osnyder
New member
Hello bird friends. I have not been on the forums for a long time. I've been more in love with my and all fids than ever, so all is well.
Today I visited the Berkshire Bird Paradise Bird Sanctuary with my SO, my son, and my brother (both teenagers). Rob (sig. other) is from the area and had never gone. It's been there for decades, and has two positive Yelp reviews. It's in the middle of nowhere-- in the woods, in the mountains, and run by a man and his wife (I think) and is described as a "labor of love." There are hundreds of birds there, a bizarre number of pigeons and doves and water foul, some beautiful rare larger type foul, some birds of prey including two bald eagles, many many owls.
And: parrots. A LOT of them.
So, you drive up to this place and it's really strange and utterly ramshackle. It's truly in the sticks. There's not much information, you can just wander in. Someone may sort of tell you which way to go to start. There are a lot of weeds everywhere and debris all over the place. It's basically a mess.
At the front are two large pens of some pigeons and doves, and then you walk up into a make-shift sort of quonset hut/green house structure. They tell you to start in there and walk through to the rest of the property. Outside the door are two umbrella cockatoos in a big hand-made space and they look really healthy.
This is where I became very concerned. When you walk inside, there are a lot of fans going, and it's very loud-- but it was about 90+ degrees and very humid, stiflingly hot. You walk down a narrow corridor and both sides are lined with cages. Behind those cages are more cages facing the other way-- some of them are large homemade enclosures. There were countless parrots, many cages of budgies and lovebirds, in big enough spaces for the most part, and two amazons in there, a female ekkie, a senegal, two hahns macaws, many sun conures and many greencheeks. One grey. They looked in good feather and their behavior seemed fairly normal and healthy. But MANY of the cages for the bigger birds were much too small. MUCH. And the water was uniformly disgusting, and there was no evidence of fresh foods being given. They were being fed mostly the same, multicolored small pellets.
One of the hahn's was panting, which I did not like. I found a bottle of fresh water and sprayed him, and later did it again, and he seemed less stressed. I started spraying any of them that would let me without running to the other side of their cages. The second hahns was a total whore for the spray, he LOVED it so much.
So, ok, on to the rest of the place. All I can say is that it was just atrociously dirty and overgrown; the bald eagles' water looked like it had been sitting for a week (it was greenish), two trumpeter swans had a "pond" that was a brown, bubbling science experiment, and with all of these birds, there was no information posted anywhere. HUNDREDS of birds. (one of the eagles apparently was a victim of the Exxon oil spill).
There was a large outdoor enclosure with five blue crown conures. I adore BCCs, and rarely seem them (other than mine!), so I stood and watched a long time. They were healthy and adorable. They had a big aviary (home made) with lots of ropes and weeds up to your chest. Dirty water. And a nest box. There were nest boxes in the budgies' cages, too. None of the parrots had any obvious special needs issues. I honestly didn't even see any pluckers.
Finally at the end, I tired to ask some questions. My boyfriend asked if they ever adopted out. He said ABSOLUTELY NOT. I asked him, what generally leads to a bird being surrendered to you? His answer was odd: "people WANT birds to come to live with us." That's all he could give me. People want their birds to live there, and sometimes even visit. He was-- somewhat grandiose. And defensive about the adoption question. He went on and on about it.
I asked about the BCCs-- how did you come to have those five blue crowns? He thought a minute-- oh! I've had those 12 years. Three of them came to me and then two were babies that hatched here. A lot of our birds have been born here. --this was presented as a point of pride.
So, folks, help me out. what should I be thinking about this place? It honestly seemed like a hoarding situation and not a "sanctuary." Maybe 20% sanctuary, 80% delusional bird hoarding. No LEGIT bird sanctuary would encourage their birds to breed, correct?
But then again-- no-one seemed sick or in danger. I just didn't like what I saw. But I can't be sure if I am being a snob or being generally reasonable. I told my son-- I don't know whether I want to donate money to this place or call the health department. When I left, I felt really drained and anxious.
Would love some feedback from fellow fid families. Thank you for reading this long post!
Today I visited the Berkshire Bird Paradise Bird Sanctuary with my SO, my son, and my brother (both teenagers). Rob (sig. other) is from the area and had never gone. It's been there for decades, and has two positive Yelp reviews. It's in the middle of nowhere-- in the woods, in the mountains, and run by a man and his wife (I think) and is described as a "labor of love." There are hundreds of birds there, a bizarre number of pigeons and doves and water foul, some beautiful rare larger type foul, some birds of prey including two bald eagles, many many owls.
And: parrots. A LOT of them.
So, you drive up to this place and it's really strange and utterly ramshackle. It's truly in the sticks. There's not much information, you can just wander in. Someone may sort of tell you which way to go to start. There are a lot of weeds everywhere and debris all over the place. It's basically a mess.
At the front are two large pens of some pigeons and doves, and then you walk up into a make-shift sort of quonset hut/green house structure. They tell you to start in there and walk through to the rest of the property. Outside the door are two umbrella cockatoos in a big hand-made space and they look really healthy.
This is where I became very concerned. When you walk inside, there are a lot of fans going, and it's very loud-- but it was about 90+ degrees and very humid, stiflingly hot. You walk down a narrow corridor and both sides are lined with cages. Behind those cages are more cages facing the other way-- some of them are large homemade enclosures. There were countless parrots, many cages of budgies and lovebirds, in big enough spaces for the most part, and two amazons in there, a female ekkie, a senegal, two hahns macaws, many sun conures and many greencheeks. One grey. They looked in good feather and their behavior seemed fairly normal and healthy. But MANY of the cages for the bigger birds were much too small. MUCH. And the water was uniformly disgusting, and there was no evidence of fresh foods being given. They were being fed mostly the same, multicolored small pellets.
One of the hahn's was panting, which I did not like. I found a bottle of fresh water and sprayed him, and later did it again, and he seemed less stressed. I started spraying any of them that would let me without running to the other side of their cages. The second hahns was a total whore for the spray, he LOVED it so much.
So, ok, on to the rest of the place. All I can say is that it was just atrociously dirty and overgrown; the bald eagles' water looked like it had been sitting for a week (it was greenish), two trumpeter swans had a "pond" that was a brown, bubbling science experiment, and with all of these birds, there was no information posted anywhere. HUNDREDS of birds. (one of the eagles apparently was a victim of the Exxon oil spill).
There was a large outdoor enclosure with five blue crown conures. I adore BCCs, and rarely seem them (other than mine!), so I stood and watched a long time. They were healthy and adorable. They had a big aviary (home made) with lots of ropes and weeds up to your chest. Dirty water. And a nest box. There were nest boxes in the budgies' cages, too. None of the parrots had any obvious special needs issues. I honestly didn't even see any pluckers.
Finally at the end, I tired to ask some questions. My boyfriend asked if they ever adopted out. He said ABSOLUTELY NOT. I asked him, what generally leads to a bird being surrendered to you? His answer was odd: "people WANT birds to come to live with us." That's all he could give me. People want their birds to live there, and sometimes even visit. He was-- somewhat grandiose. And defensive about the adoption question. He went on and on about it.
I asked about the BCCs-- how did you come to have those five blue crowns? He thought a minute-- oh! I've had those 12 years. Three of them came to me and then two were babies that hatched here. A lot of our birds have been born here. --this was presented as a point of pride.
So, folks, help me out. what should I be thinking about this place? It honestly seemed like a hoarding situation and not a "sanctuary." Maybe 20% sanctuary, 80% delusional bird hoarding. No LEGIT bird sanctuary would encourage their birds to breed, correct?
But then again-- no-one seemed sick or in danger. I just didn't like what I saw. But I can't be sure if I am being a snob or being generally reasonable. I told my son-- I don't know whether I want to donate money to this place or call the health department. When I left, I felt really drained and anxious.
Would love some feedback from fellow fid families. Thank you for reading this long post!
