Days with the Dorans

  The Goose has always been our animal whisperer but when we rescued our two birds from abuse, I had no expectation that they'd ever come to us. I just wanted to provide a safe space for them to live our their days. We leave the doors to their cage open but they rarely leave. Imagine my surprise when I saw THIS!

 So I got home from my run and was going to clean the bird cage when I noticed something didn't look quite right... Mimic was actually hanging out on the outside of the cage!! I have noticed before that sometimes the door of his cage was slightly ajar and now it makes sense. I wonder how often he does this. Later I actually watched as he flew toward that side of the cage and opened it and sure enough-soon after he was hanging on the outside of the cage. I kind of love that he can get out and stretch his wings a bit! HERE is a video of when I first noticed it!

 So the Bigs are big enough to stay home alone and they weren't getting up early to cheer on their youngest brother. While we were celebrating another win with donuts back at home the house almost burned down... Well- not BURNED down but definitely smoked out! We pulled up to the kids outside. I guess Z put in a hot pocket for 20 minutes instead of two! OH MY GOSH!!! Our entire house stunk! My first reaction was to save the animals! Thank goodness it was a nice day. Sigh. I think he won't be doing that again...

It's official! The birds have now moved into Blue's cage and I'm so happy! I got them a new little feeder which is AMAZING because it feeds them and the empty shells are collected so it's a huge saver (time and money)! The only step now is to get them more comfortable with me. I still stick my hand in with them and talk to them each night but so far they aren't trusting me. We'll get there though- if there's one person who has patience, it's this girl!!

I've been working hard on talking with the birds each day in hopes they'll get on my finger or at least get to Blue's old cage. Well, I don't know how it happened but while I had the door open, Mimic flew right out and into the kitchen door-wall. It was so scary and he seemed so afraid. He flew into our front living room and Marty found him. He was sitting there and Marty was so good letting me know he was there but not getting too close to scare him. I went to get him to "step up" (dumb Laura~ he doesn't even know that term yet) and he flew off to the dining room. I realized the only way I was going to get him back to his cage safely was to hold him, which I did. His poor little heart was beating like mad but I got him back to his cage. I've been working with them still every day but I realized the only way to get them into Blue's cage (or the way I thought was best) was to have them discover it on their own so I opened the door to both c...

Well, I am a bit shocked to be writing this post as I wasn't sure it would happen. I hadn't put away Blue's cage and was thinking about perhaps getting some birds (not parrots) again.. maybe in the summer... Then a friend texted me a while ago that a friend of a friend needed to get rid of her parakeets and would I be interested. I talked to Jeff who was actually a bit excited about it and said sure. I didn't hear back from the bird owner so wasn't sure if she still wanted to get rid or them. We went on spring break and I kind of forgot about it a bit. So on Sunday when I got off the treadmill (ugh- running on the beach was soooo much nicer), I had a text from the owner of the birds. Long story short~ Ali Jane, Z and I got in the car and headed to their house to meet the birds that afternoon and take them home. MEET MIMIC AND FREDO I learned that they are one year old and the main reason they were getting rid of them was that their cats didn't like th...

 I was incredibly shocked when on Wednesday I came down and was getting ready for school and looked in Blue's cage and he way lying on the bottom. I felt my heart sink and reached in and he was gone. I didn't know what to do. I remember saying that to Jeff over and over, "What do I do?" "What do I do?" When it finally sunk in what happened I cried. Why did this happen? What did I do? These pictures were taken just three days earlier. He seemed fine. I still can't stop thinking that I did something. His seed was completely gone (which is unlike him) though he had water. It wasn't that cold yet and I hadn't taken him to Room 119 since it got cooler (he had come with me every day when the weather was nice). I haven't told the kids of Room 119 because I just couldn't. They loved him so. When I got home, the Bigs came and gave me hugs and I just cried. I got a box for blue and put some blue shredded paper in it (the kind of pape...

 A strange thing happened a few weeks ago.  My dad suggested we go to a 'real' fish store (not the pet store chain stores I had been going to).  We headed to a place with tropical fish and spent a lot of time looking them.  The man there was really knowledgable (my dad knows a ton about fish too which is why I take him everywhere) and I asked him a lot of questions.  On the other side of the store (they are attached) is Bird Haven.  We went and looked because Z was with us and he loves ALL animals. As we were checking out the birds, I asked if he ever got any Pocket Parrots (or parrotlets).  You may recall a few years ago we went on a trip to Parrot Mountain in Gatlinburg TN and I fell in love with the pocket parrots they had!  I seriously wanted one... researched them... but couldn't find anyone close at the time who had them.  I feel like the nearest place I was able to find that had them was a few states away.  I accepted the ...