Wish she'd stop scaring me!

[Monica]

My sister, Jess, and her husband, Scott, are both home now, and we've had a friend staying here since Friday night to see us, though he will be leaving Wednesday... There is a chance thought that I may be able to go with him (as will Jess and Scott) and will be in the San Fransisco area (who can resist them red heads?? ) and would be back by next week if not sooner... in the least bit, I'd be travelling down south if I went with my mother instead so she could go fix someones computer...

Anyway, point of post, we have two cats, Sprite and Squirt. Sprite is the 'black' cat, while Squirt is the 'white' cat... Squirt has killed an adult male Californian quail when he was 4 months old. Sprite, knowing her, enjoys watching the little birds up close (i.e. paws on the cages, staring in, maybe even trying to 'reach' in and 'touch' them type of thing), so naturally speaking, if she's in my room, it freaks me out!

Well, we (Jess, Scott, our friend, and I) left today around 3ish, and didn't get back till 7pm. I didn't take an immediate look around, though my sister came up to me and asked me where Sprite was because she couldn't find Sprite, my door was open, and Squirt was looking inside! It was dark in my room, I walked in, saw Casey in her sleeping spot next to Noel's (Noel's too dark colored to see her in pitch dark), turned on the light, saw Sprite on the bed (good, she's not outside, not terrorizing birds either), look at the birds in the cages, and although a few are clinging to the sides of the cages, they look overal fine... I look over to Noel and Casey, and Noel isn't there! I nearly freaked out once again, however there were no feathers floatin around the room, nor any extra feathers on the floor or bed, and I'm a bit scared!

Well, I look around on the floor, and find Noel under one of the cages, no missing feathers (beyond the ones she doesn't have on her stomach and the back of her head), and she was ready to get back to her gym! I'm glad that she's looking fine and no problems, but Sprite must have scared Noel, which in turn scared me! Maybe some might think I should cage Noel and Casey, though my door is normally closed and I don't normally have any problems any more with the cats getting in the room, especially since we duct-taped the heater vents down... I do realize that I will need to get a cage for them someday, though I'm not looking into some tiny "conure" cage...

[Christine9]

I just had to say that I love that last pic. Now that's a bird that loves her mommy! So adorable...

[cfulhage]

That last one is a really cute pic, Monica! Your cats are gorgeous- The "white" one looks a lot like my Grissom!

[Freedomoflight]

Hee, cute pics. I know what you mean about the "conure" sized cages, I went through that when trying to find a decent sized cage for my caique! Most cages seem way to small in my opionon now a days!

[Monica]

Cages that are made for budgies to conures/greys are all too small IMO, unless the cage is 2x2' for budgies to tiels, atleast 3'x3' for the medium sized guys (conures, quakes, caiques, etc), and 4'x3' or bigger for the larger guys... I know though that many of the conure sized cages are 2'x2'x3' tall and in the least bit, I hate them! If I had my choice of cages to get, any cage that I wanted, I'd get one that would be 2-3' wide, 3-4' long, and 4' high inside... and that's a cage that could fit an amazon or too! I just find it sad that I have two flight cages that alone are bigger than most conure + sized cages!

As far as Squirt, I really haven't seen very many cats that actually look like him and have similar saddle backs and face masks! I've seen cats that are similar, but they are not fluffy enough, or have too much white or something... Though cats like Sprite are very common!

Oh, and thanks about the comments! Noel and all the other birds seem to be doing fine today, though there sleeping patterns have been a bit disrupted for the past few days with people going in and out of the house and lights going on and off (I don't normally have the bedroom light plugged in, and if I DO need light, it's only for less than a couple mins). Things should hopefully settle down by the end of this week, however!

[Freedomoflight]

I know exactly what you mean. My caique gets like, clausterphobic in a small cage- and so I have him in their cockatoo with playtop cage (you have to scroll down to see it, for some reason it wouldnt let me link directly to the pic of the cage)- http://www.cpcages.com/ but the demensions are slightly bigger- its an older version. He is in heaven in it!

This one says you can put an amazon in it, but I cannot picture a zon in this size cage! I have this size cage- it used to house a GCC! (again, wouldnt let me link directly to the cage, its the first cage on there)
http://www.cpcages.com/
Edit:
Ok, well stupid site! Click on powder coated cages and you will see what cages I am talking about! For some reason, the CA cages site only links to their main directory- its a pain.

[Alika]

Ugh... cage sizes...

Sam needs a new cage. I'll be the first to admit it. The reason? We bought her cage online. The size was not misrepresented, but it was the minimum cage size that was okay for an amazon according to my research and according to the company I bought it from. Once I got her in it, it was a different story.

We compensate for it by letting her have free time outside the cage whenever we're home... she's a very trustworthy bird... and she doesn't move around much as it is... but the next critter to get something big will be Sam. We've already been looking for new cages for her.

It just kills me that they thought that size would be okay for an amazon. I mean, it's *okay* or we wouldn't have kept it, but it's nothing like what Beeper has.

[Monica]

If the bird is out of the cage a LOT during the day, then cage size wouldn't really matter! But when a bird is stuck in a cage for several hours each day, with hardly any room to move about, now that's a problem...

[Alika]

It's not a tiny cage. She has three perches, she can move around, and she can stretch her wings... it's just not as big as I'd like for her to have. I wouldn't stick one of my birds in a cage that was abusively small.

The cages we're looking at now are macaw sized cages with amazon bar spacing.

Some of those cages they have on the market for budgies are absolutely ridiculous... especially for a high energy bird. I always feel bad for the birds whose owners buy one, then try to stick more than one bird in them.

[Monica]

I know how that is! Just makes me think of someone who found a cockatiel, and went out and bought a "finch" cage (too small for the average finch or enjoys flying around! maybe fine for 1 sick finch however...). I gave them an adequate sized cage for the tiel (not even 2'x2') and they thought it was PERFECT! It's still too small for her, and she should have a cage that is about 2'x2', however that's my best smallest cage and cannot sacrifice it...

I would never think though that you would put a bird in a cage that was so small it was abusive! How could I think that?