a scare that got me thinking

[Dougc1369]

I just had the power go out for a couple of hours due to the snow storm. It got me thinking, normally I would just go to a restaurant, movie, mall etc. (if my car would make thru all this snow!) But what to do with a bird that doesn't trust you enough to let you touch him without the bars between you? Not to mention I don't have a smaller cage for transport. I could put him in the box he came to me in but I know he would eventually chew thru that.

Things that make ya go hmmmmm.

Doug

 

[thekarens]

We have travel cages for all our pets (dogs, cats, birds) just in case.

 

[JerseyWendy]

...and we have a generator, especially because my development is infamous for losing power as soon as someone merely sneezes the wrong way.

 

[MikeyTN]

I was forced to use kerosene heater one year living out in the country side. It was either that or freeze as it was blizzard outside and unsafe to go out. They warned everyone not to go out and interstate was shut down. That was back in South Dakota.

 

[Dougc1369]

Drove thru Kansas last sept. A HUGE difference from Indiana! Not only the lack of trees, but the gates they had to close the interstate. (The hills also surprised me, I thought it would be flatter!)

Doug

 

[MikeyTN]

I've been to Kansas, not much to see for me....lol....I didn't get to see toto either....

 

[BirdyMomma]

As a family that was directly affected by Hurricane Sandy, I have been wondering what I would have done if we had birds back then. Our house was flooded. 5 1/2 feet of water in the lower part of the house (laundry room, garage), and 18" of water in our living area. We lost all our power, heat, water, everything. I am going to have to sit down and create a plan for emergencies.

 

[Chrystal]

Wow, I don't know. I would get a travel cage & a leather glove. Just in case!!!

 

[drlisaort]

I live in South Florida which is known to have hurricanes and power outages. Although we usually don't get cold weather (except tonight in the 40's is predicted), it can get quite hot when we lose electricity. In preparation, we have a generator and crates for my dog Sage and Oliver my parrot. I take both my animals on regular outings so they are used to crates and travel. Oliver thinks his travel crate is awesome because in there he gets the goodies (like seeds, pellets, dried fruit, popcorn, and such...) that he usually doesn't get to eat so he's all for a little travel in that little box!

 

[punkindave]

Good point, we have a local bird shop that was able to board ours for a few days while the power was off. We used the BBQ grille to heat pans of water with stones in them to retain the heat.
I didn't realize that even though we have gas heat and hot water, there are pretty high power electric fans required for both to operate. I knew I couldn't power the heating system with the little 1000w inverter, but didn't think the little vent fan on the hot water heater would require so much power (8amps).

We take the entire flock out (a few at a time) every week for a couple of hours to keep them used to riding in the car in a travel cage/carrier. They love "road trips to the shop to socialize and get out of the house!

Small travel crate/cage is a requirement and should be near as possible to the cage (with a towel) in case of fire. Just towel the bird to get him in the crate in a hurry, even a well behaved bird may be freaking out if they haven't succumbed to the smoke.

 

[Terry57]

Great thread. We do have a wood burning fireplace in case we lose heat, which thankfully hasn't happened (yet). Now am thinking a generator would be a good idea as well.Love the idea about keeping the carriers close to the cage in case of a fire. Things you don't really think about.

 

[getwozzy]

This is a great topic, and we recently had our power go out for 6.5 hours...and it's cold here right now- 30/20s (F) at night and 30/40s during the day. Our current (and future) home only has electric heat, but my inlaws have a wood stove and it takes literally 1 minute to walk over there... So if I really needed to I could take all our fids over there. But their house will be bulldozed soon, so our plan of action after this recent power outage is to get a generator that will kick on automatically if/when the power goes out.

But Doug- you might want to invest in a travel cage/cat carrier and some leather gloves JUST IN CASE you have an emergency and need to move him elsewhere. Or if you don't want to use gloves, learn how to properly towel a bird.

 

[Dougc1369]

I have a pair of leather welding gloves that I used to wear under my gauntlets when I did medieval reenactment fighting. So I have that covered. I never thought of a cat carrier, might have to check them out and see which is cheaper.

thanks everyone for the comments!