10/23 to 11/08/2008 - Cochise Stronghold and Parrots

So, how did the birds do on this, their first camping trip? Mostly well. At least I should say 80% well since 4 of the 5 birds were well behaved.



Then there was Henri. Aka Onry.



It seems that by heading south with the ever so slightly longer days, breeding season kicked in. Mostly there was a lot of rooting around on the bottom of cages, and some parrot groaning going on. But there was also was Henri. Arking. All. The. Time.

(Okay, who am I kidding? This contributed some, but mostly it's that Henri is LOUD).



You may be wondering how bad can some parrot arking be. Let me assure you it can drive a person insane. How can such a small little being make so much noise? Defies one's expectations.



Unfortunately Henri thinks I'm his mate so he became very jealous of me. If I talked to Dave he arked. If I touched the cat he arked. If I looked at another bird he arked. If someone came to the door he arked. If a car drove by, he arked.



You get the picture.

Unfortunately this would sometimes rile up the other birds as well. Luckily we had cage covers that helped. Still, I hadn't expected that Henri would spend his entire vacation covered. Or in isolation in the bedroom.

We took him out as much as we could and this helped for sure. But we couldn't let him be out all the time. (Our next trailer will need to be bigger with a second bird bedroom - one that is acoustically sealed).



It made for some really stressful moments during the trip where I tried to keep him quiet. Where I tried to be a good bird mom. I did this to keep Dave from unhooking the truck and driving away never to return. And to maintain some sanity myself.


The stress took its toll on me. As I sit and write this weeks later, I am still covered in hives.

Nice.

Henri won't be camping with us anymore.

There were parrot highlights on the trip though. My favorite was one morning they all got wound up and bathed in their cages. I should have taken a video since it's so funny. I did get a photo of one wet Gabbie.



Also on the ride home, Grace enjoyed 'special bird' status and rode on Dave's shoulder. She loves to sit on his shoulder and often runs and hides behind his head when he tries to remove here. She enjoyed watching the raptors and crows fly around. (You can see Gabbie in the taxi behind them).

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