs to go upstairs to be birdy-sat by my Dad. Otherwise everything is done together - studying, showering, eating, watching tv, play time, etc. but of course she has her independency where I'm not 100% interacting with her (studying is "her" time sitting next to me, unless she decides to play this game where she steals away all my pens and pencils and erasers! brat!)

So far so good. Still haven't 100% decided upon her wings .. but they're not grown in yet so my decision won't matter until then. I really would love to let her fly it would be so beautiful to watch again..