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Puddings & Toyboys
A blog about my beautiful budgies.
Category Archives: perches
Morning Moriarty
12 June 2022
Posted by on How I love to see Moriarty greet me in the morning.
When he hears me enter the room, if it is not too early, he will jump to the mid-height perch at the front of the cage and peer under the cover at me. I open the blinds, lift the covers a bit, then put my face up to him to say ‘Good Morning, Sweet Pie’…. taking care not to get my nostrils in biting distance!
Moriarty Milestones: Window Perch
26 May 2021
Posted by on It took time, but finally, on the 5th April, Moriarty braved the window perch!
Due to Perry & Lennie’s current lack of flying ability, the window perches have been out-of-bounds for well over a year (certainly Dalai was the last to use them). This has meant that Moriarty had to find his own way to the window perches, without anyone setting an example.
I would try & encourage him onto them when he was sat on my finger & a couple of times he would touch them & once even put his foot on one, but needed a bit more courage to take that next step. On the occasion I had Perry on my finger, I would take him over, hoping he would remember the old days when he liked to sit on the window perch but if I got too close he got a bit worried so I would withdraw.
Moriarty regularly sits on the back of my chair & looks out of the window from there. It was from that location that he took the brave leap to the window perch. Unfortunately he was not there long enough for me to record the historic occasion! However, since then, the window perch is now a regular haunt for him. I am pleased about that because it provides more stimulation, from watching birds, squirrels, wind through the trees, rain, people passing through or children playing games.
Favourite head rubbing perch
6 May 2021
Posted by on Tales from Quarantine – Thirty-Five Second Tour (8 of 8)
25 February 2021
Posted by on Moriarty puts his tour guide hat on & shows us around his quarantine cage:
Tour Itinerary
0:01: Begin on diagonal perch
0:05 Dried grass
0:08 Ladder
0:13 Platform perch
0:18 Perch where mirror is
0:24 Food bowl
0:25 Swing
0:27 Diagonal perch & platform perch (again)
0:28 Diagonal perch (again)
0:30 Middle of cage (flying area)
0:32 Conclude on perch where mirror is
Don’t give up the day job, Moriarty!
Tales from Quarantine (1 of 8)
13 February 2021
Posted by on Moriarty coped with quarantine (Oct/Nov 2020) well but it was clear he needed lots of attention.
When his previous owners brought him in, & the cover was raised, there he was, swinging away, seemingly not bothered about the move. That first sight of him made me think he would take most things in his stride. As for the elephant in the room…. yes, he has a similar colouring to our dearly departed Bezukhov but in real life perhaps a greener shade.
His cage originally had 3 cement perches & a cement platform perch, along with a wooden perch & a wooden platform perch. I replaced the cement perches with a variety of wooden ones (there is nothing wrong with cement perches but ideally they should not be the main perches & not used as a roosting perch). I did notice a small red/orange spot on the underside of one foot which might have been the start of an irritation – it disappeared quickly. You will see from the photo posted here that the toenail on his short, forward toe angles inwards. The odd angle has not caused any noticeable problems.
As far as toys, he had a lovely swing with colourful, wooden beads, a mirror, a chewy toy with a bell at the bottom. I should note that the swing has two bells at the bottom – it was quickly apparent that he loves shiny things! I added some more toys, such as the rings, the disco ball (ultra shiny!) & a paper rope toy, along with some dried grass for further stimulation.
- Before
- After
He was not scared of hands so though not tame, was not worried about me entering his cage to make all these changes. In fact, he had quite a bite on him but I think that may have lessened with the introduction of more toys to keep his beak busy!
The seed situation was curious as he had one of those gravity seed fountains mounted in one of the cage gaps for the incorporated seed bowls. Though he would perch on it, I never once saw him eat a seed from it! He had millet, so was not starving but at times when there was no millet, he still did not eat the seed. (It had an area underneath that collected the husks so I could see if he ate any). Given his love of shiny things, I put in a stainless steel bowl with seed & he immediately took to eating from that. Knowing he was eating the seed mix, I could start rationing the millet!
- Gravity seed fountain
- Stainless steel bowl
I also put in a water bottle along side his water fountain in the hope he would use it. During quarantine he never quite understood it was for drinking water, but was fascinated watching the bubbles go up the bottle as I pressed the water end. He also got quite attached to the shiny spout, often having long chats with it!
Home adjustments
28 November 2020
Posted by on Perry’s mobility is gradually being compromised by his growing lump. With this in mind, I made a few adjustments to their cage to help him get around easier.
The first hurdle was for Perry & Lennie to vacate their home so I could go in & make the changes, so I was on alert waiting for an opportunity. As ‘luck’ would have it, on the 24th October, I was scraping some poop off a perch with my fingernail (a not unusual occurrence) & Lennie decided this was a scary thing & shot out the cage. He landed over by the window. He made it back to the nearest safety, which was Dalai’s cage, in two stages, which, although it does not sound great, I was quite encouraged by, given his flying problems. I then got Perry & put him in Dalai’s cage also.
It was a relief to have full control of their cage & the first thing I did was give it a thorough clean! The main change I made was to have a perch run the full length of the cage at the top, hopefully giving Perry an easy walk from one end to the other & therefore easier access to the top level. I also moved the water bottle from the salt lick perch up there. The only slight issue is when he has to jump down to the seed pots but I have also lowered the triangle perch that he jumps down from. There is also a rope perch at mid-level that I also adjusted.
The bottom was already padded, but I added more padding. Most of the time, if he falls, he usually lands on the sisal rope perch that is stretched from the bottom-level to mid-level, but occasionally the padded bottom comes in handy.
The added advantage of the extra long perch across the top-level is that it makes a cross-junction with the branch perch. I did not realise at the time, but that is a particularly good thing as sometimes Perry struggles to turn 180 degrees on the perch, so the cross-junction allows him to turn 90 degrees at a time.
All the changes were well & good but would be useless if not accepted by Perry & Lennie. Lennie was the first to venture back in & managed to avoid the long perch for a bit. However, by the time Perry strolled in, Lennie had broken in the long perch. I may make some further adjustments later on, but for now, all seems well.
Lennie and the Long Perch
18 July 2020
Posted by on Recently, to encourage Perry & Lennie to explore a bit more outside their comfort zone, I rigged up a long perch between the two cages.
As the cages are both the same & alongside each other, when their main, middle doors are open, it lends itself to having a perch connecting across them. It just needed to be a long perch, which fortunately I have. Once in place, Perry & Lennie naturally ignored it, but at least were not scared of it. Extra encouragement was needed, so I pegged some seeding grass to it. Eventually, Lennie decided it was worth braving this new perch for the treat.
When I saw him jump on the perch, I grabbed the camera & filmed:
As you can see there was the obligatory faffing about, a brief chew of the prize, followed by tucking into grass nearer to him!
Remembering Phineas at Christmas
24 December 2016
Posted by on This time last year, I posted about our first Christmas without Cagney. This year, we face Christmas without Phineas.
In the photo above, the perch he is sitting on is still in the same place in the Villa, in the front doorway. In fact all is how he left it, so I can easily picture him in all perching spots. This particular spot reminds me of a specific occasion last summer.
I was out all day & came home after their bedtime. Bezukhov, Phineas & Dalai were in bedtime positions in the Villa, but because my sitter was still there they were not locked up & their front door was still open. When Phineas saw me, he sleepily got off his swing & made his way to that perch. I approached & held my hand out to him. He regurgitated to my finger. It was only a quiet, brief session as he was tired, but it made me feel so loved, missed & needed. That little action by my beautiful little grey man seemed to say, “Where have you been today? I have missed you. Here’s some regurgitated seed I have been saving for you. Glad you are back home. I’m going back to bed now I have seen you.”
So, this Christmas (& every day in fact) I am thinking of Phineas. I am also thinking of Cagney & hoping they are having fun together over by rainbow bridge with Atilla, Raspy & Thomas.