June 2008

Dear Elephants, Birds and Humans.

Oh, the problems of having several pets.....Poor Emma has to spend far too much time in his cage because Lola, my tenacious dachshund cross, will not leave his cage alone. Lola, who will literally eat anything that is, or was, remotely organic, climbs into Emma's cage every time my back is turned and pulls out everything in there, papers, seed, garbage, etc. It does not matter whether the cage has just been cleaned and there is nothing there but fresh newspaper or if there is a full day's worth of seed, pellets, food and droppings....everything and I mean everything is pulled out and strewn all over the floor around the cage. Emma will destroy things around the room, that are not his, if I leave the elephant room door closed and do not watch him for a period of time, so I can't do that. Ergo, since Lola destroys the cage when the door is open I have a dilemma. I feel bad for Emma because either way he loses.

If anyone knows of a way to teach a bird to stay on top of its cage and not climb down on the floor to do its thing PLEASE let me know. I know there are birds who do that, I just do not know how to train them to hang out where I want them to stay. Zeke has a great time because he just flies where he wants to go and compared to the two big birds, Emma and Aristophanes, Zeke does very little damage.

My God, the heat is awful. I could gladly spend the whole year in a cold climate with lots of snow, but excessive heat and humidity kills me. I really don't know how so many people retire to Florida and stay there all year. We were there in April when it was lovely; there was a gentle ocean breeze and bright sunshine every morning I understand that the heat becomes unbearable once you get into the summer months. I don't even know how the birds survive.

People, please write articles about birds for our newsletter. I always have to give a special thanks to Debbie Napolitano-Lovett and Karen Graves for writing about their birds and other bird related issues and to Little Matt for his ramblings, but PLEASE, write about YOUR birds and your ideas, needs and desires about them. We need it and it would be so very appreciated.

I have an update on speakers to come: For a while there I thought I was done and I could not get anyone else of interest to come to our club.....But.....Through my depression and dissatisfaction with the world as it is, I persevered and went into high gear. Like Little Matt says, "Nobody is safe from me," we have some really interesting programs coming up.

First of all, we have Dr. Lonnie Kasman tonight. Dr. Kasman has come to our club many times and each time he speaks to us we learn more about the medical needs of keeping our birds as pets. Dr. Kasman's soft spoken ways and kind demeanor are always very welcome. We come away wiser in the area of pet bird keeping and so much better able to take care of our beloved pets.

Our July meeting will take place later than usual this year. As I explained at our last meeting, I am playing Tevye, in Fiddler on the Roof with the Sullivan County Dramatic Workshop and I will be performing on the 2^nd and 3^rd Thursday of July. Therefore, our July meeting, which is our 21^st anniversary dinner party will take place on July 24^th, the 4^th Thursday of July. To this end I have been able to procure the speaking services of Mike Janis, the Executive Director of The Broom County Zoo in Binghamton, NY. Mike was also the curator of ornithology for the zoo in Baltimore Maryland. He sounds great and is very happy about being the guest speaker at our anniversary dinner. So far, we will be in Mr. Willy's again, we will begin at 7:00 and I will, hopefully, be able to provide all the necessary details about the evening at our meeting tonight. I hope we have a great turn out at our dinner, we usually do. That is the evening we renew our club membership for another year and congratulate ourselves for being the great group that we are.

August, too, will bring us a new speaker.. We have Reid Bauer coming to our club. He is in charge of the Raptor Rehabilitation program at Frost Valley. This should be very interesting and informative. I am sure this program will draw great attention from our club members. I try to bring in as many diverse bird speakers as possible. Most of us have parrot type birds, but there are those of us with other kinds of birds and all of us have great concern for and interest in all the birds in the world. Maybe I will be able to bring in a program about ratites (ostriches, emus, rheas and casuary birds) as pets.

We have Dr. Laurie Hess, board certified avian specialist, coming back to us in September. She is always very informative and October brings us our next great bird show. We are therefore, flush.

We talked about raising the club dues from $18 to $24 dollars per year, with $30 for a family membership. We will let you know tonight if we are going in that direction. We have been at the old rate for many, many years but expenses keep going up and we have to meet them. Soon, we hope to have our 501 C3 status and we will be able to get grants for club programs.

Several of our speakers have suggested trips to their places for the club. We have some good ideas for trips to Brooklyn, to see the quaker parrots, to Frost Valley, to see the raptor program, to the Central Park Zoo for their bird exhibits and to the Broom County Zoo. I hope to see a great crowd tonight at the club. Bring up concerns, ideas and write articles. OH, if you want to see Fiddler on the Roof, it is being presented on July 10, 12, 13, 17, 19 and 20, at the Rivoli Theatre in South Fallsburg...........love to see you there.

I want to offer some congratulations. Jairo Jaramillo, a long time club member and former presenter, passed all his tests and courses to get his license to practice veterinary medicine in the United States. Jairo was a vet, with a very special interest in birds, in Columbia, and now will be able to practice here as well.....Good for him and for us. Little Matthew B. Frumess, our beloved vice president and his sagacious wife, Naiomi, are marrying off their beautiful daughter, Rebecca on June 21^st......I wish her and her new husband the best of luck and love for their future happiness from our club.

Love your birds and all the elephants in the world,

RICHIE