Hi, my name is Michael and I own a 9 month old Senegal Parrot that I have owned for 6 months.

I have been fascinated by birds and airplanes since early childhood. I started with elementary bird watching and bird photography.

Above is a photo of bird photography in Kenya.

Also I have a Private Pilot Glider license and am currently just days away from taking the Private Pilot Airplane test. I fly sailplanes similar to how hawks and eagles soar on thermal and ridge air currents.  One time I flew head on with a pair of bald eagles and a juvenile not more than 50 feet away.

Above is me landing a Schweizer 1-34R Glider.

At first I bought a Cockatiel but it died shortly after I acquired it. I still suspect that it had come infected from the crappy pet shop I got it at. I strongly urge you to be careful where you buy your bird and to do your research or you may regret it afterward. During the time I had the Cockatiel, I knew next to nill about owning a bird so I scoured the internet for information. I didn’t even know you could teach birds much tricks but I came across the BirdTricks website and decided to get the Taming, Training, and Tricks DVD package. I listened to all the audio guides, read the ebooks, and watched the DVD which was very helpful. In the brief time I had the Cockatiel I was able to train it to step up, target, and almost got the flex but the bird died. Actually, just before the bird got noticeably sick I had ordered the small birds training course (with the flight training course) but the bird died with the course in the mail. I strongly considered returning it for a refund but decided not to, I instead decided that I would eventually get another bird.

I visited many bird stores and did careful research for my next bird purchase. Having watched several training videos by this point, I knew that I wanted something up from a Cockatiel because I wanted to be able to teach it all sorts of tricks and to talk but at the same time was constrained by time, budget, and living conditions. I narrowed my choices to a Conure, Senegal, or Mini-Macaw. I kept my mind open and would decide at the store. Unfortunately the people at the store were not particularly helpful although they were definitely the best bird store around. I ruled out a Conure when I saw how noisy and rambunctious they were. Next they were showing me a Hahns Macaw but it was the biggest scardy bird I have ever seen. Not only would it not come anywhere near me, it would panic and try to run away from the salespeople so I knew this was not the bird for me either. Finally I was given the last remaining Senegal Parrot to hold and right away I knew this would be the bird. It sat calmly on my finger and let me pet it off the start. There seemed to be a sort of connection right away. It felt like the bird chose me as much as I chose the bird.

Above is a photo of Kili from around the time I got her.

My background in birds is still fairly limited. I have a minor in psychology so I am very interested in all of the details of bird learning and behavior. In some ways my Senegal Parrot is my own little psychology experiment. Out of personal interest I have read an entire ornithology book, Irene Pepperburg’s Alex and Me, and several other bird books. I have nearly all of the birdtricks training series including: DVD Volumes 1,4,5,6,7,11, store ripoffs, parrot magic, countless audio cds, ebooks, and parrot magic magazines. I opted not to buy the Volume 2/3 advanced training DVDs because I already had the ebook for the same tricks from a different bundle. Having seen all the other DVDs and learned the methods used, I didn’t find the DVDs to be necessary and the written explanations were enough to work with.

In upcoming posts I will discuss how I named Kili, some of the tricks I have taught my bird, training diet tips, how I got my bird to stop biting other people, and much more.