Story Bird: Pikachu

I had Pikachu the cockatiel for approximately 10 months.  After he completed his first adult molt I scheduled a vet appointment to have his wings clipped since they had grown in due to his molt.  Needless to say the earliest appointment I could book was for April 20th.  On April 2nd he managed to get out of his cage when no one was home.  When my father got home and opened the backdoor to get into the house Pikachu spotted him and made a bee-line for him.  He went right out the door, circled the house for 15 minutes while my father and mother frantically tried to call him back (I was not home) and that was the last we saw of him.  The first night he disappeared it rained very hard.  Three days later temperatures in North Jersey dropped to below freezing and we had a moderate snow covering.  The prospect of Pikachu surviving the trauma of his escape coupled with the severe temperature drop and his inability to forage for food is poor.  My family has assumed the worst, with the only consolation being that he passed quietly in his sleep from hypothermia or possibly a heart attack front he shock of his experience.  Hopefully he did not suffer.  We will never know.  Of course there is always the possibility that a nice family found him and he is happy and safe, or that perhaps he may show up in our backyard some day,  but not likely.

The lessons to be learned here:  Make sure all cage doors a locked securely and that your feathered friend cannot get out on his own.  Keep wings clipped and take the extra step to learn how to clip wings on your own.  Had we been able to do this rather than wait for a vet appointment Pikachu would still be here and my family and myself would have been spared the emotional trauma of losing him and not knowing what has become of him.  Also, train your birds to "understand" the outside.  Had we allowed Pikachu to spend more time outside  last summer, with his wings clipped, he would have been acclimated to the outdoors and its vast open area.  Part of the reason we believe that Pikachu "took off" is because he was so freaked out by the expansion of his surroundings.  We could not call him back because he was "panic flying" and freaking out.  It was a hard lesson to learn and a terrible experience to got through, especially for my father who felt responsible for the incident.  We will move on, and are adopting a baby Dusky Conure to help ease the pain.  Our Dusky will not replace Pikachu but hopefully will make the transition a little better.  We will be sure to keep his wings clipped at all times and teach him how to interact wth the outside world.  We have also invested in a better cage with secure door locks.