Flying free...

[fajrdrako]

There is a story that when Richard Coeur de Lion, King of England, was released from prison in Austria, King Philip of France sent a message to Richard's brother John, saying, "The devil is loose."

I was thinking of that this morning as my budgies wreaked cheery morning havoc: two devils were loose in my living room. I couldn't get them to go back into the cage last night. Sometimes they are good as gold and just fly around for a while before going back inside. Last night... Well. Gambit decided to take up territory on top of Pryde's cage, and dedicated himself to attacking Logan whenever he tried to land beside him. The birdie testosterone was riding high. Logan ended up sulking on the curtain rod. Gambit ended up sleeping on top of both cages with one foot on each cage.

The budgie books say one shouldn't go to work and leave the budgies flying around, but they don't have a lot of advice on how to lure, cajole or force budgies into their cages when they don't want to go. I remember once running around after them with maaboroshi and a butterfly net. Never again! It was good exercise for everyone, but the budgies can fly a lot faster than we can run, and they had a full chorus going of "You can't take the sky from me".

I am told that other people have sweet, well-behaved budgies. I think I need a budgie training school. Clearly, they already have me well trained.