Hello members of “Precisely Parrots”,
As a new member of “Precisely Parrots” since today (Monday the 6th. of January 2014) I would like to take the opportunity to introduce myself to you all and tell you a bit more about my pets.
My name is Rita Wien, I’m 50, single and I live in the Netherlands, so I’m Dutch. English isn’t my first language, so sometimes I will make some mistakes writing in English.
I hope you will forgive me for that.
In 2005 I bought my first parrots, a pair of blue Forpus Coelestis. They had a male baby 3 years in a row (2006, 2007 and 2008). Sadly both parrents and the youngest son have died by now.
I still have the two oldest sons.
But with these wonderful experiences of being able to witness the breeding-proces and the care of those two little birds for their young, my parrot-passion started to develop.
In September 2008 I added a pair of Cockatiels (Chico & Kuif). Sadly the female Kuif passed away at the 11th of October 2013.
In November 2008 I introduced my beautiful and sweet male Jenday Conure Jopie to my flock.
At the 13th of February I bought my two longhair Chihuahua’s Vicky (brown) & her daughter Lisa (Blue-merle). Lisa was 13 weeks old then and her mother was just 17 months old.
Vicky had had her first litter of 3 (all females!) at the tender age of just 14 months. The breeders let her get pregnant on purpose at that much too young age.
Lisa was the oldest pup of her litter.
The second pup (a dark-merle coloured, just like her father) was already sold. The youngest one, a very tiny black-and-tan stayed with the breeders.
They told me that Vicky was on sale too. So as soon as I knew how young she had been forced to get puppies I decided to buy her too.
I wanted to save Vicky from being abused as a breeder any longer and that way she and her oldest pup Lisa could stay together forever. And that was a very good decision.
Vicky & Lisa are always together. They are best friends and they love to playfight together which they do often.
They both are very protective when it comes to me, my father, my car and my house and they are very defensive, even agressive, to other larger dogs.
Strange enough they aren’t with dogs their own size or smaller. But during our walks we of corse almost always meet larger dogs, because they are so small themselves.
They love me very very much and I love them! They mean the world to me.
The 25th of February 2009 my female Double Yellow Headed Amazone named Beertje came to live with me.
She didn’t have a good life before I got her. She’s in her late thirties (so almost 40!) and we bonded rather fast.
At the first of July 2009 I bought a female Greencheek Conure (Cinamon mutation) and 2 other Cockatiels. They were not tame.
I introduced the Greencheek Conure to Jopie rightaway and they bonded immediately. I named the Greencheek Conure Kiwi.
Then, at the 25th of August 2009 I bought a baby Umbrella Cockatoo and a baby Congo African Grey in a parrotshop and both came to live with me at the 27th of August 2009.
They were very young at that moment, about 7 (U2) and 6 (Grey) weeks old, so I had to handfeed them myself.
Looking back with what I do know now about parrots they were too young, but luckely everything went well.
The Congo African Grey turned out to be a male, so I named him Alex in honnor of the late Alex from Dr. Irene Pepperberg.
The Umbrella Cockatoo turned out to be a female and I named her Maxi.
Since the tender age they came into my life, they grew up together. They share their cage and toys.
Their wings are not clipped, so each day when they have their “out of their cage”-time at my livingroom they enjoy to fly. They love to fly.
After flying they play with all the parrot toys hanging from the ceiling and then they come to sit near to me or on top of me to relax and interact with me and eachother.
It’s such a joy to have them in my life.
Alex developed to be a very well speaking African Grey. His voice is very clear and can be understood very well.
He of course speaks Dutch, although he also says “I love you” (his only English text). I am so proud at him and his speaking-skills.
Alex is a sweet rascal. He likes it to challenge especially Beertje, but also Jopie and Kiwi and my two longhaired Chihuahua’s Vicky (brown) and her daughter Lisa (blue-merle) and my cat Trijntje.
Maxi is very caring and sweet, to me and also to Alex. She loves to preen his feathers and she sometimes begs Alex for food. Alex does respond regularly by feeding her with food from his crop.
Alex does not always want to be preened, so Maxi always approach him very carefully, making sweet sounds and saying “lekker hè” (nice huh), the only thing she can say.
She waits for his response then.
When Alex is in the mood for a preening-treatment from Maxi he let her do her thing and he at the same time, as a response, often starts to preen her feathers too.
They are so caring and sweet to eachother. I enjoy to watch them interact with eachother and be playful and happy.
My other hobby is photography and guess who are my models most of the time?
Yes ofcourse my pets, especially my beautiful birds, but of course also my beautiful Chihuahuas and my female tortoiseshell cat Trijntje.
Right now my cat Trijntje, age 13, is sick. It's serious, because she might have a tumor in her nose. I’ll expect the lab-results of the vet this week. I used to have 3 cats.
My big sweet wonderful red tomcat Thijs passed away at age 17 at the 12th. of November 2012.
My sweet deaf white tomcat King passed away at the 25th. of February 2013. He was 8 almost 9, but he had serious health-issues like the heartfailure HCM and dry eyes syndrom.
I still miss my 2 beautiful sweet tomcats. Luckely I do have many photo’s and video’s of them though.
The 12th of August 2012 I bought a parrot-buggy (which is a converted secondhand baby-buggy), which makes it a lot easier to take my parrots on a walk with me.
All my birds are flighted. I am against clipping wings.
Maxi wears an Aviator Harness when I take her outside. She is very helpful when I put the harness on.
In August 2012 I started flying her outside with a long line attached to the Aviatoir Harness and this went very well.
Beertje makes a lot of problems when I try to put her Aviator Harness on. But when I manage to put it on and she wears it, then it is okay.
Alex totaly freaks out when he sees the Aviator Harness. It’s just impossible to put it on so he goes into the travel-cage then and I can put the whole travelcage at the parrot-buggy.
This works out very well.
They all enjoy to go outside with me. And I love to take them on walks.
My two Chihuahua’s jump by themselves into the basket at the bottom of the buggy. They did that at the first moment they saw that buggy in the sellers garden.
So, during walks they sit in that basket together and let themselve be driven, without walking themselves at all. They are rather lazy.
They only jump out when they see another dog and also for pooping and peeing.
Well, that’s all I have to tell you right now. I hope I will enjoy to be a member of “Precisely Parrots”.
It was "Precisely Parrots"- “Honesty” who invited me to join this parrot-group.
I look forward to get to know other members from “Pecisely Parrots” and their parrot(s) and other pets, so I do look forward to hear from you all!
Greetings from the Netherlands,
Rita