I didn't really get into birds until the year 2000. When I was a kid, I remember looking at the "parakeets" in stores, fluttering all over and place, and wondering, who would want one of those? Well, me, apparently. I started with a pair of cockatiels named Captain and Scrambles. I just really just wanted the male, but I felt bad about separating the two. Good thing I did, because Scrambles was a pretty nice bird that let me handle her once in a while. Captain earned the nickname "Captain Crunch." Those two started it all, and were my first breeding pair as well. I still have one of their children, but at one point there were several generations living in my birdroom!

I no longer breed birds. The assistant at my avian vet's office told me her sister adopted a bird from the humane society that had my leg band on it. I made all of my new "parronts" sign a contract that stated they were giving the bird a forever home, and in the event they absolutely could not provide the bird the best home possible, they were to return the parrot to me. It was at that moment I decided there are probably too many breeders in the world and I couldn't bear to think my precious babies were getting bounced from home to home. So, in 2007, I stopped breeding birds. The only birds I keep now are my pets, though one of my cockatiels was one of my breeders before.

In my breeding period, I kept maximillion pionus, pacific parrotlets (green and blue), fischer's lovebirds (lutino, blue, and dilute), and I had one beautiful beige canary named Kahlua. You can ask me almost anything about pet birds and I can give you an answer. I've also been assistant manager of two pet stores, and in that period have dealt with a great many species. I had the same experience at the pet store as I did with my own breeding. There are so many people out there that have no clue what bird ownership is all about, and won't bother to learn. Birds aren't "things" to be bought and sold. They are living creatures that are long-lived and very intelligent. There's a reason why parrot owners equate owning a parrot to having a little feathery toddler.

So now I run this website full-time. I enjoy it immensely, knowing I am bringing bird lovers all over the world little gifts reminding them of their precious feathered kids.

Now you can meet my pet birds. I have other pets as well, but birds are really a huge part of my life! They have their own room decorated in blue with clouds, swings and perches hanging from the ceiling, and a huge 6' play gym in the middle of it all. Most of my birds are flighted (and even the slightly trimmed birds can still glide around) so they can get some exercise in the safety of their bird room. I will present my birds in order of when I got them:

My Birds:


Detour
Detour is the first baby I ever raised. She is a normal grey hen hatched in May of 2001. She is extremely spoiled but a sweetie pie. Everybody that meets her adores her, she has a very pronounced "love me now because I'm a princess" attitude that is just endearing! If you have her at the computer and you're typing, she'll come up and bump her head against your fingers until you rub her neck. Dee dee had an accident before she started flying properly, where she landed hard on her tail feathers. As a result, two of the feathers grew at an almost 90 degree angle to the rest of her feathers. They used to hurt her, and I had tried binding them to her tail (which did help), pulling them out at an angle (also seemed to help) and I had even taken her to the avian vet to see about cauterizing the follicle so they don't grow back (he wouldn't do it). They aren't nearly so bad now, and she doesn't seem to mind them at all. Detour has recently decided that my male cockatiel, Darwin, should be her boyfriend. It's a little odd because she has never shown any interest in other birds, but she seems happy about it.



Pandora
Pandora is a whiteface lutino cockatiel hen, though whiteface lutino is often called albino, that isn't correct. True albinos are not the result of a double mutation, like whiteface lutino is. They do, however, have the same appearance with no pigmentation on the feathers on in the eyes. Pandora was hatched in June of 2001. She is the perfect reason of why you should never, ever buy a bird at a bird fair. I knew that going in, too. She literally was a Pandora's box, filled with all kinds of diseases. Being genetically weaker than a normal grey, she tends to get everything. She's got a vet sheet a mile long, most of it from her first year with me. But I love her regardless. She is exactly like a little cockatoo. She can't get enough snuggles. Before I had dogs everywhere, she used to jump off her cage and follow me around the house. I could let another person hold her and she would immediately fly back to my shoulder. I had originally bought Pandora as a breeder bird because she was such a good specimen of the lutino trait (good size, no bald spot), but eventually decided to keep her as a pet instead. Pandora is very disinterested in other birds and doesn't like them close to her. She gets along with Detour okay, but the two don't interact.



Darwin
I purchased Darwin as a breeder in 2002, though he hatched in June 2002. I actually bought him for Pandora, but she reacted so bitterly I paired him up with another hen I had at the time (Detour's sister). He is a whiteface cock, split to lutino, cinnamon, pearl, and yellowcheek. He does talk a little bit, and whistles like a pro. He recently learned to whistle like my grandfather clock! He does a cute little bomb drop whistle and then says KABOOM! He's a hoot. His girlfriend died in early 2006, and for a long time he was depressed. In late 2007, he decided he didn't want to be a bachelor anymore and now he's in love with my Detour. Don't worry - there won't be any more baby birds in this house!



Pickle
Pickle is a green monster- I mean, green quaker parakeet. He is a DNA sexed male, hatched in July 2004. I got him for Christmas in that year. He was a bird at the pet store I worked at. I named him Pickle while he as there and the day he started saying, Pickle Pickle Pickle! I knew he had to come home with me. He was my first bigger pet bird. Anyone who owns a quaker will tell you they are PRICKLY little things, very territorial about their cage, and their mood changes faster than Ohio's weather. One minute they're drawing blood, the next they are the most snuggly thing in the world, and then they want to play. Well, his personality suited me just fine, and he lives in the bird room where he usually yells things at the dogs all day long. He loves to twist every toy in his cage into one big mass. Sometimes he unbraids it and winds them around bars or perches. It's a natural nesting behavior.



Biff
Biff is a female plumheaded parakeet hatched in June 2005. See, she was supposed to be a male. The pet store I worked at had obtained two plumheads in the chain, a male, and a female. I requested the male be sent to my store. As soon as I saw "him" I decided to purchase "him." Imagine my surprise when the DNA sexing arrived a few weeks later and said they sent the female instead! I was pretty mad, since the females stay the drab color and the males turn gorgeous. They sent the male to my store and offered a deal I couldn't refuse, so to be funny I named the male Buffy. Biff and Buffy are brother and sister, the only two birds in that clutch. I had the opportunity to buy their parents but I passed on it. Biff is very adventurous, and very much has to get her own way. Otherwise she'll start screaming. You don't want Biff (or any plumhead, for that matter), to scream. It's not how loud it is - it is the shrill, piercingness of it. If she doesn't get her food fast enough, she screams. If she doesn't shut her food door by herself, she screams. You'll notice from the picture that she plucks a bit. At one point, she was completely bare on the front. As of today, she is fully feathered. I switched her food to a brand called Bird-e-licious, a totally natural, organic food unlike anything else on the market today. Within a month her feathers all started growing back in. I figure she had a corn, wheat, or soy allergy. If you actually look at the ingredients in most bird pellets, they're crap. Just use bird-e-licious.



Buffy
Buffy, of course, is a male plumheaded parakeet and Biff's brother. He looked exactly like Biff when I got home. He started molting out at about a year and a half. He was pretty funny looking during that period. And even now when he molts, he's pretty funny looking. He gets the softer purple in random patches around his face until his new feathers come in. It's normal - it's just silly-looking. Buffy loves to zoom around the bird room and harass everyone, especially Biff. When he sees me coming in with the pan of cooked bird food in the morning, he flies onto my shoulder and looks expectantly at the pan. If he's out while I'm doing cages, he hangs off my shirt to chew on the paper. I don't let him do it too often, he likes to punch holes in my shirt with his very sharp beak!



Havoc
Last, but not least, is Havoc. I told myself this is the last bird I will ever own and I hope I can make myself stick to that. Havoc was hatched May 2006. She is a severe macaw, or chestnut fronted macaw, which is a mini macaw. Sort of like a big macaw in a little package. That by no means makes her easier to manage. I've been around larger macaws, she has all of the sass PLUS a napoleon complex. I suppose the advantages are that when she does scream (not very often at all, maybe twice a week) it's not quite as loud (still you want to leave the house), and the beak is slightly smaller though still capable of inflicting a lot of damage. I think mini macaws take a very special owner, even though they are touted as great birds for someone that doesn't want a larger macaw. Maybe it is different with other species, I've only had experience with the severe and the hahn's. I actually wanted a yellow collared, but with Havoc it was instant love. She is a one-person bird. She tolerates my roommate, but hates (with a passion!) all others. She does not like strangers coming into her home. She does not like anyone wearing blue. Both of these things result in her screaming until you think the world is ending. With me, she is cuddly and naughty, playful and scheming. She'll do anything for a piece of papaya. One time (just one time) I ran out of papaya so there wasn't any in her food bowl. She looked at me, looked at the bowl, looked at me, looked at the bowl, and started muttering under her breath. She talks *very* well; I'd estimate her vocabulary at over 200 words and most of them she uses appropriately. She knows all our dogs by name, she asks to be let out, asks for headrubs and tickles, and if you honk her beak she yells HONK! Really I couldn't imagine life without Havoc. :)


Well, that's all my birds. Some people ask me how I take care of all of them. Well, you should have seen it when I was breeding! I could have upwards of 20 birds all at one time. Seven is a breeze! It helps a lot to have your own bird room, too. I highly recommend it if you have a lot of small birds or more than one large bird. If you have any questions about the above species or really anything else bird-related, don't hesitate to ask! I was the "Bird Lady" at both the pet stores I worked at, and I've got a handy dandy BS in Zoology, so chances are I know what I'm talking about.