My Sister Has Birds

Jen never does things. Jen DOES things. She goes for it. Several years ago, she decided to breed persians. This innocent little seed of an idea culminated in chaos: a house full of 20+ cats including one who had a penchant for spraying (or, for those of you unfamiliar with feline terminology, peeing all over the place) and thusly being responsible for the rather unpleasant smell eminating from my sister's abode. Elly is my own pleasent reminder of this period in my sister's life:

Imagine, if you will, that this talent for doing things BIG has extended into many areas of my sister's life. When she does things she does things right. She doesn't have cats anymore, though.

She has birds.

She was breeding finches, but is now specializing in cockatiels. And she hand-feeds them! I have become fascinated, through listening to my sister's tales, with the breeding rituals of birds.

Jen had one lovebird named Pippin - a male, who, lacking a suitable mate, was lonely. The extent of his loneliness became apparant upon the introduction of:

THE TENT

Jen decided it would be cute to give Pippin a special bird tent to hide in or sleep in or whatever. She did not expect him to fall in love. She began to notice that he seemed rather fond of his tent. Now, when a bird is interested in being more than friends with another bird (or tent), they perform certain rituals - one of which is to feed the object of thier affection. Do you know, dear friends, how birds feed one another? To put it delicately, they regurgitate. Vomit. Barf. Hurl. Etcetera. As the object of affection in question had not a mouth (or a pulse, for that matter), it quickly became covered in bird-barf. Jen would observe in horror as Pippin would lovingly regurgitate it's food for the tent. When he decided it was time to take the relationship to another, more intimate level, Jen decided it was time to get him a female friend. That poor tent had had enough.

Jen reports that in her search for an appropriate mate, she purchased two females and a male. She does things big, remember? Sadly, at the time of last report, Pippin is completely ignoring it's new intended mates, the tent replacements.

Kinda makes you feel badly for the tent, huh?