Okay. What we need here are bird toys. Lots and lots of bird toys. I don’t mean a bell on a stick either. I’m thinking something more along the lines of say, a LeapPad, only with modifications made for beaks and talons.

Parrots are intelligent. I read that. I read all about it, numerous times. Not to toot my own horn, but I read fast, and I read a lot and I’ve been doing research for six months, so I should be totally “down with” the concept of parrot intelligence. I’ve even had first hand parrot experience, at the home of my former mother-in-law. However, that bird, smart as it was, tended to be withdrawn in the presence of unfamiliar people.

Kendi is NOT withdrawn. She isn’t timid (we decided she looks more like a female than a male based on all the visual clues we can gather) she isn’t nervous, she isn’t shy. She is lively, interested, curious, and ready to go. She’s a lean, green, learning machine, up for her next adventure. I was totally prepared for the opposite behavior, having dog eared stacks and stacks of articles about what to do if your parrot is shy, if she won’t come out of the cage, if she gets scared….forget it. Waste of newsprint, at least in her particular case.

There's a big difference between knowing something and understanding it!

She’s not lacking charm either. “That thing is really going to learn to talk?” The Hub asked, skeptically, as we were on the way home.

“Not any time soon, but eventually. She’ll probably just want to hang out in her cage for the first two days. She may not want to be handled by us at first, till things get more familiar for her”

By the time I got home last night, I found that she had been out of her cage for most of the evening, gotten the hang of her training perch, attempted to perch on Winston’s nose (well, he stuck it up against her chest to sniff her…..The Hub said Winston took off at first talon contact and he left her alone for the rest of the night.) and was supervising The Hub’s laundry folding technique from the top of his head.

“Um. That’s probably okay for right now, but we need to discourage that. That’s waaay too much of a dominant position for her to be in.”

“Oh. Thank goodness. Those talons are kinda tough on the scalp.” Said The Hub, reaching up and removing the bird. “We’ve had a great time! This is one cool bird. She makes all kinds of interesting little noises. She’s been nibbling my ear, and we watched a World War II video together.”

“Fabulous. I’ve been replaced.”

And there she was, looking up at me with avid curiosity from her preppy pink and green training perch. She doesn’t have to talk. Her expression said it all: “What do we do next?”

As a “juvenile parrot” she’s at the age where, in the wild, she’d be learning what to do from her flock mates. As a companion bird, we’re her flock mates. She’s going to try to learn from us. And she learns FAST.

Last night, I made myself a cup of tea and a piece of toast. I handed her a little bit of the crust to see if she would like to eat it – it’s safe for them in small amounts. She sat on her perch (which sits on the table) contentedly eating the crust, watching as I put sugar and lemon into my tea and sipped it.

Shortly afterward, we all got ready for bed. Birds don’t see it as a cage, they see it as a home I repeated mentally to myself over and over again, as The Hub snapped yet another round of “baby’s first day photos” (“What the hell am I doing? I’ve turned into somebody’s parent!” he kept saying. But he kept doing it). “Good-night Kendi” and we popped the cage cover on.

This morning, she was back out, onto the training perch, but ready to get off of it. She prefers to “snuggle” – that is, to sit on someone’s shoulder and nuzzle our ears and necks, but too much of that can lead to “over bonding” problems, so we’re trying to encourage independence. It doesn’t take that much encouragement. “Would you like a piece of grapefruit?” I asked, offering her a small piece. She tried some, but let it drop back into the dish on the side of her perch.

“Too sour, I guess” The Hub remarked.

“Hmm. Maybe so.” I said, fussing with my own grapefruit slices, and sorting the newspaper, while Kendi managed to hop down off of the perch and tried to understand the properties of glass (i.e. why could she see the butter through the butter dish, but not taste it?) I got a fork and returned Kendi to her perch – loose parrot on the breakfast table is not exactly supposed to be encouraged either. As soon as she saw me start to eat the grapefruit, she immediately ran over to her dish and got hers out, nibbling at it delicately. It was eerie, the way she was looking at me. I could almost hear her thinking “Am I doing this right? How come I don’t have one of those pronged things to eat mine with?”

Then, I caved and set her back on my shoulder while I made myself some tea and toast. As I raised the toast to take a bite – you guessed it! She stretched forward going right for the crust she’d enjoyed so much the night before.

“Kendi!” Ooops. You’re not supposed to show any reaction at all to an unwanted behavior, such as stealing food, but I was so surprised! You’re supposed to just pick the bird up and give it a short “time out” – no longer than ten minutes. That’s the best way for a bird to learn “behavior X” = “no fun”. She hasn’t even been home 24 hours and we’re already on her first time out?!? I only set the timer for five minutes though.

Still, no sooner did she get out then she did her darndest to get a sip of my tea. I put her firmly back on her perch. “Kendi, tea is not for birds. Caffeine is bad for parrots. Here. Why don’t you try out your swing?” (distraction technique –same as for a two year old.)

Okay. That worked for about two minutes. She ruled out escape via means of the drapes, opting for simply jumping three feet down to the floor. I leapt up. Was she hurt? Had she broken a wing? How could I have been such an irresponsible parent?!

As I came around the side of the table, I saw her give self satisfied tail wag – the unmistakable body language of a happy bird. I extended my hand, and she hopped up readily, looking longingly back at the swing, as if to say “That was fun! Can I do that again?” She was completely unhurt.

By the time I left, The Hub had put in Finding Nemo on the DVD player for her. I hope my house is still standing by the time I get home!