CRAZY-BEAKED TEDDY!!

I've always had an affinity for birds.Ever since I can remember I have loved to watch them fly, hear their calls and warbles and tweets and had them as pets. In part, I am sure that is why my mother called me pigeon,and dad called me gaavy, or featherhead.I was also night-owl, but that had nothing to do with actual birds, of course. So it is little wonder then, that I have nearly always had a pet bird? Parakeets, mostly, since they are inexpensive and easy to care for,and very mobile.Mr.Cheeps, I think was the first one, but I have had so many, I could be wrong. Often I have had pairs, because just one bird seems such a lonely individual,unless you have hours upon hours to lavish attention on it. Most recently, I found myself with four birds of my own, and 11 altogether. I was baby-sitting Mogwi's "Aviary" while she went to Vegas on vacation. Just before that occurred,my most outstanding and most talkative bird, blue, passed away,and I was so heartbroken, I vowed that for a while I would have no bird. Just goes to prove one must never say things like that in the earshot of one's friends. Suddenly I found pet birds being thrust at me from all directions! Two parakeets...both given individually, and two cockatiels! Again, both given individually. So here I am, with four birds, in four different cages, A white parakeet (female) I called her Snowy, because she looked like a blue bird that had been dropped into a snow-bank, a blue parakeet(male) named, Blue (what else?) a mostly Grey cockatiel,(female) named Ku-Ku, and a classic yellow crested cockatiel (male), named Teddy. The Budgies came to me as babies, because I know the signs of a young bird,and they had the bars of youth across their foreheads, the their ceres were pale. But not being as familiar with Cockatiels I can only guess that Ku-Ku was an older bird, and I am not sure how old Teddy was, because he was given to me by a friend who had had him for a while, I don't know how old he was when she got him, but She named him Teddy, because she is a teddy-bear nut,and that's what she calls her pets! I fell heir to him because her man didn't like the noise of a bird, with all the tweeting and warbling and hooting,and Cockatiels are famous for their copy-cat bird songs and hooting  and carrying on when they are happy. for several years My four birds and I were very happy together, and then I finally was able to gently pair them up together so that I only had two cages to contend with. Well, actually, that's not quite accurate.The truth is, that once I knew for sure by their ceres that Blue and Snowy were boy and girl, and they spent most of their time with their little noses pressed against the sides of their cages talking to each other, I knew I had to unite them. It just wasn't fair to keep them apart any longer when they were so obviously anxious to be together. Now, normally I had all four cages lined up side by side on the built-in desk in the kitchen,so on the day I decided to go ahead and put Blue and Snowy in the same cage, I put both cages on the kitchen table, I gave them their showers and got the cages all cleaned up,and changed the water and seed,and then surprise surprise, put Snowy into Blue's cage with him. Now, I had been watching Teddy and Ku-Ku out of the corner of my eye, and they had been having a little confab between them, with their little noses pressed together,so when the deed  was done, I turned to see what, if any, reaction there was from the Cockatiels, and they both turned to look at me, with an accusatory stare, like, WELL? When do we get to be together?! Needless to say, two cages got retired to the spare room, and four very happy birds cuddled down together in their separate little love nests! Since that time, three of those birds have gone the way of all flesh,and only Teddy remains. Naturally he missed Ku-Ku for a while, but their memories, hopefully are not long, and he has settled into being a happy bird once again. Until lately. Now, when I got Teddy, he had only two perches, two food and water dishes, and a mite-guard on his cage.Over the years he has acquired bells and chew-toys, ladders and mirrors, little jingle balls with bells in them,more perches and millet spray holders, and cuttle-bones.After each introduction of a new thing, Teddy has run away from it for a while, and then curiosity got the better of him, and he has learned to play. For some reason, he has been a timid sort, possibly because when he made any noise, or mess before, he got yelled at. He has loosened up some now, because I play with him,talk to him, play music for him and encourage his hooting and singing. But, for some reason, he didn't quite know what to do with the cuttle bone,and I began to see a strange change in him. As you probably know, when pairs of birds are together, they groom one another. Well, Teddy began to appear rather unkempt to me, and I worried about it. He still got his showers and all, but I noticed that once he was wet, he would just sit there like a big grey and white and yellow lump, until he was dry. He was fluffing, but he wasn't preening. So, I investigated further. I watched him. Then suddenly it dawned on me that he wasn't using the cuttlebone either. The one that I had put into his cage most recently was yellowed with age, and was completely untouched, there were no beak gouges in it. Normally they gnaw on them at least a couple times a day. It provides them with minerals and salts, and they use it to sharpen their beaks. One thought led to another,and finally I took the flashlight,and got a good look at him. His beak had been allowed to grow,and had grown clear down to his neck! No wonder he wasn't preening ! He couldn't! His beak was too long! In fact, the point of it was practically touching his neck,which mean he probably wasn't eating very much either,if at all! Again, his beak was so long, he couldn't hull the seeds! Immediately, I got Yon son out of bed, and told him what was going on, and pointed and viewed with alarm,we dug out all the clippers we owned and set about to trim Teddy's beak. Well, it sounds easier than it is. In the first place, Teddy does not like coming out of his cage. Even though we reassured him, and spoke to him gently, we still had to chase him around his cage for several minutes before we got a good hold on him. Then Yon held him gently until his little heart slowed down to approximate normal hearbeat, and he was breathing right, and then began the laborious task of going through the clippers, one by one, trying to find the right size to do the job without causing any damage to his beak,like cracking or breaking off too short,and we certainly didn't want him to bleed,or get his bulbous little tongue cut by the clippers. Finally, out of my manicure kit, I brought a tiny pair of side-cutters; now it had taken probably twenty minutes to get to this point. During that time, Teddy's resistant hissing,scolding, squirming and peeping had ceased, and I think he had finally figured out what we were trying to do, because when I put those side-cutters up to his beak, just to see if they were the right size and shape to do the job correctly, he put his little beak right into them perfectly, and as I snapped them shut on that extra inch or so,and the impediment popped off, he didn't even wiggle. After checking him over very carefully,and seeing that his beak was now at a normal length once again, Yon and I both sighed in relief,and then cooed at Teddy as we put him back in his cage. While Yon made a quick trip to the pet store to get more cuttle-bones, I watched Teddy intently, and was pleased to see he instantly began eating and drinking, and preening! And, it didn't take long for him to make proper use of the new cuttle-bone once it was installed either! That's been about six months ago, and we now check him over regularly and every now and then, we have to trim his beak again. He's using the cuttle bone, but apparently, his beak grows more than most birds do! So, you have watch out for those little guys. The singing and hooting is the only way they can tell you if all is right with them or not. If they're not making happy, sometimes loud sounds, you'd best be investigating why not....instead of yelling at them because they are making too  much noise!

OUI?