Shade
Crazy for Pois!
Avenue Veteran
Celebirdy of the Month
Mayor of the Avenue
Avenue Spotlight Award
Our "Mayor of the Avenue" award is presented to a member who exhibits the qualities that distinguish them to be an upstanding credit to the Avenue, a loving, informed, conscientious and caring bird parront and an all around good neighbor.
I am so delighted to announce Theresa as May's Mayor of the Avenue.
I loved your interview and enjoyed getting to know you a little better!
1. What kind of birds do you have (age, species and names)?
Corkey (CAG) 16ish, Lucy (CAG) over 10 possibly over 20, Olivia (LCA) will be 11 in August and Rocky (Senegal) 8ish
2. What got you interested in birds?
About 16 years ago, myself, my Mom, my nieces and my daughter were sitting on our front porch. My Mom noticed a brightly colored bird in the tree in front of my house and pointed it out to me. I went to the railing and stuck out my arm, like I had seen people do on TV, and to my shock the bird(Lovebird) landed on it!
I had a WTH do I do now moment
but quickly brought her into the house so she would not fly off. When I got her in the house I noticed that her beak was touching her belly and it was impossible for her to eat without great difficulty. I stuck a cracker in her beak and went to get help.
Luckily I had a neighbor down the street that knew something about birds and happened to have a cage. He cut and filed her beak, and poor baby would not stop drinking! My daughter named her Baby Bop (Huge Barney fan
)
Baby Bop passed away about 3 years later, but I have not been birdless since then.
3. What have your birds brought to your life?
Mess, chewed up furniture and moldings, bloody bites, love, laughter, lots and lots of laughter! I couldn't imagine my life without them.
4. What have you learned from sharing your life with your birds?
That most of what I learned while raising kids applied to birds, except my kids never bit me! LOL
5. What's one birdie memory that will stay with you forever?
The time I came home from work on a Saturday in December to a non working furnace. I was so stressed and worried about the expense, about the birds being warm enough till we could get it fixed. I also knew I had to go to sleep because I was working again that night.
So I was sitting at the computer feeling stressed and down, when I hear from the eat-in area of the kitchen (bird area) "Don't worry" no one was home but me and the birds, Lucy does not speak and Corkey is not much of a talker either. I thought I was losing my mind and hearing things
till Corkey said it again! He's has not said it since then.
6. Where is your birds main living area?
I have a bird room, but it's only used for bedtime or if I'm away! Most of their day is spent in the eat-in part of my kitchen on their playstands and boings.
7. Did you change things in your home to accommodate your birds and if so what kinds of things did you change?
Yup, I gave up a bedroom, the eat-in part of my kitchen, my old Teflon pans, some of my sanity
(it's over rated anyway) the ability to have nice non chewed up things. It's all well worth it.
8. Are you involved in any kind of bird related group or activities?
AA and whenever possible I do things with Tanya (Mystics Mom) and her rescue PJ's Parrot Place.
9. What is the one luxury item you would love to have for your bird(s)?
Not really a luxury item just not in the budget right now. An Austin Air or 2 would probably reduce my need to nebulize.
10. Is there any bird that you dream of owning and if so why?
No, I have my dream birds.
11. Describe a typical day with you at home with your birds.
They get up between 9 and 10 am eat their freshly cooked breakfast and pretty much play most of the day. They have pellets and BH on their playstands available all day. Dinner for them is about 8ish and they get veggies and birdy bread mush. Cuddle and play time with me is random throughout the day, they are all great at independent play, so it's whenever they want it.
We don't have a set in stone schedule. Life is ever changing, so having a set in stone schedule would be setting them up for failure/issues if or when my life changes.
I worked hard at making them easy keepers.
12. What have you learned about owning birds that you would like to share?
I made a reference to it earlier. The way I raised my kids, especially as babies and toddlers applies to my birds. Most of it is common sense and an ability to try and put myself in their shoes (so to speak)
Babies cry for a reason - birds scream for a reason - with both I assess what the reason could be, I check to make sure all the physical stuff is ok, check to see if a shadow or anything else could be scaring them. If all is well I comfort and walk away. If the screaming/crying persisted I would periodically either walk in and offer comfort or verbally offer comfort from a different room.
When my daughter would have a melt down as a toddler I found it helpful to whisper to her while face to face, 9 times out of 10 she would quiet down to hear me.
I do a similar thing with the birds, not face to face but close to them. My only screamer is Rocky and it has worked with him, just as it did with Mojo(TAG) and Sammie my foster QP.
There are variables to this, and it will not work with every bird, but for me it's been a great starting point.
13. If you knew then what you know now about birds, what would you do differently?
DIET! DIET! and diet! I did a lot of the right things instinctively, I built my Lovie a play stand, left her fully flighted and let her out every day for a few hours to fly around the house and I made simple toys out of the things she was interested in. Diet wise I totally dropped the ball, she was on seeds only
14. What other hobbies do you have?
I read, a lot! I also seem to have knack for research. My son, whose new job in the military will be investigative, jokingly referred to me as his future CI after I helped him figure out that the supposed landlord of a house he was interested was a scam artist.
15. Anything else you would like to share?
I'm a horrible writer, I have a very difficult time getting my thoughts on paper, so if most of this does not make sense..........umm it did in my head! LOL
I also want to add that spell check will NOT correct assess if you're missing the last "S"
I love AA and most of the people on it.
I am so delighted to announce Theresa as May's Mayor of the Avenue.
I loved your interview and enjoyed getting to know you a little better!
1. What kind of birds do you have (age, species and names)?
Corkey (CAG) 16ish, Lucy (CAG) over 10 possibly over 20, Olivia (LCA) will be 11 in August and Rocky (Senegal) 8ish
2. What got you interested in birds?
About 16 years ago, myself, my Mom, my nieces and my daughter were sitting on our front porch. My Mom noticed a brightly colored bird in the tree in front of my house and pointed it out to me. I went to the railing and stuck out my arm, like I had seen people do on TV, and to my shock the bird(Lovebird) landed on it!
I had a WTH do I do now moment
but quickly brought her into the house so she would not fly off. When I got her in the house I noticed that her beak was touching her belly and it was impossible for her to eat without great difficulty. I stuck a cracker in her beak and went to get help.Luckily I had a neighbor down the street that knew something about birds and happened to have a cage. He cut and filed her beak, and poor baby would not stop drinking! My daughter named her Baby Bop (Huge Barney fan
)Baby Bop passed away about 3 years later, but I have not been birdless since then.
3. What have your birds brought to your life?
Mess, chewed up furniture and moldings, bloody bites, love, laughter, lots and lots of laughter! I couldn't imagine my life without them.
4. What have you learned from sharing your life with your birds?
That most of what I learned while raising kids applied to birds, except my kids never bit me! LOL
5. What's one birdie memory that will stay with you forever?
The time I came home from work on a Saturday in December to a non working furnace. I was so stressed and worried about the expense, about the birds being warm enough till we could get it fixed. I also knew I had to go to sleep because I was working again that night.
So I was sitting at the computer feeling stressed and down, when I hear from the eat-in area of the kitchen (bird area) "Don't worry" no one was home but me and the birds, Lucy does not speak and Corkey is not much of a talker either. I thought I was losing my mind and hearing things
till Corkey said it again! He's has not said it since then.6. Where is your birds main living area?
I have a bird room, but it's only used for bedtime or if I'm away! Most of their day is spent in the eat-in part of my kitchen on their playstands and boings.
7. Did you change things in your home to accommodate your birds and if so what kinds of things did you change?
Yup, I gave up a bedroom, the eat-in part of my kitchen, my old Teflon pans, some of my sanity
(it's over rated anyway) the ability to have nice non chewed up things. It's all well worth it.8. Are you involved in any kind of bird related group or activities?
AA and whenever possible I do things with Tanya (Mystics Mom) and her rescue PJ's Parrot Place.
9. What is the one luxury item you would love to have for your bird(s)?
Not really a luxury item just not in the budget right now. An Austin Air or 2 would probably reduce my need to nebulize.
10. Is there any bird that you dream of owning and if so why?
No, I have my dream birds.
11. Describe a typical day with you at home with your birds.
They get up between 9 and 10 am eat their freshly cooked breakfast and pretty much play most of the day. They have pellets and BH on their playstands available all day. Dinner for them is about 8ish and they get veggies and birdy bread mush. Cuddle and play time with me is random throughout the day, they are all great at independent play, so it's whenever they want it.
We don't have a set in stone schedule. Life is ever changing, so having a set in stone schedule would be setting them up for failure/issues if or when my life changes.
I worked hard at making them easy keepers.
12. What have you learned about owning birds that you would like to share?
I made a reference to it earlier. The way I raised my kids, especially as babies and toddlers applies to my birds. Most of it is common sense and an ability to try and put myself in their shoes (so to speak)
Babies cry for a reason - birds scream for a reason - with both I assess what the reason could be, I check to make sure all the physical stuff is ok, check to see if a shadow or anything else could be scaring them. If all is well I comfort and walk away. If the screaming/crying persisted I would periodically either walk in and offer comfort or verbally offer comfort from a different room.
When my daughter would have a melt down as a toddler I found it helpful to whisper to her while face to face, 9 times out of 10 she would quiet down to hear me.
I do a similar thing with the birds, not face to face but close to them. My only screamer is Rocky and it has worked with him, just as it did with Mojo(TAG) and Sammie my foster QP.
There are variables to this, and it will not work with every bird, but for me it's been a great starting point.
13. If you knew then what you know now about birds, what would you do differently?
DIET! DIET! and diet! I did a lot of the right things instinctively, I built my Lovie a play stand, left her fully flighted and let her out every day for a few hours to fly around the house and I made simple toys out of the things she was interested in. Diet wise I totally dropped the ball, she was on seeds only
14. What other hobbies do you have?
I read, a lot! I also seem to have knack for research. My son, whose new job in the military will be investigative, jokingly referred to me as his future CI after I helped him figure out that the supposed landlord of a house he was interested was a scam artist.
15. Anything else you would like to share?
I'm a horrible writer, I have a very difficult time getting my thoughts on paper, so if most of this does not make sense..........umm it did in my head! LOL
I also want to add that spell check will NOT correct assess if you're missing the last "S"
I love AA and most of the people on it.
Congrats
I loved the interview, especially the lovebird story and Corkey saying "don't worry"! 
) providing both.
YIPEEEE CONGRATULATIONS 
