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Member Profile
1. What is your name: Matt Frumess 2. How long have you been a member of the Catskill Exotic Bird Club? I was a founding member. 3. How many birds do you currently own? 2 4. List the species of each of your birds and the birds’ names. African Grey - Harry Orange –Winged Amazon: Lenny 5. Which species that you have owned or currently own is your favorite? African Grey 6. If you were to buy another bird, which species would buy? African Grey 7. At what age did you acquire your first bird? (Check one) 0 – 9 10 – 19 X 20 – 29 30 – 39 40 – 49 50 – 59 60 – 69 Rather not say
8. What do you feed your bird? A very broad diet. Pellets are the diet staple, preferably Hagen, though I won so many other pellets at our show that I am feeding them to the birds. The pellets are in the cages all the time. The "downstairs" food…they spend much of the day on their playstands…includes mixed seeds and pellets as well as anything we eat: eggs, chicken, pork, fruit, greens, vegetables of every sort (carrots, potatoes, string beans), oatmeal cookies, ice cream, cold cereal with milk. Harry is the consummate eater: if we eat it, he wants it. He rings a bell when I do not offer food quickly enough. He rings it more insistently if I dawdle. Old Pavlov would laugh if he saw our relationship. Lenny is not quite as varied an eater though he enjoys whatever pellets I give him. Neither bird would eat Zupreem peanut butter flavored treat pellets. 9. Describe the funniest encounter that you had with one of your birds? Ongoing humor includes Harry’s extraordinary mimicry of the telephone ring. Visitors frequently ask me when I’m going to answer the phone. Harry, when he does not like a visitor, will reach into his food dish and hurl, accurately, the most solid things available. Kidney beans are a favorite missile. It’s great fun to watch the interlopers duck Harry’s pitches. When our bulldog, Blossom, jumps up at Harry, Harry will respond by climbing down the playstand and saying sternly, "Blossom, stop it!" Harry is clearly of the opinion that dogs are really not much brighter than plants.
10. What advice would you give to a first-time bird owner? Research, research, research. Make sure that you understand the commitment that a pet parrot requires. Spend some time with another bird owner and see the mess, the noise, the chewing. Be self-critical if you are not home most of the time. Spend considerable time investigating the different species and make sure your personalities mesh. Handle a bird and learn the basics of care and training. All that being said and done, if this is truly a first bird, I strongly suggest a cockatiel or other small, very tame baby parrot. Perhaps a Quaker or a Maroon-bellied Conure. These are easy to handle and everything else is scaled down. These all make wonderful, no compromise, buddies and are a wonderful introduction to the field. (Cockatiels are universally acknowledged to be the pet parrot against which all others are judged.) It may be morbid to mention, but the life spans of these smaller birds…~15 years… does not require the many decades commitment of larger parrot does. |
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