Oh Bill I'm so sorry about Timneh! I haven't been on the forum much in the last month because of going in and out of the hospital for multiple knee surgeries, and I just now logged on to find your thread...I know it's frustrating and scary, but don't lose faith or patience, you'll find her as long as you keep looking for her, just like Wrench already said, only when you stop looking will you not find her!
I just went through this about a month and a half ago with Lita, my Blue Quaker, she flew out the sliding-glass door and up and over the roof of the house...I got so lucky, I managed to get her back around 3:00 p.m. the next day, so she was only gone from 6:00 p.m. until 3:00 p.m. the next day,
but that night she was outside, and in a horrible rainstorm, and was in the top of tree behind my house, well you can't not feel guilty once you go back inside and go to bed, so I feel ya there for sure.
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USE FACEBOOK CONTINUALLY, AS IT'S ONE OF YOUR BEST RESOURCES TO SPREAD THE WORD! Make sure you're updating your Facebook posts about her multiple times each day, and make sure that you're posting on your own Timeline and on LOCAL PAGES/TIMELINES and not just on Parrot911's Facebook page or other "national" pages....Spreading the word LOCALLY is top-priority!!!
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HAVE YOU MADE A "LOST-BIRD" AD ON YOUR LOCAL CRAIGSLIST PET-PAGES? IF NOT, YOU NEED TO DO THAT IMMEDIATELY!!! AND YOU ALSO NEED TO BE SEARCHING ALL OF YOUR LOCAL CRAIGSLIST PET-PAGES AT LEAST TWICE A DAY (FIRST THING IN THE MORNING AND LAST THING AT NIGHT) LOOKING FOR ANY ADS FROM PEOPLE WHO MAY HAVE FOUND TIMNEH!!! I don't know how familiar you are with Craigslist, but people who find pets outside often go to their local Craigslist Pet-Page FIRST to post that they have found a pet outside, and they generally will only give very general info about the pets they find (if they're smart), like "I found a Parrot outside in (fill in town). If you lost your pet Parrot, contact me and describe your Parrot, and we'll see if it's yours"....
So Craigslist is probably the most important place to both post your lost-parrot ad and search for found-parrot ads, even more important that Facebook because Craigslist is completely local to your town/city, and you can search all surrounding towns/cities as well.
Again, I don't know how familiar you are with Craigslist, but obviously Burlington has their own Craigslist page (Ben and Jerry's is there for God's sake!)...So if you go to the Burlington, VT Craigslist homepage, you want to look under the "Community" heading, and under the "Community" heading you'll see "Pets". So you want to click on "Pets" under that heading, and then the local Burlington Pet-page will pop-up. There is a search-bar at the top of the Pet-page, so you can search to see if anyone has posted that they've found a Parrot in Burlington by just typing in "Parrot" in the search-bar at the top (best to be general in your search rather than specific, like you don't want to search for "lost Parrot" because you don't know what the ads will be tagged with...So do a search for "Parrot" and then scroll through the search-results to see if anyone locally has found a Parrot...
Then if you look at the left-hand side of the Pet-Page you'll see where you can set your search parameters, and you can search out I believe a maximum of 200-miles from the town's/city's page you're already on...So you'd already be on Burlington's page, so just change the search distance to the "200-mile" max, type "Parrot" in the search-bar, and then it will show you all the results from 200-miles out from Burlington in every direction...Then make sure you're doing that same search at least once every morning and once every night so you'll know when someone posts an ad that they've found Timneh!
****Also a really good idea, if you haven't done it already, to post your own "lost-Parrot" ad in the same "Community" Pet-page of Burlington's Craigslist.
It's best if you post a photo of Timneh in the ad, state the date and time she was lost so that people will know if she is the bird that they've found (not that there should be too many Greys flying around New England anyway), and then list all of your information so that people can contact you, including any reward you're offering. And make sure that you're logging-in to your Craigslist account and re-posting/refreshing your ad once every day so that it will keep being put at the top of the Pet-page for people to see and be aware of, otherwise if you don't update/refresh your ad every day, it will just get pushed down the list further and further, and people don't tend to look at ads that are older than a day or two.
Other than using Craigslist, I can't ad a whole lot of advice, you've already posted Timneh on Parrot911 and different Facebook pages, so Craigslist is the other huge place to post and search for her...
There is also www.ParrotAlert.com (which is totally different than Parrot911Alert); actually if you just go to Google and search for "Lost Parrot Resources" the entire first page of results are all the most-popular and most-used lost-parrot websites that you can both post your lost-bird ad on and also search the found-parrot ads on...
Other than that, post your flyers in all of the Pet Shops/Bird Shops, Veterinary Offices, Rescues and Shelters, Restaurants, Walmarts (they have a bulletin-board up front of the store that you can pin a flyer to), local storefronts, etc.
And try to at least hit all of the Pet Shops, Veterinary Offices, and Rescues/Shelters that are within 15 miles of Burlington, and you want to not only post flyers, but you also want to alert the owners/managers/all employees of these places, ESPECIALLY THE PET SHOPS/BIRD SHOPS!!! You want to make sure that ALL of the pet shops and bird shops in and near Burlington are totally aware that Timneh is lost,
because what often happens is that the person who finds your Parrot goes to these Pet Shops/Bird Shops to buy a cage, toys, food, etc., and typically they buy it all at one time because they don't have anything for a bird in their homes. So you want all of the employees at all of the local Pet Shops/Bird Shops keeping their eyes open for a person/people who comes in and buys a large-size birdcage, along with toys and food and everything else someone who just got a new (and their first) parrot needs to buy! Then hopefully the employees can strike-up a conversation with the person, asking them what type of bird they have, how long they've had it, etc. And hopefully get their license-plate before they leave the parking-lot.
****One more thing...As far as that tool who called you and started screwing with you about having Timneh...I have no idea why, but EVERY SINGLE TIME someone loses a Parrot, it seems as though they all get at least one of those same calls like you got from someone who says that they "think they have found your bird", and then they keep screwing with you, they don't show-up to meet you, they often lead people around on a wild goose-chase all over town and never show-up, they refuse to describe anything about the bird, and then just as you're ready to hang-up on them they'll spit-out a general trait of that species of parrot just to keep you on the phone, etc. It's sick, they're sick, but it ALWAYS HAPPENS with lost Parrots...One of the very popular Youtube Vloggers lost her Moustache Parakeet, and she did a Live-Stream where a guy came on to the live-chat and said that he had found him and he was at a McDonald's in LA with the bird, that's where he found him, in a tree at this McDonald's in downtown LA...Well she lives in Encino, which is about a 30-45 minute drive from downtown LA, but she got in the car of course, as did other local fans of hers, to drive into downtown LA to meet him, the entire time he was screwing with her/them just like that guy was messing with you...Turned out that the guy was actually in freaking Alaska and was just "screwing with her for something to do" as he put it...So people are sick and they love to prey on people who are desperate to find their birds, like it's entertainment to them.
You don't want to fall-prey to them, but at the same time you don't want to ignore someone who might actually have Timneh...So use your judgement, you handled that first guy very well, so just use your best judgement and make sure that you don't accidentally give away any details/specifics about Timneh right away, because you obviously want anyone who contacts you and says they have her to describe specifics about Timneh that they would only know if they really had her...
Good luck, if we can help you in any way please just ask!!! Thinking about you and Timneh both and sending positive-energy!
Yes I know your part of Vermont from being up there every day, five days a week for ten years making deliveries to the newspaper. Rt 7 has the University right there and tree-lined streets. SOMEONE has had to see her! Is she the type that would willingly go to strangers,Bill?
