More Stories of Our Birds

My wife, Jeanne, and I started out with a dark gray Parakeet, which Jeanne named "Buddy." We bought a mate, an English Budgerigar,which Jeanne named "Jinxie 1." From those two birds, we now have their 5th generation. We never considered buying nor raising Lovebirds, but we acquired a Peach-Cheeked Lovebird from a friend of ours who found the Lovebird along side the road. Jeanne named the Lovebird "Shyguy," because the bird would tuck his bill into its chest, like it was "shy." But over a year later, we discovered that "Shyguy" was a female,because Jeanne found an egg in the corner of the cage. Jeanne renamed the Lovebird "Shygirl." We figured that "Shygirl" was lonesome by herself in the big cage, so I finally convinced Jeanne to buy a male "Peach-Cheeked Lovebird on 5/31/2010. Jeanne named him "Toodles," and this baby Lovebird drove "Shygirl" crazy with his antics. Jeanne and taught "Shygirl" to climb the power cord on the portable fan which was mounted on the top of the medicine cabinet in Jeanne's bathroom. "Shygirl" in turn, taught "Toodles" to climb the power cord. It was cute to see "Shygirl" and "Toodles" perched on the top of the medicine cabinet. Much to our dismay, "Shygirl" died unexpectedly on Friday, 8/13/2010. On Monday, 8/16/2010 we drove across town to Southeast San Antonio to buy another Lovebird. Gary only had two Lovebirds, both of which we were told, were males. Jeanne bought a beautiful baby Orange Crested Lovebird and brought it home. "Toodles" began fighting with the new baby Lovebird, because "Toodles" took sole possession of the cage after "Shygirl" died. Finally, Jeanne took "Toodles" out of his cage and put him into a separate cage for a few days. When Jeanne put "Toodles" back into the cage with "Ira," Toodles" made up with "Ira," as they began to preen each other. Then Jeanne made a discovery" "Ira" was a female, so "Ira," named afer Ira Wagner, now became "Miss Ira." Both now climb the power cord together!