Central Virginia's Pets: Simon the parrot's lesson about clipped wings

It still surprises me how many people are afraid of birds.

Simon, my troublemaking little Quaker Parakeet, and I have a new roommate and while she adores the little green bird in his cage, she is not so fond of him when he is flying around the living room.

Maybe it’s because Simon flies at her head and lands in her hair. That makes our roommate cower in the floor and cover her head. Simon gets a dramatic reaction, so that is exactly where he aims.

It’s a vicious cycle that I cannot train out of either one, no matter how many times I tell her she is feeding into what he wants, and no matter how often I chase Simon down and tell him, “No!”

Our roommate’s new tactic is to hole up in her room when Simon’s on the loose.

This doesn’t compute to Simon. He knows she is in the house and he wants to play. So Simon stands at the beginning of the hallway and peers down it, hoping the door will open and he can make another run for her head.

Her reaction isn’t new — Simon terrorizes several of my friends in the same manner.

When Simon makes a brief visit to the office, a few co-workers make themselves scarce. On Simon’s first visit, one colleague came to figure out what was making the squawking noise. When he saw a caged bird sitting on the floor, he promptly returned to his cubicle and did not come back out until Simon was safely in the car.

I’ve asked many where their fear of birds comes from.

Some say Alfred Hitchcock’s movie “The Birds” impacted their appreciation of the little feathered creatures. Others have less defined excuses, like the bird might peck out their eyes or they fear that the bird will kill them.

It would take Simon a lot of effort to peck out an eye, and I doubt he would kill you unless your heart was already extremely weak and you were prone to being startled to death.

Nonetheless, he will try his little scare tactics because people’s reactions make him giggle. Sometimes, he laughs so hard his little body shakes.

I have to make an appointment for Simon to see the veterinarian again in the coming weeks to get his wings clipped again. While he enjoys his flighted freedom, I worry about his safety and that is a far greater motivator than his head-flying terror tendencies.

He went in a month ago, but wasn’t quite ready for a flight license revocation.

The process is as simple as a haircut, and the plummage grows out about every six months when Simon goes through his seasonal molt. The vet trims only his primary flight feathers so Simon can glide down, but not gain altitude or speed.

While he is meant to fly, many believe it is safer for a bird in captivity to be clipped regularly. Forget the terror induced among friends and family; there are dangers in the form of mirrors, open windows, ceiling fans and door jams.

Birds can seriously injure themselves or fly away. If left to their own devices in the wild, many will not survive.