Night Fright

[MissK]

Hi all.

Night before last there was an bit of an Incident in the bird room (formerly known as the living room). I was in the computer room, dogs were in the bedroom asleep, lights out in the rest of the house - a perfectly normal late night, in fact.

There arose a commotion in the Budgie and Ringneck cages. When I went in to check on them, the Ringneck was still but hanging on the wall of the cage. The Budgies were in an all-out panic. I was not able to find any source for their concern. I was not really able to talk them down, so I put on all the lights and left them in peace. About an hour later they all seemed fine, so I put out the lights and went to bed. The Canaries in the dining room were not affected.

In the morning it was clear to see something else had happened afterwards. The Budgies' bird bath that hangs in the small feeder door had been knocked apart and ended up propping the door slightly open. One of the Budgies was out of the cage and hiding or lost behind the furniture the cage sits on. She was pretty upset, but stepped up for me and I sent her home. I checked on them frequently through the morning and all was well.

Last night when I checked on them in the middle of the night, the Ringneck was sleeping on the normal perch, but the Budgies were crammed up close to their ceiling on perches they do not usually use for sleeping. They did not seem alarmed, however.

We have never had such a night fright before. The birds are always awakened briefly in the middle of the night when I go through the room, so they are used to that. We have no other humans or pets besides the dogs who had not been in the room at the time. We have no evidence of mice, and I am pretty sure I would see droppings by the birdseed if we had them. One of the dogs is a serious hunter and would surely alert me to any animal pest in the house. If there were a prowler shining a light in the room I also feel the dogs would have let me know.

Has anybody got experience with night frights in their bird room? Can you think of anything I may have missed in trying to diagnose the source of the problem? I've kept birds in this house for several years, and never anything like this before.

-MissK

[Skyes_crew]

Maybe one of them either fell off the perch while sleeping or something startled him, he started flapping around which set the others off? Are any of your birds afraid of bugs? Like a moth or a spider? Not big enough to alert your dogs, but definitely scary. Skye is petrified of flies

[MissK]

Those are good thoughts. I've never known them to fear a bug, but then they don't see many bugs either. Wish I knew what I could guard against for the future.

-MissK

[ellieelectrons]

I'd be worried that the cage door was open. Could the budgies have moved the bird bath themselves?

Do you live in a flat or a house? I'm wondering if it could have been a disturbance by some neighbours?

Ellie.

[MissK]

Ellie, I'm baffled!

I have to assume the Budgie got into the bath and caused enough commotion to break it apart, though I would never have otherwise dreamed her capable. I still can't see how she could have managed that, but I am the only one, ever, in the house with hands. I would have blamed the dogs, but they were sleepy in the next room, and never even got up.

It's a house, a small one, and I do have a fine young man living next to me. He is very popular and has lots of friends visit frequently. All my animals should be well used to them by now. They spend time on their front porch, which has to be at least 40 feet away from the bird cage, not to mention outside on the other side of the wall.

http://www.arcatapet.com/item.cfm?cat=9 ... PLA0109215
This is the bird bath in question. It's my favourite style, very easy to use, so has been in use in my house since I got the Canaries. The bottom half has a hooked lip to go over the threshhold of the door. The top half has a series of ridges where the bottom edge of the door fits in to lock it into place. The upper flat rectangle seems like overkill and I've never used it, but I guess for Budgies I will now. This tub has a little peg-in-hole joint on the front sides. You place the pegs into the holes, and then lower the upper back of the tub till it joins the lower back and snaps into place. Then your tub is put together and you never take it apart again. That snap together part in the back is what failed during the Budgie Incident. The fronts of the tub stayed in place, but the door lowered a little more than halfway. The back separated. The Budgie was able to escape through the wreck of the tub. I simply CANNOT understand how this happened.


-MissK