My beautiful Blue & Gold Macaw companion of 29 years, Feather LaFeet, passed away of cancer in 2009. I’m not sure but I think it started in 2005 when she laid a sponge-like misshaped egg. I took her to the vet and he said if it happens again we might want to remove the female organs. She never laid another egg. I didn’t think anything of it until she got an open sore at the base of her tail. I took her to the vet immediately but the x-ray showed a huge mass in her abdomen. The Dr. said it was cancer and I might get another 3 months with her. I didn’t want her to suffer any longer. I had to make that heartbreaking difficult decision to let her go. He said he probably would have been able to do something about it if “I Only” I brought her in for yearly check-ups. In hind sight I wish I had had her female organs removed in 2005. She would probably be with me today. I still don’t have the heart to get another parrot.

Seven years ago this month (June 1st, 12 noon on the dot), I lost my beloved blue-headed Pionus, Ares. He was newly and fully flighted, a very strong flier, and I hadn’t clipped his wings. I like my birds to be fully flighted before I trim three or four of their primaries, to hinder their ability to gain altitude but still allow them to get air so they don’t just drop and break a bone. Ares had also just turned one year old earlier that year, so I suppose you could say he was fully fledged. Well, seven years ago at 12 noon on June 1st, I took him outside with me to get the mail. He was perched on my left hand and I had my thumb firmly over his feet on my finger. A large bird, probably a crow, flew directly overhead and its shadow passed over us. Ares spooked and yanked free of my grip and flew toward the backyard. I thought he would land in the grass and call for me so I didn’t immediately chase after him. But he made a right turn and kept going. Then I chased after him, calling him to come back. I chased him through my neighbor’s backyard, he made another right turn and I chased him through the neighbor’s side yard, then across the street, and he vanished over another neighbor’s house. I searched for an entire year for him, putting flyers in grocery stores and vet offices and dentist offices and doctor’s offices and even in home improvement/garden stores. In July the year after Ares vanished, I got a phone call from a woman living nearby asking if I’d found my bird yet. I said “no, have you?” and she said “no, but I’ve got a proposition for you.” That weekend, I met her Jenday conure Tipsy, and two weeks later I brought him home with me. She could no longer care for him properly and her daughter’s boyfriend/fiancee was an abusive f—k toward him, so she was happy to give him to me. A few weeks later, during Tipsy’s quarantine period, she came over to visit him and see his new home. She met my cockatiel Matisse, whom Tipsy was already fond of because he lived with a disabled little female Lutino cockatiel before he came home with me. She was teary-eyed but happy, and Tipsy and Matisse are happy and healthy. Matisse is happy to have another bird to socialize with, and Tipsy is too. Still, for seven years I have never forgiven myself for taking Ares outside, even though doing so brought Tipsy into my life. I was adamant that I would never get another bird and would just spoil Matisse, but when I met Tipsy , that all changed. I still hold out hope that one day Ares will come back to me, but he probably died within the first week of his escape flight. Tipsy has mostly healed the vacuum that Ares left in my heart, but it will always be there. And I don’t think I’ll ever come to forgive myself for being such a f—king idiot.