Birds

A Grounded Cockatoo

Hello people. This sulphur-crested cockatoo was around for a few days. I think this could be an old bird. It could not fly up on to the fence, yet had no trouble coasting a fair distance away from off the fence. It slept on the ground out front of the house over two nights, tucked in among elm tree suckers, and I was really worried about it. It had no visible signs of injury and its feathers look healthy enough. I wanted to cage it to keep it safe from cats and foxes but I think it knew how to hide itself and it might have been too cruel to lock it up. It also had a fairly threatening squawk.

sulphur-crested cockatoo walking on fence

walking

It used my three fishpond tiers to drag itself up on to the fence!  That is why it is wet and muddy under its beak. One morning it was squawking in our ivy, on the ground, and later I see it had climbed up into the lilac tree (first photo above) It didn’t seem to see me, so perhaps it has poor peripheral vision. From there, it flew into the neighbour’s yard, where it called down a flock of cockatoos to keep it company.

sulphur-crested cockatoo on fence

looking for seed

One day I saw it sitting under the rose bushes in front of the house across the road. Maybe it used the drainage pipe to go under the road. I’ve seen no squashed bird or pile of feathers to show it has met a bad end. It came back to our side the next day.

sulphur-crested cockatoo sitting on fence

Sitting

It sunned itself on the fence for most of the day. I like to think its flight feathers were growing back after a moult and it is now happily flying about. One feather does look a bit dodgy in a few of the photos.

Thanks for reading. You have a great day!     :)

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4 thoughts on “A Grounded Cockatoo”

  1. sue says:

    Maybe the poor fellow is just getting old, or it may have an injury or illness that can’t be seen. The tail feathers look a bit short (it wouldn’t be a lost youngster would it, though it would be flying better if it was a young one).

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    • No idea Sue. I didn’t dig up the little pademelons out front this year. I wonder if it sampled the fruit, because it is quite toxic to animals, don’t know about birds. I only just thought of that, this morning, so it will bother me until I go pull them. Besides, if I don’t there will be a million plants next year.

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  2. I love the 2nd photo of him walking on the fence. He appears to have a bit of attitude in his step 🙂
    I hope that whatever issues he may have had were resolved and he’s safe. It never occurred to me that when birds moult, their flying ability might temporarily be impaired.

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    • I loved taking photos of him. If anything came near him he would squawk. He might have been a young one and not fully feathered yet, I couldn’t tell. Thanks for dropping in Joanne.

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