Last Updated on February 24, 2024 by Mitch Rezman

Lady and the Tramp (1955) Lady doesn’t know the real names of her owners, she calls them Darling and Jim Dear. This is because she only knows them by what they call each other. Darling is what Jim calls his wife and his wife calls him Jim dear.

Windy City Parrot (2024) Keto doesn’t know the names of his owners, he calls them Cat and Hon. This is because he only knows them by what they call each other. Cat is what Mitch calls his wife and his wife calls him Hon.

Am I right? We’ll never know.

We know they articulate with or without comprehension.

Who am I say, to the budgies?

In all the years, 8 I think we’ve had a budgie aviary we humans are “tolerated,” you know the food, treats, and, fresh water twice a day thing.

What are their expectations?

In this video, the narrator explains how budgie “scouting parties” follow kangaroos who find grazing areas.

The grazing parties return to the flock sharing information so everyone eats.

It’s a team effort.

When our budgies were in the first-floor showroom, they were never let out.

Large entry doors and lots of places to get lost kept them fully caged.

Upstairs is a different story, one large open space, with fewer places to get lost.

When I first opened the aviary door in the morning to serve them their 2 dishes of chopped veggie mix with a kale base, all the budgies would freeze momentarily.

(We pull all the fresh veggie and water dishes at 4 or 5 pm before everything loses freshness).

I finally came to the conclusion they feared losing access to the food if they left the cage.

They are smart little birds and quickly figured out the food would be there for hours.

They were also immediately drawn to the 3 North-facing awning windows.

What makes an awning window unique from a typical double hung is that the screen is on the inside.

Because the windows are higher in the room the view is primarily sky, a bird’s favorite place to be.

When morphing from budgies to beavers they can and will get themselves in trouble.

Note the first patch on the screen – lower right.

They became full-time prisoners once again until we could secure the windows.

Here you’re looking at a $125 piece of stainless chicken wire bolted over all 3 windows.

Even wearing work gloves I looked like
I tried to bathe a cat with all the scratch marks from working with this sheet of wire.

A problem is that most regular chicken wire is galvanized using zinc. Thus when your bird is climbing with its beak, it is literally licking zinc along the way – you’ve been warned.

My office is on the second floor, my shop is in the basement. 

If I’m upstairs I keep the budgie’s aviary door open (Barney the ‘tiel gets let out first thing when the birdcage covers come off).

But if I’m gone for more than a few minutes I close the door.

Jam one of our original remaining adult females can get out but she’s a terrible flyer, crashing into a wall or hat.

(We actually have a hat wall)

Lucky, whom we tried to socialize in a separate cage, but lost a toe trying to befriend Barney, has gotten better at flight but we prefer the safety of a closed cage when we’re not around.

I’ve digressed again, haven’t I?

In the post below I create a nutrition label with the actual nutritional value bird chop has – many of you will be disappointed when you realize you are starving your bird if you only feed it chop – another warning.

Barney, our rescued (all our birds are rescues) grey cockatiel bows his head indicating he needs scritches.

The back of the neck is his sweet spot and he will guide my finger gently and not so gently which is when I withdraw.

He perches on the headrest of my giant office chair. and has learned he can be annoying by tapping my head like he’s doing an impression of a woodpecker which startled me the first time.

If I’m wearing a Fedora he will tap tap tap, the hat, I’ll stand up, scritch (or try to), sit back down – rinse – repeat.

During a typical Monday through Friday, depending on how whiny Keto (our ringneck) gets after their lights come on, he and Chili (Our blue Quaker) are brought down to the office to assist Mom in her daily customer service capacity.

I sleep half a dozen feet from all the birdcages, the end of my bed is pictured above.

I have a video of their return trip upstairs (below) but I still have to make one for the “down the stairs” trip.

The other day Catherine and I needed to make an all-day road trip returning at close to 7:00 PM, 3 hours later than their normal commute up the stairs home.

We talk about a bird’s ability to know what time it is as accurately as a Rollex.

We knew, driving home that Keto and Chili would be pissed and confused being forced to stay in their work birdcages hours past their normal commute home, and upon our arrival, our concerns were confirmed.

We didn’t even think about unpacking the car until all the birds were settled in for “birdie bedtime” and appropriate nighttime treats dispensed.

Chili is always calculating – what can I build or hide next? 

He’s easy to read. 

He ties his knots and moves his hooks around spending the day tap tap tapping the “S” hooks on his cage bars making 2 people with tinnitus a tad more annoyed with additional sounds in the room.

We’ll finish up here and I’ll leave you with a really chatty budgie video – Unfortunately, Disco has crossed over the rainbow bridge.

Written by Mitch Rezman
Approved by Catherine Tobsing