EYES!

Poppy's eyes have finally opened!

We have had a new baby join us, as well.  I'm currently feeding and caring for this little mouse who was dropped off by a student Monday night.

One Week

What a difference a week makes.  She seems to be growing heavier each time I pick her up!  Her eyes are very close to opening, and we should see them in the next day or so.

She's apparently been named Poppy, as I discovered when L gave me the birthday present she made for me.  It's a beautiful digital image she made me with a picture of what she thinks the baby will look like when she is full grown.  The picture's title, as you can see, is "Poppy".

Baby's fifth day

I took her away from her parents for a couple of hours this afternoon to let her crop empty out.  It also gave her poor, thin parents a chance to take a break and fly around.  They spent most of their free time eating.  This allowed them to digest a little more of their intake, rather than just giving it back to baby.

Baby was very demanding during the time I had her with me. She demanded food and took short naps, and that's normal. They basically sleep, eat, or beg for food. They are growing so rapidly and will eat themselves to death if given the option! That's why baby is spending a few non-eating hours with me every day now.

None of the other eggs have hatched, and their incubation time is up.  We will remove the eggs tomorrow, so the parents have less to worry about and tend to.

It's time to come up with a name for baby, because she seems to be thriving, and I'm feeling more optimistic about her surviving.  Also, the girls are demanding it.  They each have names picked out (none of which thrill me), so there will be some negotiating over the next few days until we all agree on something.

Baby's fourth day

She continues to grow by the minute and gets stronger every time I visit her.  No, I don't know what the gender is, but I would rather go with "her" than "it".  I have a 50% chance of being correct.

I'm getting increasingly neurotic about her, examining every part of her and constantly researching whether this or that is normal.  She's quite transparent at this point, so I can see so many colors and shapes inside of her that I get concerned about each one.

Now every single time I go in to check on her, her crop is full.  I can tell it's moving, because the shape and coloration of the contents show through and change.  I'm worried that her parents are overfeeding her now.  I will probably take her to the avian vet on Thursday or Friday, just to calm my increasingly neurotic obsession with her health and development.

Happy little ratty boys

The ratty boys' permanent cage arrived this week.  The friend from whom we were borrowing their temporary cage had an unexpected opportunity to take in two abandoned rats, so they will  be  living in a rat mansion too, when we get the cage back to her.  She will then hook it back up to the other large cage she has for them.

L did a good job researching cages to find the biggest and safest one available.  She also managed to find one at a pretty good price AND on sale!  That's my girl.  She wanted a luxury home for them, so she generously offered to forego presents this Christmas and her upcoming birthday.  I don't plan to take her up on that, but I appreciated her offer.

They absolutely LOVE it.  They have already explored each of the levels, and really like running up and down the ramps.  They are just adorable!

Baby's third day

Mommy and daddy are doing a spectacular job of keeping baby fat and warm.  I am still helping out with some supplemental feedings.  It's hard work for them, and they have both thinned out a bit.  I'm giving them lots of extra produce to keep them strong and able to share their food with baby.

Annual Day

L's Annual Day performance was Saturday.  She was feeling  very poorly as a result of a horrible cold, and I really struggled with the decision of whether to let her perform or keep her home.  Because of the nature of her dance, her missing the performance would have meant her partner (Gopika, to her Krishna) couldn't dance and then the whole group would be asymmetrical on the stage.  I felt so bad for her, because she was so obviously miserable.

This was her first time dancing as Krishna, and since she was portraying a male, her makeup and jewelry were much simpler than usual.  She still had a chapped red nose, the poor thing.

She did a really good job on her dance, and we were so proud of her for being such a little trooper through the whole thing.

I was feeling increasingly rotten through the day and was quite tired and stressed, which I assume is why my brain left me, and I didn't get her performance on tape.  She came out, and I was trying to get a good picture of her, which isn't easy in a dark auditorium.  They were about 1/3 of the way through the dance when I realized I wasn't taping.  Then I decided at that point that it was too late to start (WTH was I thinking?!), so I got  none of it on tape.  What an idiot!

Still alive and a surprise

We've had a harder time than usual keeping up the last couple of weeks.  I'm not sure there is enough time to keep up with work, homeschooling, and the animals.  L had a dance performance yesterday, so we were making a few trips to Verona each week for extra practices.  That was time I didn't have to spare.  I feel rotten and panicky all of the time, because I can't keep up with this, but none of my commitments are optional.  So of course it would be just during this time period that my computer started misbehaving and ultimately dying.

The problems slowed my work down significantly for the past week, but I didn't have the time to deal with it, so I just kept working and hoping the computer would keep up.  It continued to get worse but still no time to do anything other than the most basic troubleshooting.  Long, long story short.  It failed.  I failed to fix it. I'm farther behind and more frustrated. My friend, O, is the recovery expert and will pick it up tomorrow.  Fingers are crossed!

L & H have had a nasty cold (that keeps getting worse!) for the last couple of weeks, while I've had a minor one.  Last night, mine became major and it's quite rotten.  I feel so bad that the poor children have had to suffer this!  I have an unbelievable amount of work that needs to be done, but I feel too foggy and crappy to give it the attention it deserves.  By blogging, I can at least cross a very overdue item off my list.  I'm hoping I feel better tomorrow and can be more focused.

So the pictures/video in this post are the other enormous monkey wrench that's been thrown into this mess.  Imagine my shock (and the pit that appeared in my stomach) when L informed me this morning that there was a freshly hatched cockatiel that wasn't there last night when I "tucked them in".  Our birds have laid eggs for decades and we've never had baby cockatiels.  The eggs are always infertile and eventually abandoned.  These two cockatiels have laid, perhaps ten clutches of eggs--none of which contained viable 'babies'.  Generally, cockatiels are picky breeders, requiring a nest box and very specific conditions.  Neither of these birds had ever bred/parented before.

They've always been faithful sitters, and this time was no exception, but none of us expected a live creature to emerge!  They were as shocked as we were, when a living creature emerged.  They fled the cage in which the  squeaky creature lay, and looked down at it very intently and trepidatiosly from up above.  The pathetic little creature was cold and was furiously squeaking for warmth and food.  The parents were frightened. L and I ran out to get handfeeding mix for birds.  I feed the baby, which was very tough the first time.  The beak is still quite soft--like skin.  The baby doesn't even know to open the beak yet, so it has to be gently pried apart.  You can see the little egg tooth in some of the images.  That will be gone soon.  We had to lure them to and close them in the cage, in an effort to push them into parenting, and then I tentatively placed the full, tired baby near them.

New c. parents often fail their first time.  They seem to take a round or so of experience to catch on. {I have never bred birds or experienced this but have researched the topic.}  Daddy immediately ran to cover and protect the egg from the squeaky creature.  Mommy (in the foreground of the video, with the 'pearls' on her back feathers) came over and watched the creature very curiously, and after a few minutes, came up and gently touchebd it with her beak.  She timidly started grooming the baby's fluff.  L and I watched her closely (partially out of curiosity, but mostly to make sure the baby didn't get injured in any way) and saw her increasingly gain confidence with her mothering, and we saw the moment the maternal instinct kicked in.  Mommy's expression changed, and she immediately--carefully and confidently--tucked the baby underneath her and then directed very protective body language toward us.  She let us know it was HER baby and we would have to get through her to get to that baby.

I've been feeding the quickly-growing baby every two hours and will have to continue to do so through the night.  UGH!  That means no Nyquil for cold relief. :-(  We're getting better at the feeding thing each time.  Baby can hold her head up for a few seconds at a time and opens the little beak most of the time during feeding.  Mommy and daddy are doing a spectacular job of keeping her clean and warm.  They hiss at me but ultimately let me remove baby for feedings.  I really, really wish they would figure out the feeding thing and take over.  I can tell by the size of baby's crop that they are not yet feeding her at all.  L told me earlier today, when the parents were still staring at the little creature with confusion, that she felt like she was watching "Sixteen and Pregnant" (which she's heard about but has not seen).

Nala

We had Nala for the day today, as my parents were out of town. She loves to run around our fenced-in backyard with our dogs. Unfortunately this afternoon, she found the smelly black sticky stuff (M's pretty sure that it's from mushrooms!) that Daisy occasionally rolls in. She also found a patch of burrs to roll in. She had a blast, but came back in the house looking and smelling like hell. I put her in the tub, scrubbed her, pulled and cut the burrs out, and wrapped her loosely in a towel and laid her on my bed. She lay that way without moving for about 15 minutes. Then she got up and ran around the house for a while. She had a big day!

Changes and Goodbyes

This weekend we lost our little gerbil, Botswana. It wasn't particularly a surprise, as he's been steadily going downhill since his vet visit. He enjoyed his unlimited blueberries and all of his other favorites right up until the end. He died, we hope in his sleep, in his favorite little spot. Saturday afternoon we buried him in the back garden. L was heartbroken, of course, but she knew it was coming and that he doesn't have any pain or suffering now, so is happy for him.

We miss him so much already, though! His cage is still in the same location as none of us is ready to take it down yet. Everytime I go in the herbivore room, I miss his little face! I loved our treat routine and the way he listened for the treat container and came charging out to see which type of produce I had brought in. He had so much personality tucked into his tiny little body.  We enjoyed every single minute we had with Botsi!

L went to pick up her rats Sunday afternoon, which turned out to be great timing. M drove her to the rescue in IL, while I stayed home to work on grading and making jambalaya. She's been so busy getting ready for them and then getting them acclimated that it's been a great distraction from her sadness over Botsi. Her three boys are very intrigued by everything in their new house. This is the first portion of their house. We will continue adding to it and expanding it, but we will let them adapt to each part first.


Quince


Walter

Womble

She has named the rats Walter, Womble, and Quince. I actually chose the name Walter, as that was part of the agreement--I would let her get the rats as long as one could be named Walter, after our hero-friend Walter Bond. I had other cute names, too, but she rejected them and stuck with her own.


The two bigger boys (Walter & Womble) remind us so much in personality of Basil & Charlie (the cats). Quince is smaller and more shy. They all love interaction and attention and have already learned to run to their door to come out to play. Walter & Womble both like to ride on her shoulder, which she loves! Quince loves to be out but is a little nervous up on a shoulder.


The cats are intrigued with them and watch and smell, but they are safely locked in L's room unless we are with them and actively watching them. Tica is the only cat who sleeps in L's room at night, but we're not worried about her. The big boys are almost as big as she is, and she's afraid of everything, so she just watches from afar.

You'll notice in these pictures that Walter has a green mark on his side, and Womble has red.  Until we learn their little faces, markings, and mannerisms, the dots help us tell the bigger boys apart. We are having so much fun with them!



They are super cute when they groom, and they often do parallel grooming. They are very tidy boys.