There are any number of things wafting through the air in a home where a bird lives.  Dust, dander, seed hulls and even airborne particles of dried poop occupy more than just the the immediate air space. It settles on and into everything creating the need for a higher standard of hygiene. Floor or ceiling fans and open windows seem to aggravate the problem more than solve it as it blows the settled dust back into the air.  Some of the better home air conditioning systems will trap a great deal in its filters, the rest just lies there in the vents.
Whether you need to invest in air filtration depends on your circumstances.  If you have multiple birds, have a few birds that you live in close proximity to or if you have allergies, I would recommend a good air purifier.
Among the dustiest birds are the cockatoo, the cockatiel and the african grey.They all produce a powder down that is finer in texture and more difficult to deal with, leaving a white film over anything that it lands on, in which you can write your name after a few days, if that interests you.  If you have one or more of these birds (I have 4) a separate air filtration unit is your best bet to ensure good air quality in your home for both you AND your birds.
It’s important to note here that it is not recommended that you house any of these dusty birds near your macaws, especially the blue and gold, who are very susceptible to a respiratory disease called Pulmonary Hypersensitivity Syndrome resulting from poor air quality which has led to deaths in the blue and gold and some other macaw species.  Further, Birdkeeper’s Lung is a human disease that can come from the inhalation of bird dander and other related particulates over a prolonged period of time. The particulates infiltrate the small air sacs in the lungs causing inflammation.  As exposure continues, the lungs lose their capacity and the damage as irreparable. It has also led to deaths.  Although macaws have different respiratory systems than humans, the outcome is basically the same.
pet dander

There are several different types of air filtration available. When you live with birds, a HEPA (High Efficiency Particulate Air) filter is really what works best, since particulates are the main offenders. They range in cost from about $70 to $500+.  The economical shopper is saying: “Where do I get the $70 one.”  Before you run out to Target, let me point out that you will not really be saving money with these inexpensive units. Besides being questionable in their ability to really clean the air, they have filters that require constant replacement, mostly because they aren’t very good filters to start with. The cost builds up.  And with birds, the filters need changing more often than recommended. Try to remember that the point of this is clean lungs.
Avoid anything ionic. These purifiers create ozone in dangerous amounts.  In fact, The Sharper Image, who created the Ionic Breeze recently faced a huge class action lawsuit for knowingly deceiving the public as to just how much ozone was manufactured with the use of their product. I know this because it was the first air purifier I bought, and threw out.

Following this, I contacted my friends with multiple birds and asked them what they use.  Most referred me to the Austin Allergy Jr.  One person told me hers had been running 24/7 for 14 years and works as well as the day she got it. I bought one and LOVE it. There’s no question as to how well it’s working, I know it’s doing its job.
The unit I have cost about $300.  In a non-bird household, the filter, which you will vacuum with your upholstery brush a couple of times a week to clean, needs to be replaced every 3 years (they cost about $125). With multiple birds, you will want to replace it more often.  I replace mine about every 18 to 24 months because I have several of the most dusty birds.
When buying an air purifier, look for companies talking about the filtration.  Forget about how pretty it looks in the wood cabinet, chances are more time was spent on that design.  All that matters is how well it cleans the air.  Mine incorporates a HEGA (High Efficiency Gas Air) filter that removes allergens, chemicals and gases from the air.  It also removes, bacterias, germs, molds and smoke among other things.  Air is filtered from all sides of the unit.  If you’re going to buy an expensive unit, compared with the $70 ones, it should do all of these things.

I can’t help it.  I cringe every time I see a large parrot with a small child.  From a toddler to a teenager, children carry a significant amount of energy.  You can feel that a child is present no matter where they are. Parrots, as prey animals, are easily alarmed. It is their nature and red flags go up any time something is amiss. We are far more tolerant of our parrots natures than they are of our children’s, and I have seen things go wrong, regardless of how well behaved your child or your parrot is.

I went to visit an out of state friend years ago, and she requested that I bring Abu, my first umbrella cockatoo.  Abu was one of those rare cockatoos that was quiet, sweet tempered and would sit on a perch for hours in the company of her favorite people.  She was potty trained, and without a doubt, the easiest bird I have ever had.  I had no reservations about bringing her along.  She was barely in the door before she had won the hearts of everyone, including my friend’s 3 year old grandson.

I kept Abu in the bedroom where I was staying when he wasn’t out mingling and making new friends.  Early into my visit, my friend and I were in the kitchen talking while her grandson busied himself with a coloring book in the living room.  The next thing I know, there was a horrible shriek and the little boy came running to Grandma for comfort.  His hand was bloody.  He had gone into visit with Abu without our knowledge and had apparently stuck his hand inside the travel crate.  Inspecting the wounds, it appears that Abu managed to get three fingers into her beak for one nasty bite.  One finger was nearly crushed.  I felt horrible and couldn’t apologize enough.  We all knew that this wasn’t the child’s fault because he was just being an inquisitive as children are, and it wasn’t Abu’s fault for objecting to the small hand invading her cage space, but ours for lack of supervision.

Last summer, I watched a young girl be bitten in the eye by her beloved cockatiel after he was frightened by a slamming door.  Fortunately, her lid took most of the injury, but the relationship between the two was never the same.  Even a small bird can do substantial damage to a small body.

Despite the risks, children being raised around birds are offered some unique experiences.  There’s a lot to be learned about care-giving, compassion and our responsibility to nature. When you are raised to be patient with and tolerant of things different from yourself, you can be at home wherever you are. And it doesn’t hurt to have an awareness of body language, whether it be avian or human. I have a friend who rehabs troubled parrots whose very young children (2 and 4) have learned not to make eye contact with a screaming bird so as not to reward the undesired behavior.
When I was about 10, we found a baby screech owl with a wing injury.  After waiting until we were sure there were no parents caring for the bird, we took him home and nursed him back to health.  We knew nothing about the care of a wild bird and found advice about its diet from a family friend who was knowledgeable about wildlife. Willy was the sweetest bird and he became a member of the family.  It was a wonderful experience that I am grateful to have had.
When we learn at an early age to respect and appreciate nature, it is something that we carry throughout our lives and pass along to our children.  They, in turn, pass it along to theirs.  What a wonderful world this would be if all of humanity were on the same page.

Photo of Cody by Sandi

I love spending holidays with my birds.  Even after my daughter grew up and moved out on her own, I have never had to worry about suffering from “empty nest” syndrome.  I celebrate all of the bird’s birthdays on Thanksgiving since I don’t know any of their exact hatch-dates, and it has been a tradition every year to give Christmas stockings to each of them.

This past holiday season, however, I had just moved from Austin to Orlando and started a new hectic job.  I hate to admit that both holidays passed without celebration with or for my birds.  So, I decided to do it up right for Easter.  I have spent the past couple of months scouting crafts stores for supplies to make baskets chock full of goodies.  Since they are not allowed to partake in chocolate bunnies and jelly beans, I bought lots of wood cut outs and different kinds of shreddables, fun foot toys and yummy treats.  I got papier mache boxes shaped like letters of the alphabet, spelling out each of their names with the intention of attaching them to each basket.  The baskets themselves are untreated and meant for shredding and utter destruction…then I had a dream last night causing me to think again.

In this dream were vivid images of both of my cockatoos sitting in their baskets incubating cockatoo eggs that were brightly colored and decorated like Easter eggs.  I woke up thinking about what a hormonal season it has been so far and just how much those baskets are looking like nests to me, let alone them.  I decided to scrap the idea of baskets altogether.  I’m a little disappointed, but I will still see that they get a lot of the fun stuff and goodies that would have gone inside.  Maybe we’ll have 4th of July baskets this year, since breeding season will have definitely concluded by then.

Happy Easter to everyone from Cody, the world’s most pliable, patient and photogenic Umbrella cockatoo:

Photo of Cody by Sandi

I learned a long time ago never to look at Linus when I am on the phone.  Being a cockatoo, he believes the sun rises just for him.  He can’t understand why I would talk to an electronic gadget when I have perfectly good cockatoo standing by.  If I look at him, it’s an invitation to join in the conversation.
My daughter called the other day and was telling me about a jacket she had seen in a store window that cost $3500.  She was jokingly asking me if I thought she should take out a loan for it, just as I was passing the cage.  I looked up, and briefly locked eyes with Linus.  “Alright” he says.  Astonished, my daughter says: “WHAT??”  “What WHAT??”, I said.  “You think I should take out that loan?”  “NO!!”  Apparently, Linus sounds a bit like me.  It took a minute to clear up the confusion.
I have a friend with an african grey that like to sit in his cage and have long imaginary phone conversations, in her voice.  He begins by imitating the tones of the phone dialing and goes on the have the most boring phone chat: “Uh huh, uh huh.  Really?  Hmmm.  Okay.  Uh huh…”  It’s really embarassing for my friend who hopes she’s not really that dull.  I find it hilarious, and have suggested that she employ his services when telemarketers call.  Or her mother-in-law.

Dave and Jamie’s rose breasted cockatoo, Bandit, sounds exactly like Jamie.  Listen for it when they post videos.
I have some friends that own an amazon, who favors the husband, but speaks with the wife’s voice.  I was mentioning to them that I thought this was an interesting twist.  They are convinced that it is intentional.  While the husband might not respond to the bird beckoning him, he is unlikely to ignore his wife.
Ironically, I have started sounding like my parrots.  When I leave for work, I make a big production out of saying goodbye to each of my birds individually:  “Bye BYE, Theo.”  “Bye BYE, Tinky”, until I have addressed them all.  Ususally, the last thing I hear when I am walking out the door is a giant “Bye BYE” from Linus.  It’s really cute, but not so much when it slips out when I am leaving my co-workers for the day.  “Bye BYE, Jessica!”  It’s a bird owner thing.  I dropped a pen one day and a little girl picked it up and handed it to me.  I said: “Thank you!  What a good bird.”

The cutest things on the planet may very well be (and not necessarily in this order): a baby cracking up laughing, kittens doing just about anything, and birds playing.  Some of the very best memories I have of my birds are of them playing, especially when it involves me.  There’s something so precious about watching the determination of a 100 gram bird tug on something twice its size, and the lengths they will go to to accomplish an nearly impossible task.  I am always on the lookout for things that will peak the curiosity of a nosy bird to inspire play.

Here are some things you can make quickly and inexpensively that can change and grow with your imagination, all of which work best with your involvement:

1.  Birdie tunnel (budgies/finches):
You can make this simple toy from a cardboard paper towel roll and two shoeboxes.  Remove the lids from the shoeboxes and place them open side up.  Cut a hole in one short side of each box just large enough for an end of the paper towel roll to fit through.  Connect all the pieces together with the paper towel roll in the center.  It will look like a dumbbell when you’re through.
I have a friend with 3 little budgies that spent hours with this bird toy.  Eventually she raised the height of the tube to the top of the box and created ramps and steps and climbing ropes for her budgies to reach it.  They went to great lengths to get to that tunnel,  they’d race through and start again from the other side.

2.  Birdie Maze:
Thesecan be both fun and interesting for your bird.  If you have smaller birds, budgies to conures, the  walls to the maze are easily constructed from Legos.  At first make the maze more of a winding tunnel and coax him through it with treats.  As he gets better at finding his way, make dead ends and false passageways that cause him to have to evaluate his moves.  If your bird is a cheater, and flies to the top of the wall to find his way, you can cover the top with a towel if he feels comfortable with that.
For the larger bird, you will need taller, more sturdy walls.  You’d have to have A LOT of Legos.  My daughter’s umbrella cockatoo, Abu, actually taught me this game while I was packing for a move.  She created her own maze from the cartons that were slowly overtaking the living room.  She had a ball.  I told a friend about Abu’s game.  This guy had the largest record collection I had ever seen and he used the milk crates he stored his albums in to create a maze for his amazon.  Last I had heard from him, he had still not returned his record collection to it’s original spot.  This game might not work well for some macaws because their tail is always dawdling two feet behind them.
3.  Play Mat:
What bird doesn’t have the time of his life trying to remove the buttons from your clothing?  Or trying to disassemble your jewelry?  The play mat offers all of those opportunities and more…
Take an old blanket and sew beads, buttons, bows and bells to it.  Or you could be a rebel, and use things that don’t start with a “B”.  You could use a towel and sew on plastic rings, keys, leather strips with beads, wooden cutouts and pretty much anything else you can think of that your bird would enjoy.  The fun for the birds seems to be in tugging on the items, just like the buttons on your shirt.  When you are done playing it folds right up for storage.  If  it becomes soiled, you can put it in a lingerie bag and machine wash it, depending on the durability of the items you have sewn on.
I had made one of these for the cockatiels years ago and this post inspired me to make another. I did make one for Linus, my umbrella cockatoo, a short time after he arrived to live with me.  His efforts were spent trying to fold it back up or dragging it around behind him by one of the plastic rings. I wasn’t yet aware of what a tyrant Linus was with toys, always trying to bend them to his will and make them do things they weren’t designed to do.  He had a good time, though, and that’s the point.

4.  “Greyzilla”:
I read about this guy somewhere who made a little city out of appropriately sized Legos for his African grey and made up this game called Greyzilla.  It was the grey’s role to come along to destroy and terrorize the city and all it’s tiny, little people.  It was the human’s job to portray the little Lego people running from Greyzilla and begging for their lives.  As Greyzilla crashed his way through town, he showed little mercy for the Lego-ites.  If I remember correctly, though, this compassionate monster tried to reassemble the city when he was through, although probably not to Legoville building code standards.  I can only imagine how much fun they must have had.

I had two days off in a row this week!!  I know that doesn’t sound like a big deal, but when you work in retail, believe me, it’s rare.  It feels like spring break.  I intended to tackle some projects that needed tackling.  I actually tackled two.  And they were, of course, bird projects.

New cage covers were desperately needed for Linus, my umbrella cockatoo, and the cockatiels, so I moved this to the top of the to-do list.  I went to the quilting section at the fabric store and bought about 2 miles of dark broadcloth.  Linus has a really big cage.  He also has a really big beak and had shredded his cover beyond usefulness.  He has a favorite side to his cage for sleeping, and there was so little fabric remaining on that side that he recently decided to move to the other side for a good night’s sleep.  I know this because his back-end has been positioned over his water bowl all night for about a week now.  I don’t think I need to say more.  I constructed the cover and attached it to the cage using grommets and quick links.

The cockatiels.  My sweet little darlings.  The only thing worse that waking up to the horrors in Linus’s water dish is waking up to the cockatiel’s belting out a tune at 6:30am when I worked late and got to bed at 1 the night before.  Don’t get me wrong.  I love hearing their joyous little voices.  Just not then.  I made them a darker cover to encourage them to sleep a little later.

I was so excited when I went to bed last night, new cage covers in place, knowing I could sleep until I woke up rested.  Well, that was the plan, until I woke up to my alarm clock buzzing at 6:45.  Apparently, I had set it the night before out of habit.  The good news is that I did not hear a peep from the cockatiels at 6:30…if that can be construed as good news.  Oh, and by the way, I came down stairs to find that Linus had torn a hole in his new cover, right at his eye level, and every movement I made was being monitored by a blue eye ring surrounded by black cloth.  Creepy.

Today’s project was toy making for the cockatoos.  Linus was pouting this morning as if to say:  “Mom, I have nothing to do with my beak.”  I was thinking how he found something to do with it earlier that involved his new cage cover, but kept quiet.  I went to the lumber store for a pile of 2X4s and cut enough 1″ pieces to fill a 10 gallon bin.  I drilled holes into each piece so they could be strung onto chains.  I made HUGE toys for both Linus and Theo, my goffins cockatoo, who didn’t even notice the wooden behemoth in her cage.

Linus was thrilled, though, and spent most of the day transporting bitten off chunks of wood to his stainless steel pail for further processing.  I noticed about an hour ago that he has managed to give himself a black eye, something he does several times a year in the course of going to battle with his toys.  Sometimes they hit back.  He has already gone through about 7″ of wood, or the equivalent of 15 boxes of toothpicks (if I were counting, or thinking about going into that business).  I guess we both had a productive day.  Next project on the list:  Easter baskets for the cockatoos, and Easter…boxes for the little guys.