Purple Parrot Rescue

As some of you may have read in a previous blog post, a few weeks back we were called out to catch two semi tame birds who had been wandering around in a backyard. They each had a wing clipped and one has a legring. All efforts thus far have failed to find their owners unfortunately.

This unlikely duo are a Cockatoo and Galah who have bonded and clearly been raised together. I find them nuzzling and preening eachother quite often, it's cute. I have named them Harry and Houdini. The little devils have made no less than 6 attempts at escaping from their cage, leaving little wonder how they left home in the first place.

They are very young birds, I'd say under 1 year. They're friendly enough to let me open the cage door and change the food and water bowls without worry. Harry is the quietest Cockatoo I've ever come across, and Houdini just makes little squeaky noises, also very quiet. So after chewing his way through the wire of my aviary one day, Houdini the Galah would have got away with his first escape attempt, had he not called out excitedly at Harry to follow him. This loud noise alerted me that something was up, so when I rushed outside I managed to scare him back in and block up the hole.

They've since been moved to a stronger Cocky cage, where they made another 5 attemps at escape. One day they figured out how to open the tough door latch, so I put a padlock on it. The next day they figured out how to turn the key in the padlock, take the key out, twist the padlock, take it off, undo the tough latch, push the door open and get out. They then sat on top of the cage making happy noises all proud of themselves.

We have arranged for them to go to a farm with large flight aviaries, so once their clipped wings grow back they'll be able to fly again and have plenty of room. They will also be kept together. They're so friendly I'd hate to see them separated.

Thanks for reading :).