First night with a new sleep cage!

After much debate about sleep quality and volume levels (someone in this house is a little more deaf than they like to admit, lol) Tori’s new sleep cage came in yesterday! I fully expected to have to spend a couple of days letting her play in and around it before she would be ok spending the night in it...shows you what I know! I put her in and she just gave me a look like “Cover me up already! I’m tired!” She didn’t make a peep until I uncovered her in the morning! Success!

That's fantastic!! I love the color, too

ABirdNamedPetey said:

That's fantastic!! I love the color, too

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Lol...another thing that sparked much debate! We couldn’t decide between blue (more contrast so she’d stand out) or red (so she’d kind of match)! As you can see, red won out, lol!

I’ve discovered another great thing about having a sleep cage...Tori’s big cage can get a REALLY thorough clean every night! I can even fill up all of her foraging toys with new bits of balsa wood and a few food pellets

Nice, neat little sleeping cage.

If only someone would invent bird cage blinds or bird cage curtains that are actuated by z-wave, wifi, zig-bee and/or similar technology. A sleep cage could thereby ensure a structured sleep routine.

I had to fly out of state to attend a wedding recently and couldn’t leave my conure, Orrin, with anyone, based upon the way she has been acting lately (she is on a war path toward anyone but me). So I doubled up on food and water, left the cage uncovered but in a dark room, and I dealt with the lighting issue with a “smart timer.” I bought a couple electrical sockets off of Amazon that plug into the wall, and can be paired with a smart phone using an app. The app let me create a schedule for when the socket turned on. When it turned on, the “happy light” I had plugged into that socket provided Orrin with light on a schedule. That was the best I could do, since I can’t cover her cage when I am not home.

I would have used my second smart socket to turn on and off a radio but I had problems with that. My only radio didn’t automatically come on and off when power was turned on and off.

One thing I did do was put a vivint security camera right on Orrin’s cage. It is day vision and night vision, and it has a built in microphone/speakers so Orrin can talk to me and I can talk to Orrin. I know...sounds like over-kill. There I was monitoring my bird hundreds of miles away, baby talking to her through my phone. But I just had to know my little girl was okay. She didn’t understand my comprehensive count-down until we returned home. But I said it nonetheless. I hoped the way her wings twitched when I talked that she at least knew she was loved.


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Orin2017 said:

I know...sounds like over-kill. There I was monitoring my bird hundreds of miles away, baby talking to her through my phone.

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As someone who also has a camera/microphone/cellphone combo, and has ALSO talked to the fids through said camera (while often being asked by coworkers if I was talking to my nonexistent human children)— that thing is absolutely wonderful and I’m not ashamed to admit it. My kids have unknowingly helped me get through a lot of tough days at work and school, just by being themselves (aka happily destroying a brand new ‘indestructible’ toy in 2 hours). Plus I find out some interesting things that way haha.

TLDR: Don’t be embarrassed about the camera because I have a similar set up.

Orin2017 said:

One thing I did do was put a vivint security camera right on Orrin’s cage. It is day vision and night vision, and it has a built in microphone/speakers so Orrin can talk to me and I can talk to Orrin. I know...sounds like over-kill. There I was monitoring my bird hundreds of miles away, baby talking to her through my phone. But I just had to know my little girl was okay. She didn’t understand my comprehensive count-down until we returned home. But I said it nonetheless. I hoped the way her wings twitched when I talked that she at least knew she was loved.

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Hahahahahahaha! It’s so nice to know that I’m not the only “crazy” one! We have 3 different cameras positioned to catch all of the dog’s favorite spots! The 2 way talk function only serves to rile them up so we try to only use it in emergencies (like when they were going crazy about the bear in the backyard while we were out to lunch last week!). Tori does not yet have her own camera...but I have been toying with the idea!