Sammy

Sammy is a gorgeous male canary who was rehomed because he was too loud. Dealing with toos, macaws, and other large, loud birds, we've heard this excuse before when people surrender their birds...but for a canary? This was a first!Just as with Nico, Sammy's luck changed. A family drove over 7 hours -- each way -- to add this little singer to their lives. They bought him a huge flight cage, tons of toys, and now he can sing to his heart's content, and to an appreciative audience.

Canaries

Here are some pictures of the canaries rescued from the situation we discussed here.Our vet said they were in surprisingly good condition, given the environment they'd been living in.They're looking better every day! We suspect they are rather old, but have no way of knowing.
They are ready to go and looking for a place to live out their lives.Please stop by if you'd like to adopt one of them. We can help you to set up a proper cage and teach you what you need to know to care for them properly.

Who wants a little bit of sunshine in their life?

Canary

This canary was one of the 18 birds impounded, that we mentioned here. We could not believe how long one of his nails had gotten:We groomed him and he is doing much better; perching is now much easier for him! We will update you on the other birds in the upcoming weeks. It's been a busy few days at the Center!

Aftermath of a hoarding situation

Last week, we got a call from animal control in another county. Over 40 birds had been found in deplorable condition. Their owner realized they needed help and agreed to sign over the birds to us.
The birds were fed a diet of canned cat food and sunflower seeds. As parrots are mainly herbavores, this was not good.
The birds had many wounds, recent and healed. It appears that some occurred when they attempted to flap their wings while housed in too-small cages and other occurred from fights.
These birds are not yet up for adoption, but will be shortly. We were already full at the Center, so these additional birds are placing strain on our resources as several will likely require expensive vet care to get them healthy again.
In just a few short days, they have shown remarkable improvement. Parrots are incredibly resilient and these guys just need the right homes to come around. We are working with several other parrot rescues near us that share our values, in hopes of reaching a broader range of potential homes to get them placed more quickly.

These pictures were taken at the Center, in their travel cages, before we did intakes on them.

Flower Update

Last month, we featured Flower the canary. Here is that post. We just received an update from her new owner, which we wanted to share:

She has settled in nicely in her VISION cage with plenty of perches for getting around on. She LOVES her bath dish and takes several baths a day. Her diet consists of seed and Zupreem fruit pellets along with egg food (which she can't get enough of), a very small vitamin and mineral supplement, hard boiled eggs, noodles, corn, broccoli (*) and slices of apple (is she being spoiled or what!). She has a good appetite, loves bouncing around on those perches and pulling at her "stringy" toy I picked up from you. She also likes to be "talked" to. She is starting to softly twitter a bit which is a good sign. As the weather looks like it will warm up a little the latter part of next week, I will try to get her in to see [the vet] about the tumor (I'll let you know what his opinion on it is). (*) I have read articles that broccoli flowers contain properties that have reduced some tumors in lab animals and people. This is why I am feeding her this veggie. It's a good veggie nutrition-wise and she loves to eat it so we'll see what happens.

We love hearing updates on the progress of the birds who leave the Center. Flower is one lucky lady!

Little birds

One thing we see rather frequently is small birds with obvious wounds or other medical problems surrendered to us because the owners are unwilling to take them to the vet. Very frequently, we are told that the cost of the vet bill would far outpace the value of the bird; it's cheaper to just go out and buy another. These aren't people who are unable to pay for a vet visit; they just don't want to.

One gutsy surrenderer even asked if we'd fix up her cockatiels (they'd been attacked by her dog, bleeding heavily, and we weren't sure they'd survive -- they did) and let her have them again! We discussed her situation with her and she realized that her life wasn't suited to birds.

We are just astounded by this sentiment! All of the lives depending on us are special and deserve equal consideration, whether it's a tiny finch or a large macaw. We frequently spend more on vet care than we'd ever be able to recoup in adoption fees -- it's the right thing to do.

One example chronicled on this blog a few years ago is that of Lily.

This canary, Flower, came to us in bad shape. She has a tumor and was being picked on by her cagemates while the owner did nothing. Finally, she was surrendered to us. Avian medicine is unable to cure her tumor, but we placed her in a home filled with love, ideal conditions, and other special needs canaries and finches.
Her last few weeks, months, years (who knows how long she's got left now?) will be happy ones.

Even the little ones are amazing, sentient creatures that deserve the best we can give them.

We currently have many little birds available for adoption, if you'd like to open up your home.

Our retail sales (food, toys, cages, etc.) help to fund our organization, so that we can continue to offer the best care we can. All donations are tax-deductible to the fullest extent of the law.

Please see our website for more information!