Pippin

Pippin was not a hand raised Cockatiel but was reasonably tame, though at first he just hissed and tried to bite us for the first two days. On the third day, when I was alone at home with him I decided to try and coach him out of his cage with some food (an unsweetened cracker). After much coaching and talking he ended up getting some confidence and losing his fear of me and by the end of the day he was happily perched on my shoulder playing with a stick. This was the first sign that I had a gift at being able to get a bird to be unafraid, and like me.

          From that day on he was only ever in his cage to sleep or if we had to go out some where. We made a spot for him in the lounge room, where he could eat and play and be near us when he wanted to. He eventual let us scratch his neck (but this was all), he loved this and my daughters earrings which he'd chew on at every chance. He became a very nice friendly bird, he learnt his "up" commands very quickly, and I became very attached to him while we had the pleasure of his company. I was absolutely amazed by the friendship and love shown by this bird. 

        But one day because of my stupidity, I left the room for awhile not realising that our cat was inside unsupervised, he had not really shown any interest in the bird before now, but he certainly found interest in him this time. I rescued poor Pippin from the cat but he suffered internal injuries and to my horror and much grieve he died a couple of hours later. The loss was very hard to live with. We all miss him and we will remember him for a long time to come.

My Son With Pippin

Just Perching		Having Some Seed

My Daughter with Pippin

Chewing an Earring		Playing with his stick

About a week after losing Pippin I went out and bought a genuine hand raised Cockatiel, a little lutino who was supposed to be a boy, but after the way the bird behaved, I did some research and discovered the bird to be a female, so we named her "Lilly"