a monkey with feathers

"Ray" stayed with us for the first time even though I've spent time visiting him in his own home.
Ray is a black headed caique.
They originate from the amazon. They are labelled as the 'clowns' of the bird world because of their acrobats. And for a small parrot, they pack a very loud squawk.
And of course the day Ray came to our house I was really really sick with a nasty killer migraine. Ray was in a unfamilar place and proceeded to 'call".
 It was like someone firing a nail gun through my head.
OMFG....
Birds "call" for a couple of reasons: boredom, nervousness, bedtime, hunger, mating season, and for attention.
Caiques are high energy birds.They are kind of like a hyper active three year old on "Jolt" cola. I figured if I had something to entertain him then this would distract him from screaming.
I threaded chinese finger pulls (paper toys) through his cage bars so he could rip them apart. I had a 'foraging toy" of a cardboard box filled with nutriberries and millet so he could spend time exploring and ripping that apart as well ,plus tissues rolled up with berries.
Thankfully that did the trick.
I found that he loves strawberries and raspberries. When he is finished playing with them the cage looked like it was hit by a serial killer. Red stuff was EVERYWHERE!
I have to spend more time keeping him (and the cage)cleaned and entertained.
He is very smart and knows how to undo the locks on the cage. He also knows when it's time to go back to the cage and hides behind my head so I can not retrieve him.
He was more like a monkey than a bird.he loves to climb and swing from things. I definitely have to keep an eye on him because he can easily get into trouble with his curiosity and need to chew things.
Wow!