Rob's Birds
Casey

Please read if you love parrots.

* * * * * * * Casey died in her sleep Thursday, March 22, 2007. * * * * * * *
She had been failing the previous two days, so I had moved her to a small cage without perches, lined with old towels, and rolled-up towels along all sides. She "talked" to me when I covered her cage for the night Thursday eve, but was still in the same spot Friday morning. She had a long life (we think she was about 25 years old), and a personality unbounded by her size.

Casey is a blue-crowned conure. She is a very independent little soul. (Conures seem to be the terriers of birds -- feisty, territorial, and unaware of their own size.)

I think she is a sharp-tailed conure, a sub-type of blue-crowned. She is more curvy and less blocky than most blue-crowns, and has a lot of red on the underside of her long tapering tailfeathers.

My niece got Casey from a pet store. and was told she was a very young bird (she was probably at least four years old -- see below). Casey came out of her cage occasionally while living with her, nipped the people and bossed the big dogs. When my niece decided to move to the coast, she asked her aunt (my sister) to adopt her birds -- Casey and two parakeets.

Casey never came out at my sister's house, but that household had two active cats and two small bouncy dogs (later, two collies). Casey lived with my sister for about 9 years.

Casey's bill and feathers have improved remarkably since she's been eating pelleted foods. (My sister didn't know for sure Casey was a blue-crowned conure -- she didn't have a blue head until after she'd been eating pellets for a while.) Her feathers catch the light and almost sparkle -- they look like they have dozens of fiber optic tips glowing in them. A few of these photos catch a hint of that, look carefully -- there are a few traces. Like in the lower right hand quadrant of this one, just below where the bars cross. And look at the first and last photos on this page. Lately (June 2003) her feathers have that polished look, like crows get.

(I glanced through a book about conures called "Aratinga" which said that group is known as 'sparkly' conures. Guess I'm not the only one who thinks that!)

Casey has a unique method of grooming her wings. See her foot?

Her body feathers are a slightly yellowed green, her flight feathers are closer to emerald and some get dark edges. Her blue crown (more of a helmet) normally looks darker than the rest, the blue varies with the light. (see next photo)

Fall 2003, I took Casey to the vet for a checkup and blood work (done with the help of a little anesthetic gas, since Casey is still not handle-able), and asked him to take a look at her leg band. I thought it was a split band, which would indicate she had been wild caught -- and would make her at least seventeen years old. He confirmed that it is a wild-caught band, and pronounced her "a very healthy old girl." Being wild-caught probably has a bearing on why she has always been "bitey" (even with my niece) and afraid of hands.

While caring for Alex -- and Casey, and the lovebirds -- at my sister's house, Casey became curious about my interactions with Alex, since I took him out every day for playtime and petting and periodically baths.... so Casey started bidding for more attention.

While I was focused on Alex, Casey would get as close to me as she could inside her cage and reach out with her beak to touch (and later grab) my shirt. Since Casey was still very leery of hands, I took this as a positive, and began deliberately placing my sweat-shirt-covered arm against her cage bars where she could easily reach it. Tentative at first, Casey soon decided this was a fun game and would run along her perch to bite my shirt. And I kept gradually shifting the area of my forearm she could reach, until I had the shirt sleeve pulled over my hand -- and then I started working on getting Casey to try chomping my bare fingers.

When she finally did bite my fingers, they were real bites. But she would release me if I touched her beak, or raised the finger she was biting. And whenever she relaxed her bite, even a little, I would tell her what a good bird she was. Eventually, we got to the point where she just mouths my finger (somedays more firmly than others). She hasn't broken the skin in the last couple of years -- except when I offered her my finger when she was already busily chewing up her wooden stick! (Note -- while this is working for me, I don't recommend it to others.) "Biting" my finger is part of our morning and evening routine, and has led to her being more comfortable having my hands near her -- and to things like taking single sunflower seeds from my fingers while out on her cage top.

While Casey and Alex were still at my sister's, Casey started to imitate Alex's calls. Eventually she included some words Alex says -- Casey said "good night" and "good bye" then started saying "hello".

Casey's cage is not as crowded with toys as this photo makes it look.

Casey says "hello-hello-hello" while playing with her toys, and sometimes "hello, Case". She rarely uses people-talk as a greeting. Casey also makes noises that sound like an electric buzzer (a two note sound, and a slightly drawn-out descending tone, and a buzz-like "meep"). She makes some sounds I call "happy gurgles" which are actually quite melodious, and a sound very like a purr. Of course, being a conure, she can screech with near eardrum-splitting volume.

All the birds mimic one another -- sometimes I can't tell who's talking unless I'm looking right at the one who is!

Casey holding something to munch while out playing. (This is the only photo taken with a flash.)

Casey decided to start coming out of her cage a few months after Jasmine moved in. She knew Alex always came out, and now there was another little green parrot coming out -- so Casey did, too. She was still afraid of hands, to start, but that has lessened over time. By the time Bert arrived, Casey would go in and out of her cage even if my hand/arm were still in the doorway.

Some days she likes to take her nap sitting in the top of the figure-8.

Casey has an old toy, several wooden beads on a chain with a clip at the top and a ring at the bottom. When Casey sleeps or naps, she likes to place her beak through that ring, and rest her forehead against it. I've found that when she's dozing and sleepily raises a foot to scratch, I can gently stroke or scritch her -- sometimes for several seconds before she realizes it's me and fusses.

February 2005
Casey will now play-fight with my fingers while out on top of her cage, much like Jasmine does. She will charge and chase my fingers with beak agape, as though she'll rip them to shreds -- but she barely touches them. Then she's so proud of herself, she struts. And now I can scritch her a little while she's awake.

Dec 2005 --
Casey will now let me crack open her new feather sheaths on her head and neck, but only while she's inside her cage on her favorite perch, and I reach through the bars.

May/June 2006
Casey is beginning to show her age -- even though I don't now for sure what that is! She is at least 20, though, since she was wild-caught. I have noticed that when she does not get her sleep at night, she tends to sleep a lot the next day, even napping while out on her cage top to play. She acts normally otherwise, eating, playing, wing-flapping, climbing all over, chewing sticks. I'm fairly sure she is just old, not ill. (August 2006 -- I now believe Casey is having "little strokes".)
Lifespans for blue-crowned conures used to be estimated at 25 years. Recently, that estimate has been raised to 35-40 years. I think the new estimate is more likely to apply to younger captive-bred birds who have (hopefully) been raised on better diets.

Alex	Casey	Jasmine	Bert	Loki	Chester	Boo-boo	Tookie
Baby	Others	Things	Foods	Notes	Likes	Start	Store

To reach me, send a message addressed to your favorite among my birds to this domain (net).

Please read if you love parrots.

All photos are copyrighted and may not be reproduced or borrowed without advance permission.