Pickles The Parrot Returns: My Continued Adventures with a Bird Brain (24 page)

My favorite lake, Deer Lake, was a couple of
miles away and we frequented it often in summer. The Oakalla Prison
Farm perched on the grassy hillside above the lake and we spent
many a day laying on the beach pondering and discussing horrific
rumors we’d heard about inmates over the years. The other side of
the lake was a heritage park containing many houses and buildings
that had been the first to be built in Burnaby. There was a museum
and there always seemed to be some sort of event taking place on
the grounds.

Even though we lived practically in the
middle of a city, nature surrounded us. Vancouver is still a very
green city but back then, even more so. A string of majestic
mountains lay to the north of Vancouver and provides incredible
views from anywhere in the city. The nighttime can’t hide them as
lights light up the sky where two ski resorts sit on two separate
mountains. They look like some strange alien airports suspended
amid the dark sky. It’s a short drive across the bridge that spans
the Burrard Inlet and over to the mountains and from there you can
see the entire city stretching almost as far as the eye can see
below you. It’s spectacular at night and, as a teenager, I spent
many nights in Lover’s Lane or attending bush parties.

Then there was Stanley Park. It was named
after Lord Stanley (once the Governor General of Canada) who also
has the coveted NHL Hockey trophy bearing his name – The Stanley
Cup. The park is a peninsula of over 1000 acres situated on the
ocean where the Burrard Inlet, and all ships, enters between the
mountains and the city. How many times have I walked that seawall
and how many hours have I spent gazing at the animals in the zoo? I
don’t know if it’s still the same but when I was younger, there
were deer in the park and bear would often swim the inlet and
forage in the woods. Other wildlife abounds, aside from the land
and marine animals that occupied the zoo. Nature and animals
attracted me often to the park.

The coastal city was an amazing place to grow
up, and I still love that city, but ever since I was a young girl,
I was drawn to the country. I wanted more nature and I wanted
animals – horses, cows and chickens. In my twenties, I finally got
a horse but she had to be kept at a farm stable about an hour’s
drive away. I went camping any chance I could and when Neil and I
met, we bought an RV and went camping every weekend. We spent a lot
of time camping in Logan Lake and eventually we decided to move
here to be closer to nature and part of a small town.

Logan Lake is a great little town (the
population is about 2500) and full of friendly people. We’ve been
here for fifteen years now and I’m not sure if we will retire here
but we’re certainly content for now. Sometimes we think of moving
to the beautiful Ottawa Valley, where Neil grew up, in southeastern
Ontario. I miss the coastal rains and the greenery but these
grasslands and forests can also be amazing.

Neil and I have become a little antisocial
the past few years and tend to spend our time together at home so
we’ve put all our time and effort into producing our own little
oasis in the yard. It hasn’t been easy because of our high
altitude, semi arid climate and short growing season but it’s been
fun. We like it as wild looking as possible, and as wild as the
neighbors will tolerate, and bird habitat is our main goal.

We’ve been slowly moving toward
self-sustenance, trying to grow every edible thing possible in our
yard, to reduce our impact on the environment. All around us, we
see food prices skyrocketing from floods, droughts and other
catastrophes. Climate change is definitely taking effect. Also, it
difficult to find organic food in this area so growing our own
ensures that Pickles isn’t being loaded with pesticides.

We’ve thought about raising chickens for both
the eggs and the meat but decided it’s too risky with the Avian Flu
popping up now and then in BC. The authorities don’t care about pet
birds, if any of the chickens were to contact the virus, Pickles
would be put to death. We have the trout pond and this year a
couple of them were ready to spawn so we had to build a spawning
channel so that they could dig their redds and drop their eggs. I’m
not sure if we’ll get any recruitment from their efforts but if we
do, we will raise some fish for table fare.

Our pond can only provide for a limited
amount of fish so when it becomes over populated, some fish must
die. It’s sad, because we tend to think of them as pets, but the
original 10 will be allowed to live out their lives. If too many
young fry survive, they’ll be too small to eat but they must be
removed. Nothing will go to waste, their death will not be in vain,
and their job will be to fertilize the yard and garden. We can’t
stop the trout from spawning and producing off spring, they need to
drop their eggs otherwise the eggs will be absorbed back into their
system, making them weak and possibly causing death.

We seldom water our yard, we’ve gone almost
completely xeroscape, but the pond needs fresh water now and then.
When we empty water from the pond, it is pumped through a hose and
sprayed on foliage so most of our irrigation is provided in this
way. The water from the pond is full of wonderful nutrients, which
provide awesome fertilization.

The pond tends to get a lot of algae but we
don’t worry about it too much. The algae provide shade from the sun
(protecting the fish) and keep the water temperature down. It gives
the fish something to hide in and a place to forage for scuds and
other aquatic insects that use the algae for their habitat. Now and
then, I’ll take a long stick to dip in the water for wrapping
algae, like Cotton Candy, and remove the heavy growth but it’s
never seemed to affect the water quality or oxygen levels so most
is left behind for that ‘natural’ look. Any algae I pull out, is
dumped into the compost – again, providing nutrients for
non-commercial fertilizer. Nothing in our yard is wasted, if we can
help it.

Late last summer, I placed Pickles in his
travel cage and set him on a stump in the middle of grass and
shrubbery to oversee my work as I wrapped algae. I actually enjoy
doing this; it seems to relax me somehow. I don’t even mind picking
through the algae afterwards to rescue scuds, and other bugs that
may have been trapped, and tossing them back in the pond.

A young couple happened by and stood at the
fence to watch and talk to me while I was working. I stood on the
bridge in the middle of the lake with my back turned to them while
I worked on a particularly large chunk of algae floating amid the
reeds. I must have disturbed a fish that had been hiding in there
because he hit the surface with a splash and Pickles yelled out
“Fishy eat a bug!” He says this when fish rise to the surface to
feed on insects.

“
Oh! They eat bugs?” the girl asked.
She obviously hadn’t noticed Pickles in the foliage just to the
right of her. “That was my bird,” I said, over my
shoulder.

“
The fish eat BIRDS?” she
remarked.

“
No, no,” I said, “That’s my bird in
the bushes. He said that, not me”.

She quickly spotted him and said, “He talks?
You mean, he talks and actually knows when a fish eats a bug??”

I told her that I wasn’t sure if Pickles
really understood but yes, if a fish splashes, we’ve taught him to
say that.

“
Wow” she said and turned to start a
conversation with Pickles but he was too intent on watching me.
“Can you make him say that again?” she asked.

I wasn’t sure if he would and the fish had
all been scared to the bottom, away from my stick, so I went and
got some fish pellets. I stood on the bridge facing them and tossed
a handful into the water between them and me. The fish exploded
from the surface like a school of piranha, soaking me and splashing
Pickles and our two guests.

Pickles went ballistic in his cage, furious
that he was getting wet and started yelling, “What are you
doing???” I ran over to calm him down and as he clung to the far
bars, I told him there was no more water but he still eyed me
suspiciously. “No fresh water” he spat and I told him it was all
gone, and that it wasn’t exactly ‘fresh’.

He climbed back down to his perch and sat
nicely while I talked to these people over the fence. They were
enthralled with Pickles and chuckling over his little fit and
comments. A couple of minutes later, they took their leave and I
bent over to pick up Pickles cage to take him to the aviary but
just as I reached for it, I pulled my hand back in horror. Pickles
had snatched a leaf off a shrub and was pulling it through the cage
bars. A spider clung to the edge as he held it in his talons and
began to chomp on the leaf. Pickles is scared of spiders and so am
I. It was a wispy spider, not one of those big bodied ones and I
watched as it spun a strand of webbing and dropped to the perch
beside him. Pickles continue to chew on the leaf, oblivious to the
little critter. I watched in horror as the spider crawled up his
leg, on to his chest and scampered to his back and paused on the
top of Pickles’ head. Crap. I wasn’t about to save him.

I almost let out a scream as the spider
carried on and moved down Pickles’ forehead and paused again, right
between his eyes. Ever see a parrot go cross-eyed? Pickles dropped
his leaf and nonchalantly snatched it off with his talon and shoved
it in his mouth. I’m pretty sure he thought it was one of his
downy, spidery feathers that were good to chew on, like gum. I
stared in disbelief as he began to roll it around with his tongue
while a couple of wispy legs dangled outside his beak. I guess
Pickles got a taste of it and stopped dead with a stunned look on
his face, eyes as big as saucers, then snatched it from his beak
with his talon and attempted to toss it away. But it stuck. Then he
seemed to realize what it was and stood shaking his talon in an
attempt to flick it loose. A couple of shakes later, the spider
fell to the bottom of the cage and Pickles began flapping around to
get away from it. It’s a small cage, with nowhere to go, so he
couldn’t escape the scary arachnid.

I summoned all my courage to grab the cage
handle and run the few feet to the aviary to release Pickles. I
figured I might be safe as the spider just lay there, half dead,
with a couple of legs waving in the air. The minute I entered the
aviary, I snapped open the cage door and Pickles bolted. He flew to
a perch above me as I dropped the cage to the ground, fearful that
the spider might revive and attack my hand. Pickles and I stared at
the spider, hearts beating and bodies shaking. “Scary” Pickles
said, “Wanna go home”.

He wouldn’t let up; he didn’t want to stay
there, not with a spider in his presence. But I couldn’t take him
home without his cage. Once again, it was up to me to save the day
so I stuck my foot inside the cage and mashed, and mashed, and
mashed until there was nothing left. I tossed the ‘poop paper’ from
the cage, picked it up and asked Pickles to step up so I could take
him home. He stepped up, but refused to go in the cage. Oh, that’s
just great, I thought. Pickles didn’t want to stay in the aviary
but I couldn’t take him home so all I could do was place the cage
as far away as possible and cover it with a small outdoor table
that sits in the aviary.

I ended up sitting on the ground and talking
to Pickles to calm him down enough to forget about the spider and
climb in the cage. It took several attempts and about 45 minutes
but eventually he conceded and home we went. What a pair we
are.

But let’s get back to the yard. Our main food
supply is the garden. We have fruit and berry trees growing but we
like to leave most of the berries for the wild birds and some of
the fruit trees (apple, cherry and apricot) have yet to mature for
decent harvesting. We still manage to make pies, jams, grape juice,
birdie breads and Pickles gets to eat as much of the fresh stuff as
he likes.

The garden can be difficult with the short
growing season and often we lose things like tomatoes, cucumber,
zucchini, and peppers etc. from frosts that will occur early or
late summer. Root veggies survive though, such as carrots, onions
and potatoes and the peas and beans seem pretty hardy.

Neil built a cold frame this year and
situated it next to the house, so this spring we started much our
vegetables indoors and put them in the cold frame to protect them.
This year we’re growing tons of cucumbers to make my own pickles
because I eat dills daily.

We’re big on composting and it not only
eliminates waste in landfills, but it’s black gold for the lawn,
garden and other plants. Done properly, it does not attract rodents
or bears. Proper layered, aerated etc., there is no smell – except
when I throw algae in there. Even then, it’s only for a day, until
it dries up.

As for bears, the only thing that attracts
bears to the neighborhood is garbage. I fume when we read all the
literature on being Bear Aware and they say don’t leave birdfeeders
out because it attracts them. Bull crap. Bears come into town
looking for the garbage that the same damn people leave out time
after time. The birdseed is just collateral, an extra little bonus
while they’re wandering through.

This spring, we had two bears in the
neighborhood, every single night. They got into everything,
including our bird feeder so we had to remove it so that he didn’t
get it every night. Not only was garbage being left out, but we
also found out that a woman down the street was actually
feeding
the bears! How ignorant and
irresponsible can you be? Those two bears were shot and killed
shortly afterwards, and she can thank herself for that. The CO’s
rarely trap and relocate these days, they find that the bears end
up coming right back, no matter how far they take them.