Friday, November 15, 2013

Other Toys

Charli is a paper chewer. She'll chew on wood once in awhile, but she much prefers paper. She adores chewing on my personal and valuable books, so it's a constant battle keeping her away from my bookshelves.

 Her most favorite toy is a simple roll of blank adding machine tape. I buy it in boxes of 12 rolls, and stick one roll on a pencil, which I then thread through the bars of her cage. Immediately she begins chewing on it.

 Slowly and methodically, she chews and gnaws on the roll until the paper begins to fall in long drapes of ribbon down to the floor of the cage.

Of course, there are always lots and lots of little bits of paper that fall outside the cage, which I cannot avoid walking in and tracking all over the house so that within a day or so my entire house looks like it has been in a snow storm.

No matter. The tightly wound paper rolls make Charli happy. 

And that makes me happy.  

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Toys

The whole point of a bird toy is for the parrot to chew it up, dismantle and destroy it.  This is why so many of us buy all manner of toys -- hanging toys, foot toys, big and small, some with bells or buzzers, expensive, cheap . . .

It's also why my house is littered with dozens of toys my birds are not the least bit interested in.  Well, until Cheb came along, that is.

He has shown great determination in chewing up each toy he comes across, especially the ones that Flash has ignored for years.

I haven't seem him show a preference for paper over textiles or big over small.  If it's with beak's reach it needs to be chewed on immediately.  Maybe now I can finally put some of these dozens of parrot toys to good use!