One day I went to a new pet store just to see if there was any cool new animals there. I saw these two sun conrues and over time with those birds made me want a bird. The only problem with this was I didn’t have the money for one of those birds let alone both. So I went home and told my mom that i wanted a bird. She didn’t take me seriously at first but since my best friend, Jess, is really into birds it made all of us feel more comfortable with the idea of getting one. I’ve tried to get money from my relatives but no one helped me get this sun conure that I got along with so well. Well we pretty much knew that this bird was out of reach so I had to start small and move up, but I didn’t want to. So one day I was in my room and my friend Jess came over and my mom wouldn’t let her come upstairs until she talked to her. I got mad because they wouldn’t tell me what they were talking about.
So a couple of weeks later I was in my mom’s room and she said that my aunt had something she wanted to give me but she didn’t know if she should tell me because she wanted me to be surprised. Well, my mom can’t keep a secret… so she told me. What they had for me was a baby lovebird that a private breeder had. At first I didn’t like the idea of it because I still really wanted the sun conure. I still tried to get the conure all the time but it never worked.
Another thing that didn’t work was the baby lovebird. He/She died before I could even see him/her. Well a couple weeks after my mom tells me that the man who had the baby has to give away his pair of lovebirds because his house is going under construction and he can’t keep them. He decided to give them to my aunt and uncle.
I wasn’t supposed to know about this… so my grandma took Jess and I to my aunt’s house. They causally took out the cage while I was in another room and I saw them. I saw them and thought well they aren’t that bad. I went to put my finger by the cage bars and the female bit me.
I had told my mom the might before that if I were to get one I would want one with a grey head white chest and blue body. Well in the cage was one that had a green body and a pink face and orange crown(that was the boy) and the other one had a grey head and white chest and a blue body (that was the girl).
After I saw them Jess and I thought we should breed them. So we took them to my house and saw how well they got together as mates. We both noticed that her rump was fat and swollen and jess thought it might be an egg. Two days later she laid her egg. She was really cute because she’d always chew strips of newspaper and shove them into the nest box hole. When she and her mate would go in there all you could hear was chirping back and forth. They’d chase each other and play and were really good friends. That was the day we started letting them come out of the cage. The male would come out and peck at the female from the inside but she only came out once when I was eating pizza. She flew to the floor and looked around for a minute and then ran toward me like a duck, climbed on my leg and snatched a piece of the pizza away from me. The male flew over too… always staying by her side. We were able to pick them up and touch them. They weren’t as mean as their previous
owner made them out to be.
Once again I noticed that her rump was swollen and red. Probably another egg. She’d cut more and more paper making her nest even more and more padded and cozier. Jess had also offered her a pretzel that she stole and shoved in her nest box… and kept it there next to the egg. Jess and I go to different schools and I leave the birds alone at home during the day.
They were fine the first day I went to school but tomorrow would be the exception. That day I got up in the morning and I said goodbye to the birds and left for school. During the school day I didn’t feel good at all and I wanted to go home but I decided to stick it out.
I went on many websites getting information on lovebirds and breeding them and sent them to Jess so we can learn as much as we can before we start raising them. The school day flew by and it was time for me to come home. I got home all excited to see if she had dropped the egg that seemed to be inside of her and my mom called me from my room and she sounded like she was crying.
I ran upstairs into my room to see that the cage was all over the floor and the male was stuck between the poop-catcher and the bottom of the cage crying for help. I look at my mom and ask her where the female was and if she was dead. My mom just shook her head and said go look downstairs by the blue chair. I was screaming at my cats, not knowing which one had done it.
My mom had told me that she was trying to get a hold of Jess before I got home but she didn’t know her number. Jess called and she told Jess that there had been a crisis and then I got on the phone and told her that one of the cats got the girl and she’s dead.
Jess hurried over and came to see the bird. She picked her up and started crying. Jess and I just sat on the couch while Jess pet her and cried. Jess flipped her over and there were two large teeth marks in its back. They seemed to go really deep. It probably didn’t hurt her. Just the chase was probably the worst part of it all.
After that we went upstairs and Jess put the male back in the cage and she had to leave for work soon. We still didn’t know what cat did it… We couldn’t leave the male alone.
Later that night I went into the bathroom to get ready to leave to go to my grandmas and my sister told me she knew who did it. I walked downstairs and my cat, Cinnamon, had blue feathers hanging out of her mouth… all over her face, on her paws. I knelt down, screamed at her and asked her ‘why’? At my grandmas I got a box for her and decorated it with hearts and then I decided on a name, Jane. And the male’s name would be Tarzan.
I went to Jess’s work and told her about the cat and the new names and Jess said shed stop by after work to bury her. It was funny because the night before this happened I had this feeling that I absolutely needed a camera to take pictures of these birds.
Jess came over later that night and buried her by the deck. It was very sad for both of us. We placed a rock over the grave as a temporary marker so we wouldn’t lose track of where she was. Things were sad after that, I felt like crap and I cried non-stop. It wasn’t the same seeing him without her. He was so lonely. He’d just sit in the corner of his cage on a toy and stare at the wall. The one egg that was in the nest box he ate. It had no chance of survival.
Turns out that Jane had an egg in her too. A big one … that was just about to come out. Half her body size was that egg when she was dead. She looked peaceful though. As of today Tarzan is doing much better, even though it’s only been two days.
We still cry over Jane at the weirdest times. All we have of her is her feathers from her nest and a few pictures we took the night before she died and of course her man, Tarzan. I’m still glad I got these birds. It turns out the birds I didn’t even want, are the birds
I basically can’t live without.
Love always,
| Jane A.k.a Angel |
| Jillian and Jessica |