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THE PHOENIX BEAKIN'      
January 2019
UPCOMING  
JANUARY  EVENTS
January 13th
Jacksonville, FL
A Parrot's Point of View
January 19th
Fairfax, VA
Things I Wish I'd Known
January 19th
Alexander, NC
No Place Like Home
More info about
times and places at
Almost 2,900 birds have now come to Phoenix Landing for adoption, thanks to the continued amazing efforts of our volunteers, teachers, fosters, and adopting families. In 2018, while we took almost 100 new birds into our system, we also had to re-home almost 50 birds that were already in our program. This exemplifies our commitment to ensure that all Phoenix Landing birds will have access to a succession of good homes. For some species, that can mean quite a few changes across several decades, but birds are very resilient and adaptable! We are enormously grateful to everyone for supporting adoption and quality-of-life for birds!
We receive many inquiries about how to handle birds that bite. This is a good time to remind everyone that birds are not naturally mean or aggressive unless they are protecting a mate or nest. They bite to protect themselves or because we have reinforced that behavior. Make a new year's pledge to avoid teaching your birds to bite! For a refresher, read Jenny Drummey's blog post about biting solutions here.
2019 Membership Program
Join any time, benefits are good for one year thereafter. All member ships include a 2019 calendar and tax deductible donation.  Higher levels include shopping discounts.  

Your support helps the many parrots of Phoenix Landing. Click here to join; or here to buy only the calendar.
2019 "Step-Up" Workshop Dates
Donna is syringe training Titus
Sometimes we think that a bird must learn to step onto our hands, but this may actually be the last thing we teach, as it requires the ultimate level of trust. However, there are many ways to have a positive relationship, and touching is not always the best or only approach.  That's why our "Step-Up" workshops, which actually stands for " S kills T o E mpower P eople to U nderstand P arrots" can be very helpful.  
2019 workshop dates are: June 28-30 and August 23-25. This intensive 3-day event is designed to give people an abundance of information about parrot care,  from behavior and health, to nutrition and enrichment. In addition to lectures, there will be hands-on  training sessions, cooking classes, and time to discuss issues of specific importance to you. We will work with  the adoptable birds at the Phoenix Landing facility, so you can teach behavior, foraging and feeding new foods first-hand. All of us can learn new things to improve our relationships with our parrots. Anyone with parakeets to macaws will benefit!  More information at:  phoenixlanding.org/stepup-workshops
Some of Our Many Adoptable Birds
Almost every bird will need more than one home. Sometimes it is because people have not taken time to understand how to live successfully with a parrot; but most often it is simply because our lives change. It's no ones fault, it's just what needs to happen. So it is really important that we promote adoption as a positive way to find a bird companion.  To l earn more about our process go to  phoenixlanding.org/adoption.

We also encourage everyone to never stop learning about how to provide a positive, healthy life for the birds in their care. Please join us often in 2019, as we continue to host many learning events.  Happy New Year to everyone, and thanks for helping parrots!  
DAISY and PETEY are still looking for their next homes. They are wild caught Moluccan cockatoos, so they deserve special attention and appreciation! These birds came to us on an urgent personal request from the late Dr. Zantop back in 2006, they were his clients for many years. Apparently the husband had died, and his wife couldn't care for them. They were originally named Tikki I and Tikki II. They were then adopted through Phoenix Landing and renamed Petey and Daisy. Now it's time for their next Phoenix Landing home.

Daisy is at least 34 years old, and Petey is at least 38. Petey was blind in one eye when he came to us, the relinquisher said he lost his eye because of a "mechanical injury at purchase" -whatever that means!  He already had a naked chest when he came to us. 

Daisy and Petey are still in a Maryland foster home. Daisy was vitamin A deficient, so her diet still has a strrong focus on those orange and green foods like papaya, mango, carrots, sweet potatoes, and greens. Petey likes wood block type toys, and Daisy likes more shreddable toys. 
LOVEBIRDS Sometime we can help shelters, as they are seeing more and more birds. These are 10 blue Fischer lovebirds that just came to us. Knowing how quickly they can reproduce if not managed properly, it's very possible they are all from the same family! It will be good to get them sorted out to smaller groups and separated by gender, but this group sure does make an adorable gathering!
PARAKEETS  We almost always have parakeets available for adoption, they are often relinquished to shelters and we try to help when possible. Look at this gorgeous little boy who just joined the Phoenix Landing family. We can usually tell what gender parakeets are by their ceres - the waxy, fleshy covering at the base of the upper beak. Male parakeets have a purple, bluish cere, while females have a pink or brownish cere. We recommend separating males and females. Don't forget, little birds need big cages too!  We recommend a minimum of 24" wide for parakeets or lovebirds, but 32" or larger can be found with the proper bar spacing, and is even better!
RAIN and BOW  Perhaps you remember the 36 cockatiels that came  earlier this year from a Pennsylvania shelter (and a hoarding situation). Most have been adopted, but here are two still in foster. They are a bonded pair of males, and their foster mom has done a fantastic job of bringing them back to health (one had a severe respiratory infection) and onto a better diet. They are not hand tame, but after only 6 months in foster care they are learning to trust. Both birds know how to step-up onto a stick and Rain is learning to step-up onto a finger. They sing one tune and one tune only, so get ready for every birdie in your house to repeat it!
Our Wish List
Become a 2019 Member, chlorhexidine for cleaning at The Landing ( click here); small radio for the adoption center; coconut oil;  flax seed; wire travel carriers; Kamut and quinoa. And we really appreciate your support by shopping with us at  helpingparrots.com  or using our Amazon affiliate button ( click here or on our home page to find it).
Recent Articles of Interest
Griffin training in Dr. Pepperberg's Lab
* Parrots are clever because their brains developed the same way as ours:  click here
* And this brain development may also explain their longevity:  click here and here and here
* 20 amazing facts about feathers:  click here
* Inside Irene Pepperberg's lab, putting the inferential knowledge to test:  click here
* Endangered parrots forced into unnatural sexual behavior:  click here
* 68 year old albatross lays an egg:  click here
* Cockatoo survives serious storm in Austrailia, good news story:  click here
* Beak and feather disease more widely spread in Asia and Africa than expected: click here
* Another sighting of the mysterious Australian Night Parrot:  click here
Parrot fever (Chlamydia) in 1930:  click here
* 'A legitimate zoo?' How an obscure German group cornered global trade in endangered parrots:  click here
Adorable video of a blue front Amazon trying to sing along with Mariah Carey at the Vancouver Aquarium:  click here