You may have heard the story from some years back when a member of my bird club passed away and we stepped in to find good homes for all her birds. Many were special needs birds, like my African Grays Bo Dangles and Blind Io. And after a while, some people realized the birds they tried to care for needed more attention than they could give.
About six months after the Massive Adoption Event, someone in the club that I trust very much asked if I could take in a female orange front (sometimes called a peach front) conure with a serious splayed leg condition, and I agreed as I didn’t have as many birds at the time as I do now. She brought over the bird and cage and made the introductions: “I call her Handy Dandy,” she said, showing off the skills the bird had at moving around the cage.
The bird had not been handled a lot and didn’t much care to be picked up: she would fly away as soon as she could and land somewhere soft, like a couch or chair. She was very beautiful and delicate, and I renamed her Dani. One of the worst issues with all the birds we adopted was that no one knew all their names, but they seem to have adjusted pretty well.
One of the last tidbits this friend imparted before she left the bird with us was that Dani liked to sleep on the bottom of the cage on her back; she kept a small towel there and Dani would roll herself up like a small parrot burrito. Obviously my friend had been startled to find Dani like that and didn’t want us to suffer the same surprise, so we knew when the very next morning I found her like that: On her back, wrapped in the towel, sound asleep.
Dani transitioned into several cages, usually with some shelves so she could climb up and be comfortable. At one time, I was permanently boarding a male orange front conure, Sunny, whom we called Mr. Sun since we had a female sun conure by that name. Mr. Sun and Dani got along very well and she actually laid a few eggs. None of them were fertile, but considering her leg issues, I was impressed she could manage to lay the eggs.
During that time, Dani got some Kraft paper twisted around her ankle; I thought I got it all off but a day or two later, her foot had become swollen and sore. I made an appointment with an avian vet and got the worst diagnosis: the entire leg would have to be amputated; taking just the foot would leave her with a worse problem than she started with. So she started a course of antibiotics and came back in a few days for surgery.
They kept her overnight, during which time Mr. Sun called for her all day. When I brought her home and set up a separate hospital cage, they called back and forth, until I moved him in with her. Dani settled down, took her pain meds without problems, and healed up. At her post op checkup, the vet was very pleased with her progress.
Some years after that, Mr. Sun passed away in his sleep one night. Dani seemed to know that he was gone, and didn’t call for him as much as previously: she was quieter for a while and liked to stay in the cardboard boxes we gave her to chew on. Finding just the right boxes for her became a task Mike and I both got into: she would complain when we removed an old box that wouldn’t stand up anymore and she almost couldn’t get out of, but was quick to accept a new box and start chewing on it right away.
Just recently, an item was given to me that appears to be intended for small animals like hamsters and gerbils. It’s a little hut made out of wood, and my first thought was to see if Dani would like it. I put a cardboard flat down under it so it would be warmer, then placed the hut in that. In seconds, she climbed into the flat, went in the door to the house, and pulled herself around by the little window. She loved it! We have to be sure we see her leave the house at least once per day but she is really agile for all her issues.
You never know when a parrot is going to come into your life and change everything for the better. Dani brings us laughs, love, scares, and so much peace with her being. Special needs birds are the best friends you will ever find.
Thanks for reading; I’ll be back next Sunday.
In Loco Parrotus 