Re: Are there any reputable Cherry Headed Conure Breeders anywhere in the USA???
I live in State College, PA, about 3 hours from Ana...There are actually 2 women involved in this Bird Mill, that's what it is, a BIRD MILL! Ana is in Scranton-Wilkes Barre area, and her "partner", Lilly, is in Hazelton. I called Ana about a year ago, when I first started looking for my Senegal parrot. I wanted a baby that was hand-raised, and Ana had advertised one on her Facebook page. So I called her and she said I had to call her partner, Lilly, in Hazelton (about 2+ hours from me) because she had some baby Senegals. OK, so I called Lilly, left a message, and she called me back and told me that I had to set up a day and time to meet her at her "shop", that they don't just have an open shop...Her hours were just bizarre, and it just didn't feel right. These two women sell literally hundreds of birds every month, and breed literally EVERY SPECIES OF DOMESTIC BIRD IMAGINABLE! I'm not exaggerating at all, they breed every kind of pet bird you could think of, from different species of canaries and finches to every type of parakeet imaginable to every Poicephalus, Pionus, Cockatoo, Macaw, African Grays, every type of Conure, Quakers, Ringnecks, doves, pigeons, EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING YOU COULD WANT. So off I did to do some research. It got very sad from there on.
I spoke to dozens of people that had purchased birds from these two women, and the problem is that most of there business is done over the phone or the internet. People call them or get on their website, find the baby bird that they want, buy it, pay WAY OVER AVERAGE PRICE FOR THE BIRD online or over the phone, pay between $125-$200 for same day air shipping, and done. So most people never meet either woman, never see their facilities (this is what's sad), they see the photos of the baby birds or the ex-breeders they're selling that they post on their Facebook pages and their websites that seem to be taken in their own homes, and they just go along with it. The truth is was very startling to me and made me sick.
There aren't a lot of bird breeders in Pennsylvania, and I have an advantage being smack dab right in the center of the state, I can drive to any town or city in PA in less than 4 hours. I had to drive an hour and a half to Harrisburg to get my hand-raised cockatiel, so that's a good example of how sparse bird breeders are here in PA. But these two women, Ana and Lilly up in the Northeast corner of PA had every type of bird imaginable. I found an ad for an older woman selling 10 young English budgies, under a year old, in a huge flight cage with tons of supplies and equipment for under $300. The birds were beautiful! The woman lived in Altoona (35 minutes from me) and was an awesome lady that had purchased these birds as babies from a private breeder in Johnstown for her 14 year old niece, they were to be her 4H breeding project. This woman invested well over $1,000 in the bird's, the cage, brooders, etc. and was letting the birds stay at her home but her niece had agreed to come over twice a day to care for them until they were old enough to breed. This woman was retired and volunteered at the Humane Society, had had pet birds her entire life, and was really trying to help her niece out. Well the niece got a boyfriend and no longer wanted to do 4H! So she advertised the birds with all of the equipment, food, breeding supplies, everything for $300 to a good, experienced home only. I was still breeding budgies at the time, and I thought at worst they could live in my indoor aviary happily. We started talking and we have a mutual friend, small world stuff. She then told me she'd had them up for sale for 3 months because she was not getting people with any bird experience responding to her as, and she wanted the birds to go to only the best of homes. She drove the birds, cage, all of their stuff to my home 3 days later in her little hatchback even though I offered to drive my truck over to her. She wanted to see where her birds were going. She immediately approved, as did I, and we talked in my living room for hours. Turns out that Ana and Lilly both had called her about buying the birds (she knew they just wanted the cage and equipment for nothing). Well just like with me she drove the birds and all their stuff up to Scranton at her insistence and against Ana and Lilly's. She said their "shop" or "breeding facility" is nothing but a warehouse holding a massive bird mill. And that's only one of two locations. I won't go in to what it looked like but picture the worst bird mill you've ever seen and make it 10 times as large. That's Ana's Parrots in Scranton and Lilly's Parrots in Hazelton. She took her birds home, kept them for another 2 months until I called her, and she very willingly and thankfully gave them and all of the cages, equipment, food, etc. to me for free because I was finally a good home for her birds.
"Dance like nobody's watching..."
I'm hoping someone on here knows a reputable breeder to send me too. Any help will be very much appreciated. Thanks, Elisha Hilleary
