Another of my feathered friends
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JoeUser Forums
It has been a little while since I posted an article about my biggest baby, a ring neck parakeet (large one) that was given to us by my former sister-in-laws now husband. Check through past articles for that one if you wish, as it includes a sample picture showing what she (the parakeet) looks like (actually small parrot sized, or very large parakeet size, part of the parakeet family, but not a small bird).
In the middle of the size spectrum in our house we have one of the following little critters.
You can read details on this type of bird here: www.petbirdpage.com.
This little guy is a Green Cheek Conure. As the page referenced above will tell you, they are very playful critters, and quite intelligent. Where the larger, earlier mentioned ring neck has the intelligence of something close to a 3-year-old human, green cheeks come in more on the 3 - 5-years-old level. They can learn phrases, pick up whistles of other birds, and mock noises they hear very quickly and easily. They can also use some very loud and piercing whistles at times. We joke about our little green cheek using a "George of the Jungle" whistle at times that can be quite distracting.
Our own little green cheek joined our home just over a year ago. He came from a local pet store that specializes in birds. He was being well cared for there, and had learned a few tricks from the pet store employees that were spending time with him. That's part of what helped convince us to bring him home. He was nice and friendly, and yet playful and animated too.
He was purchased soon after an attempt to bring a puppy into the house failed due to allergies and other issues. At the time I had been admiring the little green guy when visiting the store to pick up food and other bird supplies. My children were interested in getting another cockatiel to replace one that flew out of our door during a feeding that just happened to coincide with my walking out the door to grab the newspaper. Having sold the puppy for what we paid for her, we used the money to get both birds (a new cockatiel and the green cheek) with my daughter feeling a bit like she preferred the green cheek and my son still primarily wanting the cockatiel.
Things have pretty much stayed that way since Jules joined the house. He got the name for his curiousity and for the bright colors he has in his feathers. Jules Verne seemed to be a good match, and we just changed it over to Jules bird.
Jules has shown himself to be able to figure out how to get out of his own cage if every available entry/exit (including food and water access doors) aren't clipped securely. We went on a family vacation over a weekend last year and had someone else feeding and checking on the water for our pets while gone, during that trip one of the clips on the cage was left askew and on the day we got home we were horrified to not see him in his cage. We looked around the house all over worried that he might have flown out the door when we got home (it was dark outside when we got back). After a few minutes of looking my daughter looked down on the floor and saw him perched on the bottom of a chair looking at us trying to figure out what the commotion was about.
He loves to hang upside down in his house and does a little swinging dance if you come to visit him while there. He also mumbles phrases like "What's up Jules?", "Pretty Jules" or other variations of that phrase and some more. Quite the little character.
One of the neatest things about him is how he has adapted to making his own "bed" in his house. Initially we had seen these items:
in the local pet store. They are "Happy Huts" designed for birds to snuggle into. We thought about getting a similar gadget for Jules, but my wife thought they were a bit expensive for being basically just a sheet of fabric. She wound up making him a small hammock out of a hood from a fleece hoody that belonged to my daughter. It took Jules just a few days to figure out how to get into and out of the hammock, but once he got it down that became his bed for some time to come.
Over time the hammock took too much claw abuse and had to be removed from the house, so Jules is finally enjoying his own happy hut, but even that has been a bit of an adventure as Jules opted to gnaw away the string hook on one side of the hut letting the hut just about fall to the cage floor with him on it. Some additional improvisation has been done to keep the hut where it can be used still, though it has cut off another of Jules favorite past times - laying upside down on top of the hut in the traditional "snoopy on top of the dog house" pose.
Anyway, now you've met another member of the family. If you ever consider getting a bird as a pet, I do highly recommend green cheeks, though perhaps not as starter birds. Cockatiels are still a better choice for that I think, as hand-tamed and trained 'tiels are less expensive and can be just as friendly as a green cheek (with a bit less danger to pet owners since the 'tiel beek is smaller and does less harm to a human than does the green cheek's.)
In the middle of the size spectrum in our house we have one of the following little critters.
You can read details on this type of bird here: www.petbirdpage.com.
This little guy is a Green Cheek Conure. As the page referenced above will tell you, they are very playful critters, and quite intelligent. Where the larger, earlier mentioned ring neck has the intelligence of something close to a 3-year-old human, green cheeks come in more on the 3 - 5-years-old level. They can learn phrases, pick up whistles of other birds, and mock noises they hear very quickly and easily. They can also use some very loud and piercing whistles at times. We joke about our little green cheek using a "George of the Jungle" whistle at times that can be quite distracting.
Our own little green cheek joined our home just over a year ago. He came from a local pet store that specializes in birds. He was being well cared for there, and had learned a few tricks from the pet store employees that were spending time with him. That's part of what helped convince us to bring him home. He was nice and friendly, and yet playful and animated too.
He was purchased soon after an attempt to bring a puppy into the house failed due to allergies and other issues. At the time I had been admiring the little green guy when visiting the store to pick up food and other bird supplies. My children were interested in getting another cockatiel to replace one that flew out of our door during a feeding that just happened to coincide with my walking out the door to grab the newspaper. Having sold the puppy for what we paid for her, we used the money to get both birds (a new cockatiel and the green cheek) with my daughter feeling a bit like she preferred the green cheek and my son still primarily wanting the cockatiel.
Things have pretty much stayed that way since Jules joined the house. He got the name for his curiousity and for the bright colors he has in his feathers. Jules Verne seemed to be a good match, and we just changed it over to Jules bird.
Jules has shown himself to be able to figure out how to get out of his own cage if every available entry/exit (including food and water access doors) aren't clipped securely. We went on a family vacation over a weekend last year and had someone else feeding and checking on the water for our pets while gone, during that trip one of the clips on the cage was left askew and on the day we got home we were horrified to not see him in his cage. We looked around the house all over worried that he might have flown out the door when we got home (it was dark outside when we got back). After a few minutes of looking my daughter looked down on the floor and saw him perched on the bottom of a chair looking at us trying to figure out what the commotion was about.
He loves to hang upside down in his house and does a little swinging dance if you come to visit him while there. He also mumbles phrases like "What's up Jules?", "Pretty Jules" or other variations of that phrase and some more. Quite the little character.
One of the neatest things about him is how he has adapted to making his own "bed" in his house. Initially we had seen these items:
in the local pet store. They are "Happy Huts" designed for birds to snuggle into. We thought about getting a similar gadget for Jules, but my wife thought they were a bit expensive for being basically just a sheet of fabric. She wound up making him a small hammock out of a hood from a fleece hoody that belonged to my daughter. It took Jules just a few days to figure out how to get into and out of the hammock, but once he got it down that became his bed for some time to come.
Over time the hammock took too much claw abuse and had to be removed from the house, so Jules is finally enjoying his own happy hut, but even that has been a bit of an adventure as Jules opted to gnaw away the string hook on one side of the hut letting the hut just about fall to the cage floor with him on it. Some additional improvisation has been done to keep the hut where it can be used still, though it has cut off another of Jules favorite past times - laying upside down on top of the hut in the traditional "snoopy on top of the dog house" pose.
Anyway, now you've met another member of the family. If you ever consider getting a bird as a pet, I do highly recommend green cheeks, though perhaps not as starter birds. Cockatiels are still a better choice for that I think, as hand-tamed and trained 'tiels are less expensive and can be just as friendly as a green cheek (with a bit less danger to pet owners since the 'tiel beek is smaller and does less harm to a human than does the green cheek's.)