Lee sent us quite a few pictures of her pet birds as well as a picture of her pygmy goat!  We chose this picture of Sherman and Blue, a lovely pair of parakeets, for Birds of the Month. We also chose a photograph of her baby cockatiels. You can see the babies  next month. Lee said, "I recently acquired a breeding pair of cockatiels from a friend. Tookie and Fred are the proud parents of 3 babies. Ironically enough, my 2 parakeets,  that I've had for about 2 1/2 years, had never mated....until we got the cockatiels. The tiels must have shown them what to do. Sherman and Blue are now sitting on 6 eggs. I can't wait to see if they hatch and wonder what they will look like!!! Oh, I know this is a bird site...but my pygmy goat gave us a little Christmas baby--Prancer!. We love animals and have a very fertile household!..LOL."

Mari Angeles sent us the wonderful, close up photograph  of her cockatiel Avi's face. She thought Avi was a male cockatiel but recently found out that she was mistaken. Avi is a female! Mari Angeles said, "It doesn't matter and it's not really important to me. I love her either way. Avi is a very lovable and affectionate bird. She is only 9 months old and has already learned to whistle like me. She loves to jump over my keyboard and peck at my earrings. Avi also likes to play inside of a glass basket that I have.  She looks so cute. I hope that Avi learns a lot of things as she gets older. Most of all I hope that she will be with me for a very long time."

           

Kat sent us these 3 photos of her baby lutino cockatiel, Rocky. In the first 2 pictures you will see an obvious problem around the babies crop and neck area. The huge bubble is not normal. Kat knew something was wrong because the parents wouldn't feed Rocky and he wouldn't open his mouth for handfeeding. She took the baby to an avian vet immediately and Rocky was diagnosed as having a ruptured air sac. The mother bird somehow punctured Rocky's air sac, possibly by moving around on top of him. The vet performed a procedure to deflate this bubble and taught Kat the procedure as well . She was sent me home with supplies to continue this procedure twice a day until the inner air sac healed. Kat had to be very careful to avoid the tiny blood vessels when working on Rocky.  Kat said, "It doesn't seem to hurt the lil guy and he actually looks relieved. I noticed the outside healed and formed a scab but obviously before the inner air sac healed. This caused the air to leak out to the outer air sac and remain there unable to escape. He's doing much better and is quite a fighter.  So I've decided to name him Rocky.  In the 3rd picture you can see that Rocky has recovered and is now growing normally. I hope this helps others and makes it possible for other baby birds with this condition to survive."

Cathy sent us this beautiful  photograph of a father bird feeding his baby. Cathy said, "The daddy bird, is the first bird I ever had. I got him 2 years ago for my birthday. His name is Pretty Boy! My husband and his sister bought him for me from a breeder who handfed him. This entire year he has been hissing and has not been very friendly until I bought a female this year to keep him company. The female is gray and yellow. She is really loveable and loves to sit on my shoulder, picking at my diamond ear rings. I thought Pretty boy was going to be so mean no matter how kind I was to him. He just wasn't happy even though he would sing, and say pretty bird all day long. Now Pretty Boy is so loveable. He feeds those babies and actually yells for me if I'm out of the room. When I go near the cage he gets right up there next to me and shows me all kinds of affection. There are 7 more eggs inside of the nest and we are truly excited about these new additions to our family. Our four kids are grown and gone. Dad and I are the only ones home so it's just wonderful to us. I'm not sure how Sammy , our yellow lab, is taking this though! I sent the photos to our grandchildren and the phone has not stopped. "Grandma, can we spend the night this week-end?"  I have let them start thinking of names for the new babies."

There is 1 more page of Birds for March 2004
CLICK HERE For Page 2, March 2004
CLICK HERE For Birds of the Month

Click below to meet other beautiful birds.

Birds of the Month is NOT a contest. If you would your bird in Birds of the Month, please email me a photograph of your little angel and two paragraphs, telling me about him/her. You will be sent an award for participating in our monthly feature. Click below to view the award.

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