The Story Of Phoenix-part 2

Whew! This is one long story 🙂

QBN

The day had finally arrived. Release day.

We had made the final decision to release him at our house, and we put the dog and cat inside so there would be no problems. I was pretty nervous, because even though Phoenix was an adult now, he didn’t show many signs of independence, still screeching at us for nectar mix even though the bright flowers in his cage were clearly visible against the metal bars of the aviary. He also seemed very tame, still flapping determinedly to land on my head whenever I came in with him.

We decided to do a soft release with him, which is what we did with Mondo (read more about Mondo my New Holland Honeyeater in one of my earlier blogs). A soft release is when you set the bird free, but you leave out food and water for it until it eventually learns how to do it by itself and flies off and finds a mate (like we think Mondo did)

So we prepared his food and water and hooked it to the side of the aviary. Then I reached out and opened the door to the aviary…

When I opened the door, Phoenix was clinging on to it, but he didn’t quite seem to know what to do once it was open. (It’s funny, with some birds, they really want to get out of the aviary, but as soon as I open the door, they stay IN for ages until they realize that they are being released! I walked a few paces backwards, though, and Phoenix came flying right out after me! He turned and flew up the nearest tree! He finally realized that he was free!!!!!!

Phoenix was leaping between trees, joyfully licking everything he came across, including branches, leaves, and then he flew down, divebombed me, landed on my shoulder, and licked my EYE!

I guided him to the food, and then we stood and watched for a while as he flapped around. We were convinced he would be FINE.

Over the next few days, Phoenix remained as tame as ever. He would be there to greet me most mornings, pleading for food, and whenever one of us came to stock up his water or nectar mix, he started practicing a new hobby: dive bombing. He would stare straight at one of us, then start flying fast straight towards us, then at the last second, make a hairpin turn and flap onto one of the branches instead, though if you held a arm out, he would sometimes land with a thud onto it (which he frequently did to me) My mum was super scared about this happening to her, so whenever he showed any signs of flying towards her, she would duck, though one day it backfired, because Phoenix thought her back looked like the comfiest landing cushion ever!

It wasn’t just us he would dive bomb. One day one of my friends came over, (Ambybirb) and it tried flying at her, but luckily didn’t land on her, though that day my alpacas were out, and it decided that that would be a great place to land! (the alpacas freaked out, and when Phoenix later landed on my shoulder, they stared at me with wide eyes as if I had been holding not a bird, but a ticking bomb balanced precariously on my shoulder.

But we had a worry. Since Phoenix was so tame, he would be a easy target for a hunter to catch. Especially since he had developed a new habit of swooping down on the ground, looking for ants. It wasn’t the dog we were worried about, it was the cat.

Grey pelt barely visible even between the rich green and brown shades of the grass and trees, she relentlessly stalked down Phoenix and stared up at him hungrily as he hopped from tree to tree merrily, no idea that danger lay below. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that the cat was just waiting to pounce on a yummy bird casserole.

We took to putting Phoenix back in the aviary every day when it was twilight, but we often saw the cat pressing up right against the aviary, eyes gleaming in the light until we shooed her away. And it was getting more of a struggle to put Phoenix in the aviary each night, because his new tactic was to fly up into the trees whenever we showed signs of being ready to capture him.

We had to do something, because who knows what could happen when our family was out at school/work/shopping! We didn’t want Phoenix to end up in the cats stomach as lunch…

Hey guys, that was part 2 of Phoenix’s story. Sorry for keeping you hanging… but I’m going to do it again! Part 3 to Phoenix’s super long tale will hopefully come out on Sunday, if not Monday. Mwah ha ha. Feel free to comment and like (or dislike 😦 and answer the quiz! See you soon, QueenBirdNerd