World Parrot Day

Today we are celebrating World Parrot Day with Kismet.  She’s hosting a party and everyone is invited!

We asked Mr. Google about parrots, and here’s some of what we found:

World Parrot Day was started on May 31^st 2004 by the World Parrot Trust. Its aims are to highlight the threats to captive and wild Parrots around the world. At the very first World Parrot Day the World Parrot Trust handed in a petition calling for the EU to ban the trade of wild birds in Europe. This has since come into force in 2006/2007.

What makes a parrot a parrot? The most defining and recognizable feature is a thick, hooked beak, which most species use to crack open their preferred food of nuts and seeds. They also have feet that are known as zygodactyl, meaning they are arranged in sort of an X-shape, with two toes pointing forward, and two pointing backward. This helps them hold on to tree branches, and also lets them manipulate food and other items with their claws.

A Cockatoo, but NOT Sidney

A Sidney the Cockatoo story by Lucy: Many of our lifetimes ago, Mom worked as the office /clinic manager at a veterinarian hospital. A big cockatoo named Sidney came in regularly to board, and he and Mom developed a bond. He would sit on her shoulder and they would chat while she worked at the front desk. One day he kept trying to bite her necklace. After repeatedly telling Sidney, “No!” (she was good with that word way back then, too) she said, “If you do that again you are going back in your cage.” When he laid his huge beak against her cheek she thought she was going to get bitten for sure. Instead, Sidney said, in a low voice, “Sawry,” meaning he was sorry and didn’t want to go in his cage. One time, his owner’s adult daughter brought in her dog to be boarded while Sidney was there, sitting on Mom’s shoulder. Upon asking how Sid was doing, Mom told her that he had been talking up a storm. The daughter looked more closely at him and asked, “Are you sure that’s Sidney? Sid doesn’t talk. No one in the family has ever heard him talk.” That’s when everyone realized that Mom was his favorite person. She hoped they would offer to give him to her, but that didn’t happen.

A Blue and Gold Macaw but NOT Mary Lou.

A Mary Lou the Blue and Gold Macaw story by Xena: At the same vet’s there lived a blue and gold macaw in a humungous cage. That cage was bigger than my kennel. It took at least two people to roll it up front every day. It was a trick to get that cage moved without getting bitten. Mary Lou was not a nice bird. (Unlike Kismet who invited us to her party today.) So one person would push, causing M.L. to run over to that end of the cage to try to bite the person’s fingers. That person would let go and the person at the other end would pull, causing M.L. to turn and run to that side for the same reason. They would keep doing that until that cage was moved to the front near Mommy. Mommy tried to make friends with that bird, but Mary Lou didn’t like anyone! 

I think that’s all we’ve got, but before we go I want to remind Kissie that I hung out with a bird named Pirate Pete  on Talk Like a Pirate Day and I didn’t eat him! 

Your friends, Lucy and Xena Schnauzer Warrior Princess