Lazy Weekend Bonding

Barney has been doing very well so far. I have not seen him drink from his water bowl yet (I will monitor this), but I have seen him pick through his food bowl. And, just as I hoped, Barney seems to be more bonded with me than with my husband. My husband has stated that when he goes to visit with Barney, Barney would look past him in hopes to see me right behind him. ;-) What a cutie.

On Sunday, we started the day with a quick shower. I gave Barney a shower by letting the water from the showerhead hit my hand and spray him just a bit. He wasn't so sure if he liked it or not. I may try a spray bottle next time.

It was a really beautiful day outside, so after the shower, we sat together on the patio to dry off and warm up in the sun. Barney just sat on my shoulder and mumbled words I couldn't understand and hummed a musical note which I thought was so cute...he did it with a falsetto too. When it started getting a bit too hot, we went inside and I let Barney "play by himself" in his room. Usually I don't think he plays, but instead just sits on his opened cage door and watches the neighbors through his window.

His window is usually left open, which has a screen protecting him from the outside world. He can watch cars and people past buy. (Our house is 15 feet from the curb, so no one really gets close to the windows without us knowing it). On Saturday, an owner with his dog passed by and Barney started to imitate a bark!

I also spent some time with him in his room - either doing my own thing while he sat on his cage, him sitting on my shoulder or us interacting directly with eachother. One time, while Barney was sitting on his cage door, he started to slowly scratch his head with his own foot. I decided to "join in" and I slowly raised my hand to scratch the other side of his head. Happily, he allowed me without missing a beat from his own foot-head-scratch. So, there we were, him scratching his head on one side with his foot, and me scratching his head on the other side. Too cute! Too bad I didn't get that on camera.

Oh, if you are waiting for that video I talked about the other day, I'm sorry. I'm having problems loading that video to YouTube. I am trying again today and it should be going up soon. (keeping fingers crossed!)...yay, now it's up!

Barney does allow me to touch him pretty much anywhere. With scratching around his head, he needs to be in the mood for it, but is usually kind in letting me know by just moving his head away.

He was very captivated with my laptop. Especially after I played the video I made of him doing the wolf whistle. It looked like he was trying to find the mysterious bird that lived inside my laptop.

We have supplied Barney a radio to listen to when we are not at home. I hope he is okay with that. He steps up wonderfully for my husband and myself without any coaxing..he really wants to be with his flock!

Since he is doing so well with adapting to his new home, I am thinking about taking him to an avian vet possibly next week instead of waiting 2 weeks. His possible high stress levels is what I was worried about and wanted to wait 2 weeks so that he can get more comfortable, but wow...Barney is such a great bird! I don't think he really stresses about anything. Oh, there was one thing he got scared of...when I moved the spray bottle, we use to clean his cage, too close to him, he did freak out a bit. but other than that, no problems.