I take Gutsy9 outside as often as I can but I can’t leave him alone because he’s nervous of the bigger birds.
This is King and Princess 1 wondering if Gutsy9 is theirs, but not willing to get too close.
Gutsy9 scurries back to me all the time!
Parkinson’s paradoxes
When most people hear the term ‘Parkinson’s Disease’, they tend to think of Michael J Fox and the Parkinson’s that make you shake, move haphazardly or suffer debilitating tremors. Anthony’s type of PD is not like that and is often termed ‘Parkinsonism’. His symptoms have included a dramatic loss of movement. In many ways this is a kinder PD because of the lack of tremors but on the other hand the crippling immobility of brain/body has been a long, slow series of gradual shocks. First his hands couldn’t do things like open a jar of vegemite, steer a car, operate a chainsaw; then his face stopped ‘working’ in the sense that he no longer smiled and he stopped blinking, so that his eyes took on a blank look. I have already written about some of these things in previous posts so I won’t repeat myself.
One of the most noticeable things about Anthony’s PD is his stillness. Before the nursing lodge he would sit for hours on the front verandah in complete stillness. Sometimes he would be so still that the blue wrens would alight on his lap not realizing he was a human. Sometimes he would be so still I would think he’d died. Sometimes he would be so still he would drop his cup of tea.
Well, today I took Gutsy9, the baby peacock, in again to see Ants at the nursing lodge and guess who loved Anthony’s stillness?
Rejection rescue
Peahen 4: What is that noisy thing?
Princess 2: It’s definitely not mine!
Gutsy9: MUMMY!!!!!!!!!!!!
Me: Argh!
Okay, Gutsy9 is now around 4 days old. I have taken him outside to meet his potential mothers but none of them will take responsibility. They just look at him as if he is an alien and he keeps running back to me anyway. I will keep trying but obviously he will need to get a bit older before he is re-integrated.
In the meantime he is living on my shoulder. I love it!
Control crying
Gutsy-9, the baby peacock, is now about 72 hours old. He has begun to cry, and I mean CRY, if he is separated from me. His crying is like the beautiful sound of birds chirping and tweeting – multiplied by a million, which makes it not so beautiful.
If I put him on the floor he looks at me as if to say how could you abandon me like this?
Control crying methods will be helpful tonight.
‘Gutsy’
Ming-who-is-not-interested-in-birds has decided to re-name 9, Gutsy.
I can see his point!
Gutsy-9 will not leave my shoulder!
A chick called 9
I got home from seeing Ants and went out to feed, and commune with, the birds and whammo! Some tiny scurrying thing caught my eye – a chick! All by itself! I couldn’t believe my eyes. I sat at my picnic table watching it for awhile to see whose chick it was but, despite a lot of interest from the gang and the chooks and peafowl and the guinneas, not one of them came to the party, so I had to catch it (sounds easy but it took about 9 hours!)
So here he/she is, in Ming’s hands. We have no idea what kind of chick this is, but it might be a peachick!
And its name?
9!
We have now cosied 9 into a box with some straw, water and crumbles but 9 is already addicted to cuddles.
I wonder what 9 is!
It’s complicated!
Princess 2: Thor, how about a little kiss?
Thor: Not now P2.
Princess 2: Get lost, Rabbit!
Princess 2: Oh, there is never any privacy here!
Princess 2: Why do you have a name like ‘Thor’ when you can’t even scare a rabbit away?
Thor: Well actually, P2, I quite like Mr Rabbit. In fact he’s been giving me a few tips.
Princess 2: On what?
Princess 2: Oh I can’t take any more of this nonsense!
Princess 2 begins to sing ‘Where is love?’ (from ‘Oliver’, the musical).
Thor: P2 will you calm down – Mr Rabbit has been giving me some tips about breeding!
Princess 2: Oh! Oh, darling, I had no idea!
Rabbit 675: What a complicated couple!
Peafowl ‘prantics’!
Here is a link to a very short youtube of a guy in China using some sort of peafowl horn to call peas down from mountains. I definitely need to find this guy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iy_A3Tt8tcI
I looked online for one of these horn things but the one I thought would be good turned out to be an antique ornament and not a real one and, since then, I have given up because one of my blog friends suggested I imitate the call myself, so I have been doing that but now I’ve lost my voice!
Okay, so for anyone who needs a recap of the situation, it is mating season and a few of our adolescent peas are experiencing wanderlust and adventuring off to forbidden territories (the neighbours’ roof). This has caused a fair bit of high drama:
Email from neighbours:
FOR SOME TIME NOW YOUR 3 PEACOCKS AND 20 ODD PEAHENS HAVE BEEN SPENDING MOST DAYS AND NIGHTS OVER HERE AND HAVE BEEN MAKING AN AWFUL MESS EVERYWHERE. THEY HAVE BEEN FLYING ON THE ROOF AND MESSING IN OUR DRINKING WATER. THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE!!!
PLEASE CONTAIN THE BIRDS ON YOUR SIDE OF THE FARM. SURELY, IF YOU KEEP EXOTIC BIRDS YOU SHOULD LOOK AFTER THEM PROPERLY. UNLESS YOU WANT THEM IMPOUNDED BY THE RANGER, I SUGGEST YOU KEEP THEM PENNED.
My response:
Don’t stress. Except for King and Queenie (the adult couple), this is their first mating season, so they’re experiencing a bit of wanderlust. It won’t last long. We only have a total of 15 peafowl (12 blues and 3 whites), so I have no idea where the others are coming from. I feed ours at around 5pm and they roost in the wattle trees at the back every night.
A further comforting response from me:
I think all of the peafowl are back here now. If they return to your place again, simply point a hose at them and shoo them away in our direction. You can hose them off the roof or out of the tree this way. If you do this to a peahen, the peacock will follow … As I said in my previous email, this wanderlust is a seasonal thing and will not last. However the girls may be looking for nesting spots so you will need to persevere with the above methods. I’ve rung and left a message with two peafowl-savvy friends who will come and get them if the‘problem’ persists. Some of them may need to be re-homed.
So sorry but, again, this is a passing phase and I have spoken to the ranger and he’ll alert me if you alert him. Much better, though, if you simply ring me.
Email from neighbours:
CONSIDERATION IS THE OPERATIVE WORD!!! Your Peafowl are over here all the time and it has gone far enough! They are making such a mess (as Ming saw), the worst thing is that they have polluted our drinking water by defecating on the roof and everywhere else. Advice from the Ranger and the Shire (Clause 480 of the local Govt. Act) is that we are to give you 7 days notice to remove your birds or we will dispose of them ourselves, one way or the other. It is a week since we notified you of this problem and has made no difference.
My response:
I’ve come to the conclusion that you actually like fighting with people – so sad. I don’t understand why you are so angry and miserable; it must be exhausting. Ah yes, the frolicking peafowl: I will take the seven days notice as of today, and make some phone-calls. There is a waiting list for peafowl so it shouldn’t be a problem to re-home some of them. Have you tried hosing them away, as I suggested, or even shooting the gun into the air? The latter is bound to work …. As I said before, this is a passing phase, due to mating season, and may require a bit of latitude on your part. Do you not have a water filter for your tank?
……
Now obviously I have omitted names from the above cut/paste, but you get the gist. Since then (due to reports to the ranger and his emails to interested parties), I have had several people ringing me who want the peas and I have finally decided the guy up the road with a more isolated property, and with a great sense of humour, is the one who I will give a few males to. Now we just have to catch them!
I sat outside tonight, as usual, and did the bread ritual and I counted 12 peafowl zooming up into the trees, so 3 are missing and I guess they are on the neighbours’ roof again – argh! I got Ming to ring and leave a message that all is in hand now. But somehow I feel this drama isn’t over!
Prince: What the hell is going on now?
I think Julie is in trouble again
jmgoyder 