Hello, well Ramble I got excited about your article until I went to Petfinder.com and it only offers cats and dogs. I couldn’t find any links on birds. Update: I Googled Petfinder/birds and found the area, though they didn’t have any Goffins near me… on that 25 you found were there any Goffin Cockatoos??
I did however, go to BirdsNow and a few other sites. I looked into rehoming birds and was surprised to find very few that overall seemed healthy. I have two autistic sons so I have to be careful when it comes to bringing in new animals to our family. What surprised me the most is that even with rehoming their prices are about out of reach. The healthiest bird I found, the owners wanted $6,500 for their bird. Gone are the days where “free to good home” is an option.
So I did a little research, turns out our little beloved Goffins are having trouble breeding in captivity due to all the chaos of the world right now. Healthy breeding pairs are becoming difficult to find. As a result prices are going through the roof for the little ones and scammers are out making a quick profit from buyers lack of due diligence.
Point in case, I had went to two local websites, one located in Georgia and the other in Florida. The first sent me pictures via email and asked all the right questions. The second also asked varying questions which was expected. But then I pulled back and took a month off to reassess my decision and push through the holidays.
A month later I returned only to notice that the first website was no longer operating. I found that odd but moved on… I began my research again and found that another website had as their main stock photo an exact image of one that had been sent to me privately via email. It was easy to conclude this was their new website. So, I reached out to them only to notice their new address was different, their new phone number was by text only, no verbal communication. I found that odd. (They ghosted me after mentioning I recognized their old website). Moving on, I began to research and find Facebook posts of parrots and would you believe I found those original pictures of the parrots for sale from random, non-related happy families located in Concoon? In other words, they stole photos of Facebook posts and then sent them out as parrots for sale trying to collect money.
Moving on to #2… the second breeder, who also had a website advertising parrots, contacted me via text, sent pictures, asked the right questions… so, hesitant after the first encounter I did more thorough research. I noticed the aviary was listed on Google Maps, the phone number matched up with the locations’ area code… on the surface everything looked legit. But then came the red flags… he said that he would ship right to my door, no need for me to keep up with flight tracking, (but the price quoted didn’t include the cost of the extra delivery), and he wanted me to make payment via bitcoin. Hmmm??? I mentioned that I didn’t deal in bitcoin transactions. So then he said that he would accept PayPal but if paid by friends or family and I had to send him a screen shot of the payment confirmation for his records… well the problem with friends and family is there is no recourse for the transaction if it goes bad. You take full responsibility for the payment.
Moving on, something didn’t feel right. So again, I went searching. Would you believe I found the exact two birds for sale (same photo, that he said were only 22 weeks old) on an old ad from May 2021 via BirdsNow. That meant the sellers of that ad had advertised the same grown birds three months before they were even born! Kinda obvious it was a scam at that point. But then I found every picture he had sent me on randomly previous sold ads. One of the pictures was of a bird sold out of Michigan, another one from PA… and so on. Basically he stole pictures from the website and then sent to me representing himself as a breeder.
So here are my take aways… check the phone number and talk to them in person. That’s your first clue… then see how they want payment. If it is payment with no recourse, that’s another clue… third do your research and listen to your gut. If something doesn’t feel right then it probably isn’t. Finally if possible, go get the bird in person… don’t exchange funds until you have met the previous owner, whether rehoming or breeder, and verified the bird.
Just some thoughts passing along…
