New from Texas :D

[fqtt]

My name is Lynnea, I currently live in Texas right outside of Dallas :) My parents are missionaries, so I've lived in various Third World Countries, and have lots of stories to tell!

I have loved animals all my life, and currently work at a Veterinary hospital as a Kennel tech. I've worked there for a little over a year now and enjoy it very much :)

I have had numerous pet fish in the past, since my mom is allergic to almost every animal imaginable. I've had a handfull of neon tetras (my first pets!), a huge bunch of koi (we had a pond in Indonesia), 2 bettas (not at the same time!), 5 hamsters total, 3 regular, 2 Dwarf (sisters), and now finally have a dog! She is a Lhasa/Cocker Spaniel mix (as far as we can tell) about 3 years old now, and she doesn't make my mom sneeze! She really was a gift from God, since practically every other dog (besides hairless!) my mom has ever been around has given her an allergic reaction. The dog's name is Flopsy, and although she can be quite the troublemaker, she is very intelligent and very fun to play with :)



I also have 6 cockatiels! I had 7, but Kuro passed away yesterday :'( She had a tumor in her chest that was pressing on her lungs and the vet put her down for me.



Jessop & Tsubasa are mates, and Kuro & Stacy were mates. Jessop & Kuro were my only females, the rest are males.

Togo is a downright sweetheart! After two years of having the birds, though, he is still handshy. He LOVES being scratched behind the neck, and will sit quite happily on my knee while I'm at my computer, but he hardly ever steps up.
This collage was made a while ago, and I dropped the 'Kakashi' off of Pidgeon's name. It simply means 'Scarecrow', but I just call him Pidgeon now. He is the loudmouth of the group! He sings alllllll the time and always comes up with new tunes :) His favourite to start out with now is a high-pitched wolf whistle, and it actually sounds kind of nice!
Jessop is a very pretty bird. She is also very curious and kind! She loves to nibble at fingernails. She will sit quite happily on my hand for hours, as long as I can keep her attention!
Lucky is a feather-plucker. He has been since I got him. We have tried our best to discourage this behaviour, and he is out daily with my mother, riding all over the house, but he still plucks. When I got him, all the flight feathers on his left wing were gone, and my vet told us that they probably wouldn't ever grow back. Lucky has also contracted cataracts, and is practically blind in his left eye. The cataract in his right eye is still small, but is growing. We are teaching him how to respond to certain words, like 'scratch', so that when he goes completely blind he will still feel relatively safe and not freak out too often. He has his own cage now, and doesn't stay in the big cage with the other 5 birds anymore. He is quite happy in his new home :)
Kuro and Stacy were my explorer birds. They LOVED hanging out on my ceiling fan, where they could see everything! (It was off, of course!) They also liked landing on the picture frames in my room and nibbling at them. It was hard to keep them away! They would explore just about everything, but I made sure to keep them away from possible nest spaces.
Tsubasa was my sister's bird to name. I let my brother and my sister and my best friend each name a bird. My brother chose Stacy (we thought Stacy was a girl at the time!), my sister wanted to name Tsubasa 'Grey-Wings' in Japanese, so that's what he was named. We just call him Tsubasa now, though. My best friend said she had always had a pet named 'Lucky', so that's how Lucky got his name :) Tsubasa is a very good mate for Jessop, and takes very good care of her. They love each other very much :)

In the pictures, you might be able to see a little bit of blood on the birds (Lucky's beak, Tsubasa's chest, Pidgeon's shoulder). When I took the birds home from the shelter, the woman stuffed all 7 in a VERY small box. When I saw the box at first I was worried, and asked her if they would be alright in such a small area together (it was about a 30 min ride home). She said they would be perfectly fine, and sent us off. The poor birds fought all the way home!! I was so afraid that one of them would be dead by the time I reached my house. Thankfully, though, they were all fine :) I was so relieved! Pidgeon did have a pretty big gash on his shoulder, though, but it's healed up perfectly, and he's as right as rain now :)

That's about all I can think of... sorry for such a long introduction! I've been hanging around this site every once in a while ever since I got the birds, and decided it was finally time I joined :)

[RubyMuse]

Hi and welcome - it is great that you got the birds from a shelter! But, you were right - teh shelter worker should have known better than to put that many birds in such close proximity and in such stressful conditions. When animals suffer crowding - aggression is exactly what happens.

Sorry for the little bird you lost yesterday.

[expressmailtome]

Welcome to BB! Your cockatiels look beautiful! Enjoy the site!

Matt

[becca623]

Welcome to birdboard! I'm sure you have tons of stories to share. I've never been out of the states so I live vicariously through others. :)

[fqtt]

Thanks a lot for the welcome, all! :)