How Kiwi Changed Our Lives

Our cinnamon pearl cockatiel "Kiwi" moved into our house 19 days ago.  Within 24 hours I and my 'nightowl' husband began living on bird time. Cockatiels need at least 2-3 hours with their 'flock', which means my husband and I. (I suspect he actually gets about 7-8 hours with us.) However, cockatiels also need 10-12 hours of sleep each night. Because Kiwi won't even be 5 months old for another 10 days, I keep his cage covered for almost 12 hours. Covering the cage prevents 'night frights' (usually caused by seeing shadows, lights or hearing strange noises during the night).  A thick blanket over his cage keeps the cage temperature moderate, even when night temperatures drop.  We also installed thermal blinds in Kiwi's room to moderate the temperature.  Kiwi rapidly adjusted to his 'schedule' of sleep time, out of cage time with us, meals with us, in cage quiet time or feeding time and sleep time. 30 minutes before I cover his cage and turn off lights for the night, I turn on a low light and put on a relaxing harp CD.  Sometimes he goes to his feeder for one last snack before I cover his cage. More often he settles into his highest night perch in anticipation of total darkness and sleep.  Of course, keeping him on a regular schedule led me to  go to bed and get up earlier.


Because cockatiels need fresh fruits and vegetables, but must avoid excess salt, fats and sugar, our diets have slowly improved. We bring Kiwi downstairs to share our breakfast and lunch. So we avoid any foods he can't eat (like leftover chocolate Valentine's cookies) at those meals.  He loves to eat many fruits, vegies and grains (gluten free breads, muffins or cereals), which we eat.  He gets about 70% of his diet from specially formulated pellets for cockatiels, which he eats in his cage. However, we try to supplement the pellets with cockatiel safe fruits and vegies, grains, and occasional nuts and seeds (I use millet for training).




Previously I never seemed to find enough time for sewing in my studio. After my studio became Kiwi's room, I finished at least one sewing project daily, because Kiwi needs lots of time with his 'parents'.  Having a bird on my shoulder/arm/sewing machine makes some alteration projects quite challenging. Nevertheless I now seem to accomplish more than ever.. 


Most of all Kiwi has trained us to be loving bird parents very quickly. My husband is the chief neck scratcher/feather preener.  So Kiwi loves to spend quiet time getting his neck preened or just preening his own feathers sitting on my husband, while he reads the paper.



I am responsible for maintaining fresh water and food in the cage (including clipping fresh stalks of brocolli and other vegies to the cage), giving Kiwi regularly 'misting' for feather health and decreasd dander shedding, bringing him down for meals, encouraging him to play with new toys, and training him to fly to me on command. (I forgot to mention that I also replace cage floor paper daily, clean cage parts weekly and the entire cage monthly.) I'm so pleased that Kiwi will fly across the room on command and land on my shoulder now, even without millet reward. That targeted landing training has almost eliminated crash landings after startled flights. Often I can coax Kiwi to land on me after he begins a startled flight.  Sometimes, he just flies to me without command. Maybe he began to see me as a safe place, when he's startled. However, Kiwi loves to just be whereever I am, pecking at keys on my laptop, pulling thread while I sew (or hiding in the garment cloth), and of course eating breakfast and lunch with me.  So I suspect I'm 'big bird' or prime parent, while my husband runs a close second place parent with his neck scratching/preening. 


I never imagined that Kiwi would change our lives so much, but I'm so glad he did. A friend recently said that she wouldn't want the responsibility of a pet to 'tie her down' so she couldn't travel.  We have the option of boarding Kiwi with the pet shop owner, whenever we travel.  However, I've travelled so much in my life. I had lived in 26 different places by the time I was 26 years old. I've been across the country several times, toured Europe when I lived in Germany for 18 months and returned to Maui to celerate our wedding anniversary 7-8 times (I've lost count).  We may return to Maui to celebrate our 20th anniversary, if I can bear to leave Kiwi for 2 weeks. Yet I would be just as content to stay home with Kiwi and live on 'bird time'.