June - Parrotcare

Comment taken from comments section

Website: Parrotcare

I have read though the UKPR watch blog and even commented twice, As a parrot rescue of many years standing I feel that the UKPR will be held up as "what not to do" in running a rescue organisation be it birds,cats dogs etc.

While the UKPR may have started out with the idea to rescue birds it soon became clear that the people who founded it did not have the people skills or the amount of knowledge needed to ensure the smooth running of a rescue,

People skills are very important as it is the members and general public that are needed to make a rescue work, banning members right left and centre instead of answering their misgivings will soon paint a picture of "having something to hide" whether true or not, it will make other members weary of voicing their own misgivings, taking and removing birds from homes that were meant to have been completely home checked before fostering birds to them, points to shoddy home checking or to a "do as I say or lose your birds attitude",

It is always better to take a long time getting the right home for the bird and fosterer rather than feel later that you have made a mistake.

Taking a bird from the home it has been placed in and moving it to another will cause the bird untold stress and if it has an under lying health problem (although it should ALWAYS to vet checked before going to a foster home and NO ill bird should be placed without veterinary care first) to surface and can even mean the death of the bird.

If at any time it is felt that the foster might be having problems then working with the foster to help improve the situation is always the first step to take.

Not only may they be glad of your help but you will go along way down the road to being a more caring "rescue" for both birds and people.

The most important part of a parrot rescue is understanding and knowledge of birds and this understanding and knowledge MUST lie with the people running the rescue, the people who will make the finale dissuasion on the birds welfare.

Sadly this knowledge was shown to be lacking in the Milo and JJ case, No one who understands parrots (especially Macaws) would separate a pair even for a day let alone the intended week.

First if the two birds were fighting then it is the carers job to find out why,

If it is down to stress then the stress MUST be removed (stress can kill birds) moving birds that are showing signs of stress is wrong and the two birds should have been settled back into their cage/cages the injuries seen too, given a good feed and sorted out before any move was planned,

This would give the carer (who had looked after the birds for 6 months) and thereby should know them well the time to plan their future travel arrangements better and would allow the birds to get over the stress/problems they were experiencing.

If someone takes on the job of moving birds then it is their job to know enough about birds to recognise any problems that might arise with the birds travelling and to ensure that they travel in the safest way (in this case that would mean each bird having a crate of its own with feed and water pots.)

If the new foster/carer is told there is a cage/cages coming with the birds then this MUST happen, other wise the birds could reach their new home and have no where in which to live, and everyone must agree that this would be unforgivable.

At the end of the day all the birds from a budgie to a macaw must receive the very best of care at all times.

The owner of Milo and JJ requested that these two birds stay together, they had spend years together and whether bonded or paired these birds were living together, it really doesn't matter about the arguments surrounding these birds, the birds do not know or care about them, While Milo seems to have settled into home life away from JJ happily it could be that JJ has not and this could have a long term affect on JJ.

So maybe it is time to really think about theses birds future and to bring them together so that they may get on with being a happy PAIR of birds.

How this can be done I do not know but the fact is it must be done and done as quickly as possible.

Further reading: They call themselves a “rescue”

Further reading: Why the change of Heart...