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Happy Endings~Tell us how you recovered your escaped bird~

Danita

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Lets share our stories of how you were able to recover your lost bird.
It has happened to so many of us and there are many happy endings.

I want people who are feeling hopeless to read these experiences and find the energy to keep looking.

What were the things you think helped the most finding your bird?
 

birdlady

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Oh Danita what a great thread!

I never lost a bird, but I did find one.

I recieved a call from my Dad that a member of his church saw a green bird and it did not look wild...so she knew my Dad had a daughter with birds in her neighborhood, and I ended up going to her house...it was a Sunday.

I saw a green bird with blue head flying to and from her bird feeder. I had two BCC at home so I knew this was what I saw.

I kept talking to him and calling him...he would fly down and then fly off...I spent hours doing this...then went home to get a spare cage and set it up with food, water, etc....and hoped he would come down. He came close but no good....then I cut up bananas and got nuts and sat on the ground next to the bird feeder. The bird would fly down to the ground and get closer and closer and then fly off....it kept happening....and then he did it again and I threw a towel over him and snatched him up! The whole ordeal I had talked to him and talked to him...hi sweetie, come here honey, etc...over and over.

I never found his owners but Tiki is still with us today!
 

Danita

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Leslie, how long do you think Tiki was living outside for?
 

igors mum

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mine isnt my story but my ex's. he had a cockatiel who he tooked outside all the time and it never flew off. well one day he had left the front door open and out it went. he looked and looked but never could find him. there was some pretty bad storms for about a week with a lot of rain and wind and cold.about 3 weeks later i just happened to be on the phone with him ( i lived in oklahoma at the time he was in australia) and he said hold on there is a tapping on the door. he came back to the phone a few mins later all excited and i could tell he had been crying to. that little bird had come home and knocked on the door all by himself.he was soaking wet and starving and very ratty looking, but he came home all on his own.he was gone over 3 weeks in that cold weather and they lived right near the mountains so he figured he was gone for good.
 

birdlvr466

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Danita I just read a story in Birdtalk today about a Cockatiel that got loose and it was sub zero temps. Of course the man was frantic but he had the idea of recording his other birds on his Iphone. He brought that back outside and played it as loud as he could and held it high in the air. He spotted his Tiel but the bird was too afraid to fly down. So he turned around and started walking away hoping his Tiel would follow and he did!! Tomorrow I am going to start taping all my birds when they are making their sounds, screams etc..I think it is invaluable to have a recording like this on hand. :hug8:
 

Danita

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It was dark and pouring rain on New Year's Eve here in the heart of a city. My husband always walked around with our Macaw (clipped) on his shoulders. Her clip was growing out a bit and she was due. She LOVES my husband and would never ever leave him, but she did.

He was vacuuming a mat at the front entrance and opened the door, off she flew. All he could do is watch her fly away, beautiful and heart breaking at the same time. Her instinct took over.

Once she was out of his sight, he came running to me "Kiwi flew away!!!!"
I immediately ran to get my keys and told my daughter to make lost flyers and take them to the printers, 100 copies.

All the while, I ran up and down the streets sobbing hysterically. My husband, 4 or more neighbors and I looked for her. I asked everyone I saw. An hour later I had the posters and gave them to everyone to hang. I went to the close hotel and asked the security guards if I could go on the roof, I went to the fire station, grocery stores, apartment buildings, alleys, and streets. I went through yards calling her name. I gave out fliers to whoever would take one, homeless people, pedestrians, city workers you name it. Everyone took them because they felt so bad.

Now it was really dark. The fireworks were starting to go off, in the distance. It was around 4 pm now, freezing and pouring rain. My neighbors already stopped helping.

I came back home to get more tape and my daughter said "Someone found Kiwi!!!", a phone call had just come in!

We ran to get her, she was in the alley across the street, the exact direction she flew in. Where the crows were all yelling when she went missing. The city workers had just finished working and so it was quiet, she pranced out from a big pile of bushes and walked right in front of the lady.

Here is my big aggressive macaw, she climbed right up on her. The poster was there, with her picture and she called us right away.

I have never sobbed so much as I did that day.
 
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birdlady

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Danita, I have no way of knowing for sure, but Tiki was so skinny...yet knew how to find food in feeders...also, he was super good at flying and avoiding the crows that were after him...he must have been out there for a wile.
 

Holiday

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It was dark and pouring rain on New Year's Eve here in the heart of a city. My husband always walked around with our Macaw (clipped) on his shoulders. Her clip was growing out a bit and she was due. She LOVES my husband and would never ever leave him, but she did.

He was vacuuming a matt at the front entrance and opened the door, off she flew. All he could do is watch her fly away, beautiful and heart breaking at the same time. Her instinct took over.

Once she was out of his sight, he came running to me "Kiwi flew away!!!!"
I immediately ran to get my keys and told my daughter to make lost flyers and take them to the printers, 100 copies.

All the while, I ran up and down the streets sobbing hysterically. My husband, 4 or more neighbors and I looked for her. I asked everyone I saw. An hour later I had the posters and gave them to everyone to hang. I went to the close hotel and asked the security guards if I could go on the roof, I went to the fire station, grocery stores, apartment buildings, alleys, and streets. I went through yards calling her name. I gave out fliers to whoever would take one, homeless people, pedestrians, city workers you name it. Everyone took them because they felt so bad.

Now it was really dark. The fireworks were starting to go off, in the distance. It was around 4 pm now, freezing and pouring rain. My neighbors already stopped helping.

I came back home to get more tape and my daughter said "Someone found Kiwi!!!", a phone call had just come in!

We ran to get her, she was in the alley across the street, the exact direction she flew in. Where the crows were all yelling when she went missing. The city workers had just finished working and so it was quiet, she pranced out from a big pile of bushes and walked right in front of the lady.

Here is my big aggressive macaw, she climbed right up on her. The poster was there, with her picture and she called us right away.

I have never sobbed so much as I did that day.
What an amazing story :hug8: Danita, didn't you also help someone find their Grey?
 

marian

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:) Thank you for sharing these stories everyone
 

Stevo

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I was fortunate with my last bird, an Alexandrine, who had the misfortune of unintended extended flights outside 5 times in 15years..

Only 3 were out of sight and of concern to me - The first he was gone for a couple of days before we found him at the RSPCA (like ASPCA); he had landed on an old ladies fence in the rain and started talking to her so she took him in and then handed him into the RSPCA. The hardest bit about getting him back on this occurance was convincing the society that he was an alex, not an eckie, and belonged to us.... When he ran to my gf all doubt was gone.lol.

The second was when he flew to my shoulder but slipped off and kept going (I had a slick jacket on that he couldnt grip) - he flew off over the neighbours houses and I spent the next 5hours searching for him. In the end I heard him in a tree next to the road only 4 houses away; he had circled around and was making his way back home!

The third he spent the night outside. He was flying to my shoulder when I went to greet some friends into the house, missed me and kept going. I watched the direction he went in and spent the whole day grid searching amongst the neighbourhood out to a distance that I though reasonable for his level of fitness (about 3km). I didnt find or hear anything that day and reported him lost to all the local vets, radio station and RSPCA. I also put a lost message in the newspaper. I was up before dawn the next day and continued the search in roughly the same direction, but stepped out the distance in case he'd gone further. After a couple of hours of fruitless searching I decided to regroup and walked up to the shops to get the paper and check the advert that I had submitted. On the way back Charlie saw me from the tree he had roosted in for the night and called to me! He was in a fir tree across the street and up from home about 5 houses in a totally different direction from when he flew off. There was no way I would have seen him in the tree if he hadnt seen me first and called out - I climbed the tree and he sat on my shoulder while I climbed back down. He was happy to get back home! It was interesting that in both of the later occurances it seemed like he was making his own way back home.
 

Anne & Gang

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dANITA and others thanks for sharing these stories..I have two one that happened only two short weeks on tiel talk...a man we all love over there named Pat has a beautiful pied hen name Chloe..he is single and she is the light of his life...He was cleaning and forgot she was on his shoulder and opened the door..she flew out..he came screaming onto tiel talk and we told him what to do..he plastered the area with flyers with her picture..he put the flyers also in pet stores..he sat out with a cage and had the neighbors involved..she was gone two days, in California so nice weather but he was so distraught...enter Rocky, a young boy walking along the street looked down and saw a bird on the sidewalk..he scooped her up and brought her to the nearest pet store, only a five minute walk..they had flyers on their bulletin board, thought the picture matched..and called Pat..he zoomed over there and sure enough, it was Chloe...he brought her home, she was very hungry and thirsty but none the worse for wear and after a vet visit, she is fine.. So flyers do work!!!!!!!!! Another one is also from tiel talk....a moderator there named Sly has a grey named Kismet..She lived in suburb of Detroit... She was transporting Kismet in a cage to her car for the annual vet visit & the cage door broke and out flew Kismet..she posted everywhere imaginable..one week later a young man called her from Detroit and said he found a grey on the skyscraper he was working on as a construction worker..over 30 miles away!!! he coaxed her down from a beam with a baloney sandwich..he took her home and called a vets office to find out what to do..the vet had flyers..so gave him the # to call..he called exchanged picture to Sly's e mail and the next day took Kismet all the way to Sly's house..what a joyful reunion...and the young man & his fiancee after visiting Sly for a while and viewing her lovely birds, decided to get a bird of their own...to this day they are friends.
 

Danita

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mine isnt my story but my ex's. he had a cockatiel who he tooked outside all the time and it never flew off. well one day he had left the front door open and out it went. he looked and looked but never could find him. there was some pretty bad storms for about a week with a lot of rain and wind and cold.about 3 weeks later i just happened to be on the phone with him ( i lived in oklahoma at the time he was in australia) and he said hold on there is a tapping on the door. he came back to the phone a few mins later all excited and i could tell he had been crying to. that little bird had come home and knocked on the door all by himself.he was soaking wet and starving and very ratty looking, but he came home all on his own.he was gone over 3 weeks in that cold weather and they lived right near the mountains so he figured he was gone for good.
This is so cute!!!
It is amazing how smart they are. What a sight that must of been.

Danita I just read a story in Birdtalk today about a Cockatiel that got loose and it was sub zero temps. Of course the man was frantic but he had the idea of recording his other birds on his Iphone. He brought that back outside and played it as loud as he could and held it high in the air. He spotted his Tiel but the bird was too afraid to fly down. So he turned around and started walking away hoping his Tiel would follow and he did!! Tomorrow I am going to start taping all my birds when they are making their sounds, screams etc..I think it is invaluable to have a recording like this on hand. :hug8:
I would never of thought of the cell phone, that is brilliant.

I was fortunate with my last bird, an Alexandrine, who had the misfortune of unintended extended flights outside 5 times in 15years..

Only 3 were out of sight and of concern to me - The first he was gone for a couple of days before we found him at the RSPCA (like ASPCA); he had landed on an old ladies fence in the rain and started talking to her so she took him in and then handed him into the RSPCA. The hardest bit about getting him back on this occurance was convincing the society that he was an alex, not an eckie, and belonged to us.... When he ran to my gf all doubt was gone.lol.

The second was when he flew to my shoulder but slipped off and kept going (I had a slick jacket on that he couldnt grip) - he flew off over the neighbours houses and I spent the next 5hours searching for him. In the end I heard him in a tree next to the road only 4 houses away; he had circled around and was making his way back home!

The third he spent the night outside. He was flying to my shoulder when I went to greet some friends into the house, missed me and kept going. I watched the direction he went in and spent the whole day grid searching amongst the neighbourhood out to a distance that I though reasonable for his level of fitness (about 3km). I didnt find or hear anything that day and reported him lost to all the local vets, radio station and RSPCA. I also put a lost message in the newspaper. I was up before dawn the next day and continued the search in roughly the same direction, but stepped out the distance in case he'd gone further. After a couple of hours of fruitless searching I decided to regroup and walked up to the shops to get the paper and check the advert that I had submitted. On the way back Charlie saw me from the tree he had roosted in for the night and called to me! He was in a fir tree across the street and up from home about 5 houses in a totally different direction from when he flew off. There was no way I would have seen him in the tree if he hadnt seen me first and called out - I climbed the tree and he sat on my shoulder while I climbed back down. He was happy to get back home! It was interesting that in both of the later occurances it seemed like he was making his own way back home.
:omg: Stevo your Alexandrine must of loved you so much :heart: Truly amazing he came back those three times.

dANITA and others thanks for sharing these stories..I have two one that happened only two short weeks on tiel talk...a man we all love over there named Pat has a beautiful pied hen name Chloe..he is single and she is the light of his life...He was cleaning and forgot she was on his shoulder and opened the door..she flew out..he came screaming onto tiel talk and we told him what to do..he plastered the area with flyers with her picture..he put the flyers also in pet stores..he sat out with a cage and had the neighbors involved..she was gone two days, in California so nice weather but he was so distraught...enter Rocky, a young boy walking along the street looked down and saw a bird on the sidewalk..he scooped her up and brought her to the nearest pet store, only a five minute walk..they had flyers on their bulletin board, thought the picture matched..and called Pat..he zoomed over there and sure enough, it was Chloe...he brought her home, she was very hungry and thirsty but none the worse for wear and after a vet visit, she is fine.. So flyers do work!!!!!!!!! Another one is also from tiel talk....a moderator there named Sly has a grey named Kismet..She lived in suburb of Detroit... She was transporting Kismet in a cage to her car for the annual vet visit & the cage door broke and out flew Kismet..she posted everywhere imaginable..one week later a young man called her from Detroit and said he found a grey on the skyscraper he was working on as a construction worker..over 30 miles away!!! he coaxed her down from a beam with a baloney sandwich..he took her home and called a vets office to find out what to do..the vet had flyers..so gave him the # to call..he called exchanged picture to Sly's e mail and the next day took Kismet all the way to Sly's house..what a joyful reunion...and the young man & his fiancee after visiting Sly for a while and viewing her lovely birds, decided to get a bird of their own...to this day they are friends.
I loved these stories Anne. I love the ones where the birds walk up to strangers with this intention "help me find my mom/dad"
 

Renae

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Charlie, my mum's Cockatiel has got out not once, but twice! one of the times, two of them got out and we didn't get one of them back, but we got Charlie back both times.

Charlie & Jasper got out!

I was changing the bottom of the girls cage and there was Charlie right next to me.. and Jasper was sitting on top of the cage - it all happened so fast, I had two 'tiels to catch and as soon as I went to get Charlie, he went, and off Jasper went with him. (I looked at the boys cage and one of the little doors was wide open)

Jasper went one way (somewhere in the thousand acre bush) and I could hear Charlie close by.. in a tree so I ran and seen him in a tree and as soon as my brother climbed the tree off he went right back into the bush, same direction as Jasper.

I had put one of my other Cockatiels, Emmit, outside in a cage, but it was getting really dark and cold, so I couldn't leave him out for very long.. I was calling them and calling them, I couldn't hear them though. Later on when it was pitch dark, I brought Emmit back inside and I can remember just sitting in my room and crying and crying, I couldn't eat or anything! I started making poster and such to put up the next day, and I got some numbers to ring from the phone book. The next day I put all my birds outside again in hopes that they would still be around and come back, but still nothing.. I started putting up poster, put fliers in letter boxes, rang around and put ads up on websites. It had been two days now, and I had heard nothing, or seen either Jasper or Charlie, I was so sick to my stomach, all I could think about is if they were okay and safe, or if someone had them. Still two days since they had been gone, I was walking around my town for ages looking and calling for him, when I came home late in the afternoon my mum said she was sitting outside and heard chirping, I said it's probably just another bird, I sat outside but couldn't hear anything. I emailed heaps of people later that night that I know asking if there's anything else I could do, but there was nothing they could think of. Again, I started crying, crying enough to make myself be sick and throw up. I got not even 10 hours sleep within the two days that they had been missing, I couldn't stop thinking about them, it was like my heart was ripped out and stomped on, it hurt so much.

Day three, while I was outside and heard chirping coming from a distance, I called and called and I looked around the trees and I spotted Charlie sitting in a tree in my backyard right in front of me. He looked so worn out, but I was so happy that he had actually stuck around and knew where his home was. It took awhile to get him because he kept flying off, but he eventually came down and landed on one of the Cockatiels cages and recovered fully within 2 days.

I also thought he would've went a bit "wild" but he didn't when I went to get him he actually couldn't step up because he was so worn out, but let me cup him in my hands, he had no energy and probably hadn't eaten or drinken within the three days he was gone. He was still tame as ever even when I went to grab him and when he had recovered.

Charlie's gone AGAIN!

I had put all the birds outside and made sure they have fresh food and water and I've been checking on them every now and again. How'd he get out this time? well, there's a little door thing you lift up to get the slide out tray and it doesn't close properly and he must have pushed it open and he got out. He was close by in the trees in our backyard and then he flew off into a tree across the road and then a stupid moterbike came flying past and scared the crap out of him and he flew off down the road somewhere. I went looking for him but no sign, I had seed, I was calling and calling him. (so were my 2 little brothers) All the birds are outside at the moment, they were calling him before he flew off.. we just hope second time lucky he would come back but we aren't sure if he would this time.

An hour or so later, I seen him in the block of land next door being chased by minor birds, I was screaming at them to leave him alone. He sat over there for hours upon hours, I lured (sp) him to come back over by calling him and taking a few steps each time and made sure he could see me, but would he budge? NO. I got one of my other Cockatiels, put him in a travel cage and walked over there, he still wouldn't come, all they done was scream back and forth. So I sat about 15 feet away and waited to see if he'd come when one of the birds was flock calling, but he still wouldn't come down. Fast forward a few hours, he came over and was circling the house, he eventually got to the backyard and needed a rest, landing in a tree in my backyard, so I put one of the Cockatiels cages up near the cage and horrah he flew down, he stepped up and I put him in the cage and took them inside. He was only gone for no more than a day though.
 

Danita

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Renae, you were lucky too!!!

My vet said, that once a bird flies away, they have a taste for it and will attempt again.
 

Renae

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Yeah, very, very lucky.

I think your vet may be right too. I feel very fortunate we've got him back both times, but they're in a secure cage now and it's impossible for him to escape, it hasn't happened again since the second time and hopefully will never happen again, but I think IF he was to escape again, he would come back!
 

Saemma

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Thank you for this thread. I have not read through it.. but it seems very thoughtful. Thank you.
 

BraveheartDogs

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Lets share our stories of how you were able to recover your lost bird.
It has happened to so many of us and there are many happy endings.

I want people who are feeling hopeless to read these experiences and find the energy to keep looking.

What were the things you think helped the most finding your bird?
Okay, I will share mine. I had a good sized outdoor aviary with 5 finches, the two parents and three babies. One day I went out there and the birds were being very vocal. I look around the the three babies are outside of the aviary flying around my backyard!! The parents were still inside. It was awful and so scary, but, believe it or not, I was able to recover all three babies.

My aviary had an emergency enclosure with a hanging shade door. I pulled up the shade part up. The babies wanted back inside and were hanging close by. I would position my body to gently push them towards the opening. Slowly but surely, one at a time, they went into the enclosure and I could pull the shade down and go inside and get them into the second door.

One of them took longer and went as far as across the street on a neighbors wires. I had to encourage the others to vocalize which I think helped him find his way back. It took a couple of hours but I got all of them back.
 
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