Mozart Chronicles: The Fluffy Flower, Pt. 1

"You know you really should breed him. He's an endangered species and he's wild caught. He's important to the gene pool. He's really a fine specimen, a really big guy."

These words from the parrot rescuer I'd adopted Mozart from came over the phone sounding totally foreign to me. As someone involved with animal rescue, breeding is strongly discouraged. But bird rescue is different. True, breeding is still strongly discouraged for most species not suited for a life in captivity, but in those days, bird overpopulation wasn't as well understood as it is now.

"I thought he had been at a breeder and didn't want to breed?" I asked.

Mozart's rescuer continued, "Yes but cockatoos, especially Moluccans will spend their entire lives in the wild searching for the perfect mate and then mate for life. He probably just didn't like any of the females he'd been put with. It's not like he had any choice," she replied. She was working me over pretty hard it seemed. I thought this must be really important, after all, her resumé was and still is probably the most impressive I've seen for any professional animal handler, including a Master's in animal psychology. She went on, "You know we've searched all over the country to find a teenage wild caught female for him, they're very hard to come by."

Gullible as I was in those days, I began searching immediately for a wild caught female Moluccan cockatoo who needed a home. I thought I'd be searching for years from the way this woman made it sound, but I found one in only a few months. A pair of vets, a husband and wife team, in Minnesota were looking to place their 13 year old Moluccan hen with a nice male. She was very sexually frustrated they said and plucked and shredded her feathers. Mozart's quarantine time was up and it didn't seem like Fluffy needed to go through one coming from such fine vets who had only two birds of their own, a macaw and a middle aged amazon.

I flew to Duluth, Minnesota and arrived in February 1997 on one of the coldest days on record. The vets, who bred show collies on the side, were excited for Fluffy's future and picked me up and brought me to their farm to meet the little lady.

Fluffy was very sweet and took to me immediately. She was completely tame. That night in my hotel room, I gave her a shower and carefully dried her with the hair dryer on cool setting so as not to burn her. We cuddled and allopreened that evening. It was a magical night. It is hard to describe snuggling with a large bird, it's like meeting an angel and getting a big hug. The next day, the vet picked me up and dropped me off at the airport. I had a health certificate and airport carrier and Fluffy was riding in the cabin with me. I had to take her out of the carrier so they could inspect it for bombs (there had been a recent incident with bomb scares on domestic flights) and Fluffy climbed to my shoulder and exulted in the shower of 'oohs' and 'aahs' from the other passengers. We became instant celebrities. The flight went well and soon enough we were home in DC.

(pictured above: Fluffy sits atop her brooding box)

to be continued tomorrow...