[PowerBBS]

Hmmm take a ball of yarn put it on the ground next to your cat (don't touch it). Does your cat play with it? When it gets bored and stops playing with it, take it and un-weave it a bit so that you can now swing the ball in circles above/around the head of your cat - don't flail it about like it's a weapon, just do it like you wanted the cat to play. Does it attack it? Is the cat more interested in the flying ball than it was interested in the still ball on the floor? Does the cat only swat at the yarn on the floor, yet actually attack, chew and claw at the swining ball. My point is that the mobility of an object tends to bring out the attacking nature of a cat more than a stable object.

Pretty neat experiment huh. This being said if your bird does learn to fly. You'll have little control of where it flies to (and that could be directly into the jaws of your cat). The flying nature will most likely instill your cat into developing it's predatorial instincts even more. Meaning the excitement may teach him to actively hunt your fids.

Now, don't get me wrong, all four of my fids are FULL FLIGHT. And we don't have cats and I still see it as very dangerous sometimes as I just have no control where they land and the fact that they're flying in the house so who knows what they'll run into. So I'm not actually apposed to flighted birds. I just see more danger in letting them fly around with your cats versus having hand control of them at all times.

I'd say let them fly if they were outside, but they're our pets and hense live inside so the "natural" flying ability just won't develope normally. However the natural ability for your cats to be predatorial is hereditary and genetic. Cats are the most successfull predators of all land predators. I grew up with cats and many times they've brought home a dead feathered "food gift" to our front door.

Honestly, I'd keep the wings clipped so that you could have at least some control your fids (especially around the cats). Just take the extra pre-cautions to see that your fids never get out alone. As trust me. All our fids fly, and we have no control where or when they decide to take off. Just a regular household wood creek makes our two smallest (Autumn and Chucky) fly a couple laps around thru the kitchen and into the living room. I think you want control in this case. Flight means a loss of control

Just my opinion though.