A couple of
days ago, a very small bird got trapped in our lanai when the door was still
open. I'm not good at bird recognition), the Florida birds I'm most familiar
with are the larger shore birds. We live next door to a wildlife preserve, 487
acres of inland waterways, walking and biking trails, native plants, small
animals and birds which often make their way next door to our area.
I never tire
of watching them.
Birds have
been in our life and even in our house since our middle daughter was in grade
school and we were living in California. She fell in love with the smaller
tropical birds that you see in pet shops. The first bird was a cockatiel that
was hand raised and very tame. I don't know who was more frightened, the bird
or the repairman.
Our daughter
had two parakeets in a cage in her room. Obediently I picked up the cage with
the two birds and headed for the car. I waited a few minutes, then decided I'd
better take the remaining bird to school where our daughter was waiting, At school, I
handed her the cage, mumbling something about Marco's absence. I retrieved the
extra birdcage from the house and loaded it with bird seed. Then, cage in hand,
I started to climb the tree. I balanced the cage on a branch above me, door
open and hoped the seed looked good to a hungry bird.
Marco cocked his head,
looked at the bird seed and looked at me. Marco moved again, his eyes on the
cage. Then - bang- he was in and I secured the cage door. Unfortunately, this
wasn't the last bird escapade. I tied a fishing line to the cage door and left
the cage in front of the tree. It didn't take long before the first finch
hopped over to the door, enticed (I hoped) by the bird seed within. I
hand-carried the parakeet and cockatiel in a small cage.
Even familiar
birds such as canaries as actually a type of finch and common aviculture birds
such as Zebra finches belong to another finch family. The first
step is picking the right cage for you finch and here are some tips.
Finch size
As a rule,
however, finches are always smaller than parrot family birds such as the Budgie
and the Cockatiel. The
difference in feet is that parrots have two toes facing forwards and two facing
back whereas finches have three facing forward and one backwards.
Cage sizes
The strength
of the bars isn't so much of an issue with finches - whereas parrots can chew
through weak bars, finches won't.
Whatever type
of cage you are going to get for your finch, the best recommendation is to get
the very biggest cage you can. Some clubs recommend, for example, a pair of
zebra finches be housed in nothing smaller than 16x12x16 inch cage with at
least two perches.
Cage features
There are
some very elaborate cages available for finches but remember, these features
mean little to the birds.
1.) Patterns
of the brain waves during different phases of sleep
2.) Eye
movement
3.) Muscle
activity
1) SWS -
Shown in test as slow high voltage brain waves.
2) PS - (Paradoxical Sleep) in
test show low voltage brain waves similar to those of being awake. In humans,
dreaming happens during the Paradoxical Sleep stage. An interesting sleep stage
was also recognized in the parrots which is referenced as Unihemispheric
slow-wave sleep (USWS).Which is the ability to sleep with one half of the brain
while the other half remains alert. This form of sleep is also a form of
protection while one part of the brain sleeps the other part is alert for
predator detection.
In the wild,
Parrots normally sleep in groups known as flocks. Parrots are much like people
when it comes to sleep. Without the proper amount of sleep parrots can be
irritable. How much sleep does a Parrot need?
Keeping in
mind of your Parrots need for sleep will help you and your Parrot have a more
fulfilling companionship.