Peeper's home!

[asterroc]

She's doing really well. She's chowing down on millet at the moment, her favorite food. I left her in her cage for a while to make sure she eats, as I got the feeling that if she were with me she'd rather I scratch her. She's still not gripping, and the discharge letter says she may never regain that function, but she doesn't entirely realize that yet and keeps trying to climb up things she used to be able to climb - it's somewhere between really adorable and pathetic.

Her discharge letter also says that she was "extremely sweet" and that it was a pleasure to have her. From what the vet said to me as we left, she was a total attention whore the whole time! Every time someone was near her cage she'd poke her head out to beg for scratches, and all the students and technicians and everyone would oblige her. The vet said they were sad to see her leave. :) I guess she's even nicer a bird than I thought.

I think I'm going to have to have a pretty card made with her picture on it and send it to them. They saved her life, and loved doing it.

ETA: We have a follow-up next Wednesday at 2pm. At that time they'll draw more blood and see how she's doing. I asked the vet if he could give me a life expectancy for her now - months, years, days - and he said he had no clue, but that after he sees the further bloodwork he can possibly make a guess. :-\ However, the resident said they recently got a 27-year-old cockatiel... *grin*

The vet I was dealing with actually is already a full vet/doctor. He's from Italy, and he came here to study more, including exotics. Interesting.

Comments

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the well-wishes. My coworkers have also told me that my stories about Peeper sound like their children - like how she follows me into the bathroom, and won't let me sleep in on weekends...

I've heard that for cockatiels and owners, female-female is a good combo, and female owner / male bird is a bad mix - the bird gets jealous of any of her friends. I hadn't heard much about guys with cockatiels yet.