Green Cheek Beak Injury

Anyone who has a green cheek knows how curious and bold they can be. Even while closely supervised, they can get into trouble. That was just the case when one of my young green cheeks decided to land on a cage containing young senegals. The senegals were not too happy about the newcomer and before I could get the little conure off the cage, one of the senegals bit the green cheek on the beak and caused a puncture wound.

I took my little conure to ABC Animal & Bird Clinic on Highway 6. This injury definitely needed medical attention! I thought it would be interesting for my readers to see this conure's progress as his beak was cleaned and patched. A big thank you to Dr. Roset for taking the time to take the pictures during the procedure while the bird was anethesized.

Dr. Roset did a wonderful job. As predicted, the patch did not last long but it did it's job allowing some healing to take place while the would was still fresh. The conure is doing fine and you must look very closely to see the injured part of the beak now. The procedure did not phase him a bit and he is just as friendly and curious as ever! He is currently for sale.

Happenings Around Here

What a nice day I had today! Two of my previous customers came by and paid me a visit. One of them needed her linnie's wings trimmed. "Ande" has grown into a beautiful adult lineolated parakeet! Thank you Cathy for bringing him by. It was great to see you and your kids! My other customer, Sandy came by to pick up a female parrotlet from me. We ended up chatting about all sorts of things and having a great time. This is one of the reasons I enjoy breeding birds. I meet so many wonderful people!

I am selling some of my very nice breeding pairs to scale back a bit. I need to ease my workload so I can have time to do other things that I enjoy (spending time with family, working with the horses, etc.). Like I mentioned, these are very nice pairs! See my website for more information.

I have four beautiful blue quakers that I am handfeeding now. They have just moved into a cage and are starting to perch! If anybody is interested in these little cuties, let me know.

We still have green cheeks available. They are weaned and ready to go! I am running a sale on them right now. Normals are $100 and turquoise are $200. There are just a few available at these great prices!

Product Review Safety Pumice Perch

I've seen these in cages before but wasn't quite sure about them. The Safety Pumice Perch, manufactured by Sweet Feet & Beak is a hard plastic nail grooming perch. It it smooth on the top and bottom as to not rub your bird's feet, with a sandy texture on both sides to help blunt the nails.

I've been curious about them and thought they might be good in my weaning cages so I bought a few of them. Two small and one medium. I wanted to see the size difference between the two and figure out which birds they would be best for.

I put the small size in my young caiques cage. They took to it right away and I was pleasantly surprised to find that it groomed the nails quite nicely. The perch was easy for the young birds to grip. They were immediately comfortable on it. These perches are very lightweight - especially compared to the cement grooming perches we are used to using! So they would work well in the smaller cages as well.

I also placed this perch in my green cheek conures cage. They reacted the same way. Got right on it and were comfortable on it. The rough surface on the sides gave them a good grip and once again it helped blunt those needle sharp nail tips that babies have!

The medium perch, I put in my amazon's cage. She was a little leery of it at first (she is used to natural branches in her cage) but once she got on it, she seemed to like it. She is a good sized yellow nape amazon, so although the medium fit her feet okay, I think the large size would work a little better.

These perches only attach to vertical bars, so that is something to keep in mind.

All in all, I would give this product a thumbs up. These perches do a good job grooming the nails, are very lightweight and easy to attach to the cage. I definitely plan on purchasing more!

New Arrivals

Our first caique of this clutch hatched Friday night. The second egg should hatch tonight sometime. No matter how many times I do this, it is always exciting! I posted some neat pictures of this baby hatching on my facebook page. I will be posting pictures periodically so you can all watch this little one grow. See the pictures here:   http://www.facebook.com/pages/West-Houston-TX/Almost-Angels-Aviary/161328391371?ref=ts

Craft Idea: Newspaper Swing

A customer of mine sent me this link. What an economical and interesting way to entertain your bird! I think with a little creativity, a larger version could be made for medium size birds too. Such a great idea, I had to share. Here's the link: http://www.lineolatedparakeet.net/uncategorized/parrotlet-newspaper-swing_410?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LineolatedParakeetBlog+%28Lineolated+Parakeet+Blog%29

We have a variety of green cheek conures available as well as senegals and parrotlets. If you would like more information on what we have available, contact me or check out my website at http://www.almostangelsaviary.com/

Our first caique egg of this clutch is due to hatch on Saturday! I'll keep everyone posted.

Parrot Skewers

I know I have mentioned these before, but they are worth mentioning again! I feel every parrot owner should have a few of these! These handy little skewers are great for hanging chunks of fruits and vegetables and for stringing up leftover toy parts to make a new toy!

My red flanked lory, Munchkin got into the habit of taking a bath on his fruit. He would rub his body all over the fruit (similar to the "leaf bathing" that caiques do) and would turn himself into a sticky mess. Finally, I got tired of it and started stringing his fruit up on a skewer. He loves it! No more mess for me and a great new toy for Munchkin! Here is a picture of his skewer from the other day. His breakfast consisted of a piece of hardboiled egg, a chunk of apple and a chunk of orange.

How to make a play basket

I've been getting questions lately about how to make my famous play baskets LOL! They are not hard to make. All you need is a few supplies and some time. These baskets work great for small to medium birds. I find that birds prefer these over the store bought dowel type playstands. You can put two or three baskets together of varying sizes to make an interesting play area. That is what I do here. My birds hang out on their play baskets for hours! When my young birds are ready to rest, they will just go down into the basket and take a nap.

Supplies:

NATURAL wicker basket. No paint, varnish, stain, etc. I buy my baskets at Michaels when they go on sale at 40% off.

Hot Glue Gun. I think everybody has one of these! If not, you can pick one up at the craft store when you buy your basket.

Sissel Rope. You can get this at any hardware store. It is grass rope. The one I buy comes in a package. Be sure the kind you get is natural, and not treated with anything.

Zip Ties. You can find these in the electrical section at the hardware store.

Baby Links. You can get these at Walmart in the baby section.

Basically, you want to wrap the handle of the basket with the sissel rope. This makes a grippable, climbable perch for your bird. Put a little hot glue on the basket, and wrap a few strands of rope. Then proceed this way until the entire handle is wrapped. You may have to hold the rope for a minute or so to make sure the glue sets it in place.

After the handle is wrapped, take a couple of zip ties and attach one on the middle of the handle, and maybe one or two off to the side. Leave just enough room where you can get a quick link through, but your bird cannot get his head or leg caught. This is where you are going to hang your toys. You can also use baby links for this. I find the zip ties are easier though.

Place some paper toweling or a towel in the bottom of the basket and put some bowls down there for food and water. I like to scatter food in the bottom so my birds can "forage".

Hang some interesting toys, and your done! The entire basket is a bird stand/chew toy! When your basket gets worn out, just toss it and make a new one (you will have plenty of supplies for a few baskets). Get creative with toys, etc. I recently helped a customer who lives nearby with a play basket for her parrotlet. We poked several chinese finger traps in the bottom and hung a few toys. She loves her basket and spends lots of time out on it! Here are a couple of pictures of Zoe enjoying her basket.