By Lynne Singerman
Parrot Festival presented Jan. 28-29-30 by:
NPRPF National Parrot Rescue and Preservation Foundation
A companion parrot is a surprising, delightful, and challenging pet.
Parrots surprising – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clu4tlLqysM
The Parrot Festival is an annual weekend event dedicated to explaining the surprises, increasing the delight and understanding the challenges of bird ownership. Each year this Houston, TX event is created entirely by volunteers (NPRPH) to raise funds to support parrot rescue and to benefit the birds and the bird owning communities. Last weekend NPRPH offered this unique educational experience to over 300 attendees who traveled from as far away as Australia. I traveled from “ The Loop “ for my first experience at the Parrot Festival and I was in awe from the registration booth on! Everywhere I looked was the color and fun of vendor booths filled with an abundance of handmade and unusual bird toys and accessories. . I was a BIG supporter of the vendors and each day I came home with a bag of treats, toys and foods for my pets to sample.
Parrots are companions – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_fFeyM0Bj8
The schedule was a well-organized balance of lectures, shopping, and mingling with fellow bird lovers. The 3 days of lectures covered areas of interest to an audience of beginning bird owners, bird hobbyists, and breeders. I attended almost every lecture and between the talented speakers, slide presentations and an extremely user friendly binder with lecture notes, I learned so much it has made writing this article a challenge. With so much great information it has been hard to decide what to highlight. Instead I will be using the lectures to help create interesting articles for future blogs and simply state this – MARK YOUR CALENDAR NOW FOR THE 2012 PARROT FESTIVAL- the last weekend in January on the 27th– 28th-29th. I can honestly tell you, if you love a bird or are considering one as a pet, this is a wonderfully fun, educational and stimulating way to spend a chilly January weekend!
Parrots are delightful – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wCR7GRmlVs
My favorite event was the 2-hour Q & A panel discussion where the audience submitted all the questions anonymously to the panel of 10 festival speakers. The questions were serious and silly and here are a couple of examples of the questions: “Do male parrots always bond better with female owners and do female parrots always bond better with male owners?” and ” Where can we stroke our parrots that won’t stimulate a sexual/ hormonal response? My Umbrella Cockatoo loves me to tickle her wing pits”.
Now you decide which question is silly or serious and watch this column for the answers!
Written by Abby Parrot aka Lynne Singerman – Adventures in Birds – Houston ,TX- 713-681-5299
