has anyone experience with taking parrot into classroom

Hi all, need advice.
I was approached today by a third grade teacher asking if I would bring Sam into her summer school next week as part of an end of term celebration. (Sam is a 2 year old cin. GCC who is relaxed, well socialized and has never been much bothered by strangers although she prefers her immediate two and four footed, hoofed and clawed family.) Obviously Sam may change her mind when push comes to shove, but assuming she is in the mood, Sam and I will be at a station and every 15 minutes or so a new batch of 10 children accompanied by teacher and a parent or two will sit down in front of us and get information about birds. Sam, (who is clipped) sits on my shoulder for this when we have done visits with a hospice program in past. This wll be a bit of a zoo...literally. The station to one side of us will be a dog handled by my 17 year old son and Sam and the dog are firm friends. (Jed, an Arkansas mountain feist, gives Sam rides on his back when we are at home although the dog always looks a bit embarrassed to have the little parrot clinging to his harnesses. ) I don't know what is planned for the other side but will make sure it is nothing problematic. (A boa comes to mind but I image that is my own wimpiness rather than anything that would alarm or endanger Sam. So has anyone ever done this sort of thing. I don't even have experience with bird fairs. I think doing the outreach is a good opportunity to talk about humane treatment of companion birds but I want it to be a pleasant experience for Sam as well. The whole thing is supposed to last a bit over an hour. So specific questions. Sam is generally fearless from my shoulder but should I have her cage there in case I need it. I can bring it easily as it rolls and fits easily in horse trailer. (And no, the horse will not be in the gym with us!) Second although the school is smoke free they will be doing BBQ right outside in the courtyard. Sam has never seemed particularly sensitive but how close is too close to smoke as last time I did one of these "pets in our lives " nights I noticed the smell of the BBQ permeated the gym. I was stationed with our Rottweiler and he and I both thought it smelled pretty good but we don't have bird lungs. Finally if you think it is crazy for me to subject Sam to this at all, please let me know. I am of two minds. Does the benefit of the outreach justify the stress?

I've done a few events with my Blue Throated Macaw Quincy on the subject of rare and endangered parrots in the wild, he seems to really love the attention he gets but all birds are different, sam sounds like hes pretty well socialized so being in that atmosphere may be fine, its good that your bringing his cage, in case he gets stressed he'll have a place for quiet time, a towel to go over it may be a good idea as well, if you plan on letting others hold sam you'll want to bring hand sanitizer and have all who handle him use it before doing so, you said Sam was clipped, I would suggest a day or so before you go you check his wings to make sure feathers haven't grown back since it is the time for molting and flight feathers have a nasty habit of growing back when you least expect it and the small birds don't need much there to be able to take flight...hope this helps...........

I have lots of experience with classrooms as well as bigger events. We did the Twin Cities Pet Expo several times as well as the Minnesota State Fair and many classroom/entire school events.

My biggest piece of advice is be prepared to take breaks and cover the cage if it's getting too stressful. Have lots of favorite treats on hand and lots of paper towel, and don't allow anyone to touch or feed your bird.

@the wing clipping issue, I WHOLEHEARTEDLY AGREE. I was working the MN state fair once and a lady had her female Eclectus with just three feathers on each wing clipped. That bird caught a gust of wind, and while we're sitting there with fifteen other parrots, she got blown straight into a tree.

Ten hours later we were still standing outside in the dark at the fairgrounds with the police, spotlights and a cherry picker trying to rescue this poor, terrified bird. We even lost sight of her in the branches at the end of the night and the owner had to go home in tears without her bird.

The next morning the eclectus was in a lower branch and stepped down to a person who was able to return the bird. But happy endings like that, with publicly shown birds who are "probably not flighted" are rare.

In smaller settings, such as classrooms, I used to bring my male Vos and my female GWM in to see even preschoolers. My rules were the same, even in tiny rooms - clipped wings or caged, no touching or feeding my birds. And, if there are other birds from a foreign source nearby, other parrots included, KEEP THEM AWAY PLEASE. The germ factor, alone, in showing birds, is absurd, but it certainly can be managed with proper sanitation and isolation from sources of dangerous pathogens. Keep hand sanitizer with you, too, for whatever you may touch before touching your bird, and have bottles of water for you and the bird.

Good for you for teaching the young kids about the birds. I always always stress, with children, that it's never ok to take a bird from the wild, because I can't tell you how many heartbreaking "I took a robin's nest!" stories I've heard from little kids! HAVE FUN, I miss showing my birds like crazy.

I can't talk about classrooms but I have taken Puffin into aged care homes. I have a few clients who always hear me talking about Puffin and said how they would love to see him so I waited for a good day time wise where I could spend some free time there and off we went. Puffin loved the attention and was a real pro, he spoke clearly and really showed off but it is not something I would do often.

Thanks all for excellent info and advice. What a great forum this is. I will definitely bring her cage, her cover, hand Sanitizer for me and do a zero hour check of her wings. I appreciate the responses and Sam, who is cuddling with me as I write this, says "thanks ". Actually she is just saying "pretty bird" and wolf whistling in my ear but I speak bird and that translates to "thanks! "

The eclectus in the tree story is a sobering reminder of how easily things can go badly wrong. Sam is outside with me constantly and I am going to be extra vigilant about flight feathers now.

One thing that I neglected to mention, and its a pretty obvious one, is water, water and ummm oh yeah water....lol, not sure where your located but here in florida its not hard to dehydrate with the high temps, I'd offer Sam a water break about every 15 minutes or so.......good luck and let us know how it goes.

Good point re water. We keep plenty around her generally and will carry jar to refill as we will have to empty bowl before putting cage in trailer. She won't like the barn (hard ) water we will be carrying for Twister. Also your question re environment reminds me to make sure we are positioned away from door and air handler vents. Again. Thanks. Barbara

You sure are going to have an incredible experience, I wish you well and your bird.
Great advise from above members, remember you can never be to careful !!!!
Be safe and enjoy the day.
Don't forget to take pictures LOTS OF THEM

Yea don't do it. its like that kid that wont stop crying in church or on the plane.

erik7181 said:

Yea don't do it. its like that kid that wont stop crying in church or on the plane.

Click to expand...

Hi Erik,
I appreciate your point of view. Sam will only be there for an hour and is rarely noisy from my shoulder. I imagine a parrot who lives in a classroom could be very distracting and I doubt the bird would much enjoy it either. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Forgot to mention this........... me and my "bird brain" :22::22:
Years ago, my youngest son Steven had to do a speech on a pet, for his grade 3 class.
At the time we had an AG Congo, he was 5 years old. Congo was a very aggresive bird, who preferred being in his cage all day. Congo never ever went outdoors, so this was a big event for him. I took along his travel cage. Congo was a one person bird and that was me. I sat in front of the class, with Congo on my lap.
Steven completed his speech, and answered any question he had to. Steven told them not to touch or feed the bird anything at all. Many of the kids still tried to touch Congo. Steven and I had the situation under strict control, Congo had a delightful day.
Lay down the rules, stick to them, and everyone will enjoy the event.

I used to go to schools and pre-schools to give talks about birds and took two or three of them with me. The advice given is good and I only have a couple of points to add:

1. Make the kids sit or stand at a good distance. A kid could sneeze on the bird and pass something to it. Birds don't catch the human cold viruses but they can get sick from the bad bacteria humans have in their mouths.

2. Ask them not to shout, wave their arms or shove each other, it stresses out the birds.

3. Find out in advance what is the largest number of kids that could be attending and prepare a little gift for each. I used to give them each a sheet of paper with pictures, names, species and a little story about each of the birds I brought. I also used to staple a feather to the top but I have a lot of birds and collecting lots of feathers is no problem to me while it might be to you.

Well, All, Sam went to school and got an "A"!

If someone can tell me how to upload pictures I will share some taken by event's organizer but Sam was as fascinated by the kids as they were by her. We ended up having to put her cage in the car (because we ended up hauling a second equine in trailer) so I just brought along her smaller night cage. We never needed it though I was glad to have it on standby. Sam spent the evening on my shoulder and her antics made her the bell of the ball. We ended up having a single station with Sam and Jed, our mountain feist, together because every time we tried to have Jed and my son, Peter, go to their own designated spot about 40 feet across the gymnasium Sam would begin calling "Jed SUDA SEECHAUS (COME NOW!" ) in my husband's heavy Russian accent. A few of those in my ear had the children in giggles and Peter and I looking for permission to merge our stations. It meant that we had 20 kids for 20 minutes three times but our concerns about keeping their attention that long came to naught. The children were so delighted with Sam chatting with Jed (her routine ranged from HELLO and GOOD MORNING --to which the kids in unison would reply GOODNIGHT SAM!--to Sam offering all her sounds. The kids especially liked that when the bell was rung over the school intercom to move them to the next station Sam would answer with four BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEPs from our microwave oven's all finished alarm. The highlight of our shtick came about midway through when Sam climbed down from the towel on my shoulder and jumped across to Peter's lap from where She could leap onto Jed's harness. She stayed there about 10 minutes to Jed's embarrassment and the kids' delight. So all in all Sam enjoyed herself. She fell asleep in her night cage while we were loading the horses afterward and slept through the drive home. The event raised money for our local animal shelter and Peter and I were able to speak to themes of pet care during the summer months. (You would be horrified by how many dogs get left in hot cars around here.) Thanks to all who gave advice. Sam benefited from your efforts to prepare us for the experience. We kept kids at safe distance and followed all other hints. I couldn't do the individual goodies for each child but one of their stations was a craft area where they made little mobiles to take home.
I don't know if we'll do this next year with Sam. It will depend on how she is feeling today. I checked her a moment ago and she is still sleeping as it is not yet dawn in Midwest USA. Thanks again everyone!
Barbara

My way of uploading pic's, others might do it differently.
Go into pictures and albums, scroll down to add albulm, then click on add album.
Add a title, then the description of the picture. Click submit, then upload the picture from your computer/laptop.
Once the picture has been uploaded, copy it, proceed to paste it in your post.
Hope this is helpful
Good luck

Wonderful that is all went well and everyone enjoyed themselves.
Such a great experinece for everyone concerned.
Sounds like Sam had a blast, entertaining all the kids with all the sounds etc.
Well done.
NOW we are just waiting for the ic:

It sounds simple enough, Antoinette, but I am rather incompetent at this sort of thing. I should get email of pictures taken today and will see what I can do. Perhaps I will experiment with one Peter took of Sam and Jed in past.
Barbara

bogo1 said:

It sounds simple enough, Antoinette, but I am rather incompetent at this sort of thing. I should get email of pictures taken today and will see what I can do. Perhaps I will experiment with one Peter took of Sam and Jed in past.
Barbara

Click to expand...

Barbara If I can do it ANYONE can. :11poke:
Anything further queries just ask

Oh My Barb, now there will be no living with Sam since he reached "Super Star" staus ...lol, glad all worked out well and that you and Sam enjoyed it, be careful though, it can become addictive

Sam is awake and seems unaffected by her night of stardom. She did the barn run on Mikhail's shoulder and carried out her self appointed role of keeping the accompanying canines in line. Eating fine. Droppings normal. Guess the evening was not too much for the little parrot.
Barbara

Sam is awake and seems unaffected by her night of stardom. She did the barn run on Mikhail's shoulder and carried out her self appointed role of keeping the accompanying canines in line. Eating fine. Droppings normal. Guess the evening was not too much for the little parrot.
Barbara