He'd flown...he didn't know how far. He was very tired and hungry. But he was smart. And boy, was he lucky. Very, very lucky.
He landed in a backyard with a garden. And with a caring human inside a house. And with one phone call, he got everything he wanted. Took long enough.
One summer day, while I was home alone between college semesters, I got a near-frantic call from my grandma. She told me there was a "big bird" in her backyard, and if I came right over, I could have it.
Well, as a lifelong budgie owner who, at the time, had no birds in her house, that sounded wonderful. I did have several problems, though. My grandma lived a few miles away, in the next town over. I had no access to a car. Grandma was going to stay at her house so the bird stayed there. I only had budgie-sized cages available, and no food.
But as someone who would be damned before she'd let an opportunity like this slip away from her, I did the best I could anyway. I got on my bike, toting the budgie cage in my left hand, and drove through small-town traffic, over the bridge and through the historic preservation district to Grandmother's house...and the bird.
I didn't know what to expect by the time I got there. The bird could have been a macaw, a lorikeet, a Pionus parrot, anything.
He was not "anything." He was a huge normal gray cockatiel, with a beautiful blond head and deep brown eyes, and he was LOUD. He wanted something, and he wanted it NOW.
So I got off my bike, picked up the cage, and bent down to the grass and the bird. I decided to see if he'd been trained and offered him my finger. He gently stepped onto it, and not-so-gently complained about being stuffed into a small cage.
Once we got him proper housing and food, he ate for what seemed like hours straight. Just eating and eating, now that the humans he'd been telling to let him in and care for him finally got it through their thick skulls that they needed him.
We don't know who once owned him. We don't know if they still remember and miss him. But we do know one thing. Sunny Grey, who still lives with and loves my parents, was incredibly lucky. Luckier than most birds that get lost. He still has traces of his time in the wild. He is afraid of crows and blue jays. But he survived and found humans to care for him.
So please, if you own pets, do whatever it takes to keep them safe. Clip the bird's wings. Sunny's former owners did not. Microchip your pet. Don't leave doors or windows open with your pet out, especially if you own a bird.
We saved one lost pet. There are more. They are out there. Don't let yours become one of them. Thanks.