Lou is a Green Wing Macaw that my husband and I acquired from our handy man when we first bought our house back in 2008. He was somewhere between 3 and 5 years old and for at least a year or two was a “free range” Macaw. “Free range” meaning that his former owner decided that Lou didn't need a cage and could wander freely on his very large property.
While this sounds nice for Lou, it wasn't. His only source of water, for bathing or drinking, was a rancid algae filled plastic mold pond on the dilapidated back porch. There was no real shelter for him when the weather would turn cold or wet so when the opportunity for me to get Lou out of there came around, I snatched it.
Now let me start by saying that I absolutely love parrots, and Macaws are absolutely beautiful, with really big beaks that could snatch my finger off my hand in a second. So I have a very healthy respect for these large beautiful birds. Most of that respect manifests with me staying out of strike range anytime Lou is not in his cage.
Hi Lou!
I know that if it were not for me that Lou would have probably died from his free roaming lifestyle. His partner cockatoo had already been run over and killed in his former owners driveway, so I had no doubt that Lou would not have lasted another year in that situation. I got him out of there, got him a huge cage and lots of toys and set him up in a place where he could be happy and healthy with the hopes to build him an outdoor enclosure as soon as we could afford it. Now if Lou would get on board with this plan we'd be set.
You see, Lou does not like me. Well not just me, he doesn't like any woman, but he seems to have a real hate on for me. And he is a plotter. For the first six months or so Lou and I had an understanding. I would sit next to him and we'd talk. I'd feed him treats through the bars of his cage and we were good. Sometimes, if he was feeling particularly chipper, we'd play peek-a-boo, which was always fun. All in all Lou and I were getting close, forming a bond of trust that had me believing that we would be the best of buddies and I would be able to handle him soon. Little did I know that Lou had an entirely different take on the situation, and that he was mainly biding his time until he could kill me.
The event happened on a slow Sunday afternoon. It was cage cleaning time and Lou was on the bird stand while his cage was being scrubbed down. I was sitting there talking to him and telling him what a good boy he was while I handed him treats. All was good for a moment, then it got ugly. As I handed him a treat he thrust that huge gaping maw of a beak at me. He grabbed my thumb by the rather long, at the time, nail and snapping it off like it was a twig. I freely admit that I screamed like I had been shot. My nail had been ripped off a bit past the quick and it hurt...a lot.
From that point on I have never been in grabbing distance of Lou again. He was loose one morning when I woke up and found him roaming in the kitchen. I hid behind a door until my husband was able to get him and put him back into the safety of his cage.
I still feed Lou treats through the bars of his cage. I still talk to him, play peek-a-boo, sing with him when it rains and have a pleasant relationship with him..as long as he is in his cage. When he is out, I find another room to be in, because it is obvious by his lunging and body language that he does not trust me and in general has absolutely no use for me what so ever. That's alright though, I still love him like I love all my parrots, I'll just refrain from giving him kisses.
~Suzanne
~Suzanne
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