Gordie

hgord

I was going to write more about Gordie’s life, but Michelle did such a good job, I’d just be repeating her. Instead I’ll share some thoughts from the last week.

Now that Gordie is gone, it is really tough to look at the flock without thinking about him. Even the flock has been behaving differently without him. He didn’t have the loudest or craziest personality and was likely one of the calmest birds. Maybe that was because he was a mature bird.

It is difficult to explain how sad losing Gordie has made me feel. I try to tell myself that Gordie lived a better life than he ever did before meeting us. He was with a flock, he had a mate, he took baths, grew out his flight feathers and flew around, probably for the first time ever. He enjoyed eating millet and fresh fruits and vegetables on a regular basis and even looked healthier than when he first entered our home. He met Cooper.

I hope we made him happy and I wish we had found him sooner. As sad as it is to lose Gordie, I feel more inspired to find another budgie that needs a good home. Good bye Little Man, thank you for making our lives better, you will be missed.

We Miss You!

The flock really misses Michelle. She went to AZ to visit family and had a freak accident while ice skating, breaking her leg in multiple spots just above the ankle. The budgies were hoping to see her tonight, but she’ll be out for another couple days. Here’s a video of the main flock because I know she would love to see them.

Oops

Michelle is gone for the weekend and I was left in charge. I forgot what I needed to do for a post and took a picture of Cooper and Sunny.Oops1After talking to Michelle, I remembered (after being told) that I was supposed to take a photo of the new bird. Yay!Oops2I didn’t like how that turned out, so I took the top off the cage and… spooked her with my camera. Eeks! She flew away and crawled under the couch. After much coaxing, I managed to get her here.Oops3Welcome to the flock, Nuni! (That’s not her name, I just like to call her that).

Budgie Dreams 10

budgiedream10Maybe when Sunny sleeps, she is dreaming about Dewey’s return. I miss him, too. This is what I remember about him.

We brought Dewey home because he had such bright colors and was a beautiful bird. After getting him home, we saw he had been sick and worried that we would have to return him. Instead, we cleaned him and watched him carefully. After going through quarantine, we introduced Dewey to Cooper. He immediately took to her, but she was somewhat indifferent to him. It wasn’t long before Ozzie came along and he and Dewey became good buddies.

Everything changed with the addition of Sunny. From the beginning, it was obvious that Dewey and Sunny were in love. Since they met, the two of them have never separated, until the very end. When Dewey got up in the morning, the first thing he did was go to Sunny’s side and start chatting her up. The two would always groom each other and when they did, it was obvious they were enjoying themselves.

I’d never really thought about birds having much personality, but Dewey changed that. If he wasn’t the leader of the flock, he was definitely the point man or the instigator. All the boys wanted to be Dewey and the girls wanted to be with him. He was the fruit ninja. Dewey played air hockey. He was my hockey team’s mascot. Whenever we opened the cage, he was usually the first one out and the flock would not follow unless Dewey was flying around.

How Dewey loved to fly. All the birds are fully flighted, but Dewey just seemed to get an extra kick out of flying. When he was on your finger, he was always looking to where he would fly next. The other birds climb down the cage to get back in. Not Dewey, he would jump off the top, turning in mid-air to swoop back in even though it was a few inches away. I liked to call that maneuver the “Dewey Drop”.

The flock has definitely gotten quieter since Dewey passed. You will be missed Little Man.