What's the most amazing thing your birds have done that surprised you?

[Nathan1]

I think everyone on this site knows birds are very intelligent, but even so sometimes they do something that really surprises us. What amazing things have your birds done?

My Quaker(stitch) and my green cheek(yoshi) don't necessarily like each other, they respect each others boundries and have never gotten in a fight...They basically ignore each other, usually. Stitch will give me a kiss if I say "gimme a kiss" and one time I said "Give yoshi a kiss" and he went ahead and did it. This was pretty amazing for 2 reasons, first stitch wasn't trained or anything, he just knew her name and "give kiss" then he put 2 and 2 together. Second they normally just avoid each other but then stitch displays affection towards her.


It's also impossible to hide treats from yoshi, if I hide it in the room and I look away for 10 seconds she's into the bag of treats...She has gotten into drawers, under the couch, she surprisingly flipped over a pale much larger than her...She finds ways to get them.

 

[RavensGryf]

That's cute. Wow, that Stitch is a very smart guy! I've noticed that Quakers are really Cockatoo/macaw type of smart. They're amazing little guys.

I can't off hand ever recall anything here that just blew me away, but I'll post if I think of something!

 

[Kiwibird]

What a fun thread! Sounds like your birds are natural born foragers

Kiwi doesn't do anything super amazing, but he is something of a feathered oven timer. He starts flipping out consistently about a minute or so before the oven timer goes off. He may not be able to talk or do math, but he knows when dinners ready!

 

[Birdman666]

This was kind of a surprise! I was teaching Papaya to skateboard, and Demitre became so jealous of all the attention Py was getting that he grabbed the board, took a flying leap onto it, and shot across the living room coffee table...

Jealousy can work to your advantage. It's one of the ways they trained Alex, you know. He had to compete with someone else for the attention, and come up with the answer first...

 

[Birdman666]

One day Sally was sitting in the window on her boing, when a red tailed hawk landed on the bird tree on our balcony and peered in at the tasty treats in the window...

Sally (who was free flighted in those days) flew across the living room, around a corner, and down the hallway to my bedroom. She pushed the bedroom door closed with her head. When I opened the door to my bedroom, she was hiding in Papaya's cage. She had closed the cage door. LATCHED the cage door shut. And was hiding behind a toy...

I'm not taking any chances!

 

[Birdman666]

Had a really, really, bad day at work. Came home just worn out and devastated, almost to the point of tears...

My CAG waddles over to me... sees the state I'm in. Climbs down and waddles back to his cage and picks out a cashew (his favorite nut.) Waddles back to me. Sets the nut down in the palm of my hand and tells me:

"It's okay. You're a good boy."

 

[Christinenc2000]

Are you serious !! That is amazing.
Mine just whistles to the dogs then throws shells at them.

 

[Birdman666]

Inca, my daughter's Jenday was bonded to her. I went to pick her up from school one day, and brought her with. BAD MOVE. Inca gets spooked by all the strange kids, and flies into a tree... (Clipped but semi-flighted and could still get enough air to get away.)

So I climb the tree and go after her. Just then, Sarah comes out, and realizes what was happening. (Inca used to fly across the rescue to her shoulder the minute she walked into the room. They were that bonded. That's why we took them. We had to...)

Sarah yells: "Inca, bad bird! You get down here right this minute."

Inca immediately flies to Sarah's shoulder.

Sarah then yells: "Daddy, get out of that tree this minute! You're embarrassing me in front of my friends!"

(Trust me, I'm a pro at that!)

 

[Birdman666]

Are you serious !! That is amazing.
Mine just whistles to the dogs then throws shells at them.

My CAG is a cognitive talker. I've had two of those...

I've got more. I'll keep posting as I have time.

 

[Birdman666]

The halloween story kinda amazed the whole neighborhood.

Another Tusk story:

Halloween comes along and I just put the birds outside in the tree rather than deal with the squawking every time someone comes to the door, or a stranger walks by outside. My macaws, as I have shared many times, are lap birds, and won't even stay in the tree. The other three did, and you couldn't tell they were there in the dark.

So along comes this little four year old girl racing from house to house with a bag of candy that was almost as big as she was. Halfway across my lawn, she figured out that the giant red bird on my lap WAS REAL!

She put on the brakes, and ended up tripping and falling. Spilled her candy. Started crying...

TUSK walks to a branch directly over her head, hangs upside down by one foot looking down at her and says:

"Awww... Whatsamatter? It's okay. You're okay. Come here."

All the other birds know come here, and all five began repeating it when Tusk did... the little girl stopped crying and we gathered up her candy. I held Maggie's beak, while she gave her a head scratch, and learned there was nothing to be afraid of. I gave her some extra candy...

By then, we had a crowd of at least 25 people gathered around the tree with their jaws hanging open...

 

[Birdman666]

Sally "Gaslighted" me for awhile.

I swear I was losing my mind. She had a favorite puzzle toy on her boing in the window. I came home, and I could have sworn I cleaned the poop, picked up all the bird toys and put them back on the boing, before I left for work...

I must be losing it! Unlatch the cage door. Let Sally out. (I closed cage doors while I was at work in those days.) Then one day I came home from work early... and unexpectedly. AND SHE WAS BUSTED!

She knew how to unlatch her cage. But she also knew how to latch it. And she knew when I came home. So, apparently after I left for work in the morning she would let herself out. Sit in the window all day, and play with her toys, and then fly back to her cage when I came home, AND LOCK HERSELF BACK UP!

He'll never know...

THAT'S ABOUT THE TIME I FIGURED OUT IT WASN'T WORTH CLOSING CAGE DOORS ANYMORE.

 

[Birdman666]

As long as we are on the subject of opening cage doors. There was an escape artist CAG down at the rescue that was famous for not just letting himself out, but going around and opening the cage doors of his buddy birds...

One day he was caught red handed with his beak on the latch halfway open. The bird had the nerve to look you in the eye and blame another bird:

"Pebbles did it!"

Umm... No! You did it.

"Pebbles did it!"

Oh, and the first time it happened, there were 75 birds running around loose... and we didn't know what had happened, but we did have a tattle tale: "Pebbles did it!"

(No, she didn't! But at the time we thought... Nah! Couldn't be... Could it?!)

CAGS will deliberately mess with your head!

 

[Kiwibird]

THAT'S ABOUT THE TIME I FIGURED OUT IT WASN'T WORTH CLOSING CAGE DOORS ANYMORE.

Sally thought she had her daddy fooled! That is hilariously smart of her. I wonder if she let her other bird friends out too sometimes:54:

I've actually started actually leaving Kiwi 'free' if I won't be out very long (kind of a trial) based off you letting your birds be free all day without issue. He seems to be doing well with it. By doing so, he has stopped pitching a fit every time we leave. It apparently wasn't the fact we were leaving him behind, it was the fact he had to go up the stinker!:20:

 

[Birdman666]

About the time a divorce was imminent between my ex-wife and myself...

Papaya was probably as sick of her as I was. Now, this bird was kept fully flighted and recalled, and had NEVER flown off on me.

I'm working two jobs, and don't get home until 10:30 pm most nights. It was brutal! So my ex-wife takes Papaya outside and HE IS GONE.... and just to torture me, she calls me up at work, knowing there's nothing I can do about it, and says, I'm sorry but your bird just flew away...

I wanted to just drop everything and leave work, but I couldn't. And that night just crawled by. It was killing me.

So, I finally get home at around 10:30 at night. Turns out he had flown to the corner of the block and waited there until he saw my car. I could hear him calling when he saw it, and out of the corner of my eye, he was following me home, tree to tree...

As I stepped out of the car, he swooped down to my shoulder and said "Hi papaya! How's my bird." Then climbed inside my shirt to "his spot."

Turns out he was just as sick of her crap as I was.

 

[Birdman666]

that's about the time i figured out it wasn't worth closing cage doors anymore.

sally thought she had her daddy fooled!

and she was right!!! :d

 

[Kiwibird]

I have a good one about breaking out of cages (which my dads goffin is the master of). Some years ago, my mom bought Alfie this new cage that had these "snap" together panels. Well, Alfie (who is/should never be allowed out freely without supervision) managed to disassemble the cage from inside by pushing up and sliding the top panel so he could move it over enough to escape. He then freed the amazons (who don't even have locks on their cages and still can't figure out how to open the door), and ransacked the house. The worse is he turned on all the stove burners and pulled off the knobs He's lucky it was an electric stove or he could've caught himself and the whole house on fire! My dad thought he walked into a burglary or something until he found "the culprit" nursing his (lightly) toasted feetsies on a chair in the bedroom looking most guilty. The zons never even left their cage tops, as they probably knew they shouldn't be out...

 

[Birdman666]

It apparently wasn't the fact we were leaving him behind, it was the fact he had to go up the stinker!:20:

There are two things that I have noticed greatly influence behaviors: (1) not closing cage doors, and (2) getting them outside in a tree.

Mine have been out so long they go stir crazy if they are not.

 

[Birdman666]

Well, my amazons and my CAG figured out door latches.

My Red Fronted Macaw figured out how to work the screws and take the friggin' door assembly apart.

Maggie, on the other hand, didn't bother with working the latch. She removed them. As in just pried them clean off! Now I don't have to mess with it every time I want out...

 

[RavensGryf]

April OMG . What did your parents do about Alfie's cage? Did they have to get a new one, or just put locks on it?!

I'm glad his feet weren't too injured. That was so dangerous for everyone!

 

[Birdman666]

I have a good one about breaking out of cages (which my dads goffin is the master of). Some years ago, my mom bought Alfie this new cage that had these "snap" together panels. Well, Alfie (who is/should never be allowed out freely without supervision) managed to disassemble the cage from inside by pushing up and sliding the top panel so he could move it over enough to escape. He then freed the amazons (who don't even have locks on their cages and still can't figure out how to open the door), and ransacked the house. The worse is he turned on all the stove burners and pulled off the knobs He's lucky it was an electric stove or he could've caught himself and the whole house on fire! My dad thought he walked into a burglary or something until he found "the culprit" nursing his (lightly) toasted feetsies on a chair in the bedroom looking most guilty. The zons never even left their cage tops, as they probably knew they shouldn't be out...

Doesn't surprise me... escape proof isn't.