The grey cells

In his spare time, Phineas pretends to be Hercule Poirot:

Phineas Poirot

 

To help Phineas put his own spin on the little Belgian detective, he adjusts the scripts a little:

FROM….

• Lemon: It’s only been three weeks since your last case.
• Hercule Poirot: Three weeks is an eternity to a brain like mine. Without the constant stimulation, my little grey cells will starve and die.

TO…….

• Mama: It’s only been three minutes since your last jiggy.
• Phineas Poirot: Three minutes is an eternity to a brain like mine. Without the constant stimulation, my little grey cells will starve and die.

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FROM…. 

VeGducating Thomas: Spinach

Continuing in the VeGducating Thomas series, I am happy to report that Thomas is also partial to a little spinach:

MORE green stuff?

I have gradually been introducing vegetables to Phineas.  If he copies the toyboys then his diet should be reasonably varied.  He likes broccoli although he does tend to shred it quite a bit.  I am confident that he eats some of it though.

Spinach was a recent attempt.  He took to it quite quickly & seemed to like the taste, i.e., most ended in & around his beak rather than scattered around the floor.  As usual, here is the proof!

So you’re saying you want me to try ANOTHER vegetable? What’s in it for ME?

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It looks a bit icky… I will have to close my eyes….

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Actually…. that’s not toooo bad….

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Just call me Popeye… now where’s my pipe?

Green beak

Cagney has had a green beak for a couple of days.  Somehow, he managed to get a piece of spinach stuck to it. 

The spinach worked its way off today though, so he is back to his handsome, well-groomed self.

Let’s add broccoli to this spinach covered beak…

Poop mountain, reinforcements & misting

Even though Mr Exotic Vet had cleared poop away from Atilla’s lump, it started building up.  I can only assume this was happening because the poop was either too runny, and/or she was too weak to do her squat & wriggle to propel the poop away from her vent & the lump.  I tried a couple of times to catch her to clean the poop but found it impossible to keep her still in my hand – she could wriggle & squirm for England.  That in itself was quite reassuring in that she was not so ill that she could not resist.

Spinach leaves

In the hope of loosening the poop mountain, I gave Atilla & the toyboys a misting.  As far as leaves, they only had spinach, so I picked out a few large leaves & hoped they would be tempted to get wet.  Atilla came out onto the landing platform quite quickly to investigate but I can only assume the water temperature was not quite to her liking as she turned her back & retired to her perch.  The boys had a little play in the wet spinach but I guess followed their leader & were not able to drum up much enthusiasm.

So, there was no luck with soaking Atilla’s poop, however the poop had to be cleared as it would not be long before it would be mounting up & blocking the vent area.  I decided to call in reinforcements for the next day.

Surprisingly Atilla was quite alert the next morning.  So much so that when I opened up the Manor she clearly wanted to fly & stretch her wings.  She promptly landed on the floor, but when I returned her to the Manor she flew off again, got further around the room but landed on the floor again.  No matter… I felt this was a good sign as she clearly wanted to be active.

Unfortunately, her activity did not shift the ever-growing poop mountain on her lump.

Not long after Atilla’s little fly, the poop-clearing troops arrived (my mum).  After much discussion, we decided the poop should be soaked for at least a minute & the best way to do this would be to put Atilla in a bird bath.  I would be the one to catch/hold her & mum would be armed with cotton buds & cotton wool for shifting the poop.

As a precursor I gave them all another spinach misting (in the hope that Atilla could soak her lump herself!)  Atilla did not have the energy to roll in the spinach but did get a little wet.  Cagney had a crawl through the spinach leaves & got a nice wet belly & Bezukhov had a romp & a dance over the leaves & I think he forgot that he was actually meant to wash himself!

The aftermath

So, after that distraction, it actually took us two attempts to get rid of all the poop.  Both times, I managed to put Atilla into the bird bath with warm water & keep her in by placing my hand over the open doorway (where the bath should hook onto the cage bars).  Atilla attempted to bite a hole through my fingers to escape but the skin on my fingers are like leather now (thanks Atilla & Raspy) so I could withstand the biting.

The soaking definitely helped in removing the poop.  On the second try I managed to wrap Atilla in a tea-towel which made it a lot easier to hold her still for longer.  Once the poop was gone, before releasing Atilla, mum smeared some vaseline on her lump.  I had already mixed in some aloe vera gel from a plant into the vaseline.  I hoped this would protect the skin on her lump as it is difficult to pull off poop that has hardened.

The poop mountain

What a relief.  The deed was done.  Atilla tweeted as she ran back to her perch & I think she appreciated being rid of the poop though did not appreciate the dunking in the bird bath or the general indignity of the process.  I turned the electric blanket on so she could stay warm as her back end was still wet from the bath.

After she recovered she was able to preen her bottom/vent area & tidy it up a bit.