World Parrot Refuge

With Heather’s kind permission, we are posting this letter to the website. Heather recently made the difficult decision to give her friend Bobbie a home for life amongst the love and companionship of our flocks.

Hi Wendy,

Again I am so sorry that I was not able to meet you yesterday, but Stephanie and all of your staff were absolutely WONDERFUL! I cannot say enough about them. No words can describe your facility, spectacular, amazing! She took me on a full tour. Made me feel really good about Bobbie’s new home. You are all angels to these birds.

My heartfelt thanks for everyone helping to make me feel better about my decision to leave Bobbie with you. I know that he will be well cared for and he will have a successful transition. You have such a special group of people assisting you in making your facility one that shows how much you all care and love the birds.

It was heartbreaking to leave him. Even though I know that he will have lots of love and attention, and he will make new birdy friends, it was very difficult to say goodbye, or to “see you later” as I prefer to think, as I will be back for visits if you don’t mind. The silence was deafening when I got home. He is an absolutely wonderful little bird who just needs to be around other birds now and I know you will all love him. I know that you are busy but I will be emailing you to see how he is progressing, so whenever you are able to, just drop me a quick email response. Please let me know if you need anymore information from me. As Stephanie said, “He has just gone off to bird college.”

Wendy, I want to thank you again. Keep up the wonderful work. You are a true advocate for our feathered friends who sometimes are forgotten. I have an incredible admiration and respect for all of you, for your undying dedication, selflessness and compassion that you show towards all of the birds.

“The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them. That’s the essence of inhumanity.”

Thank you.

Your new friend,
Heather

Unloading the Hagen donation.

In December, the World Parrot Refuge was blessed by an incredible donation of pelleted food courtesy of Mark Hagen, on behalf of the Rolf C Hagen Company. This nutritional diet was created by Mark, who operates HARI, the Hagen Avian Research Institute in Montreal. Mark also paid for the shipping of the donation. How can we convey our extreme gratitude for such a generous donation?

On one of the wettest days Vancouver Island has experienced in recent memory, the staff were on hand to take delivery of over four pallets of Tropican diet pellets. There were over a hundred 25 lb bags! Nobody was complaining about the weather though. The staff were laughing and in great spirits as they unloaded the pallets and stored the bags in a very dry and safe building. Even the truck driver was excited to be the bearer of such an incredible donation!

Tropican is already being used to supplement the parrots’ daily diet, and its fruity scent fills the Refuge! In the week prior to the donation, we received 12 new large parrots, 6 from a seizure by the Calgary Humane Society. Half of these birds are in really poor condition and the veterinary report says it is due to poor nutrition. We are hoping for a major improvement in these Scarlet Macaws, who are only 3 years old, and the nutrients in the Tropican will really help.

Thank you from the depths of our hearts to Mark Hagen and the Rolf C Hagen Company!

Our crew brave the cold and rain to unpack the Hagen donation.

As you may remember, the wonderful folk at Postal Depot 4, Langford, operate a concession on behalf of our parrot entrepeneurs, Ben and Andy. On Wednesdays, they also sell cookies at Depot 4 and Postal Depot 1, Victoria. We owe a big thank you to them, and a special thank you to the great people at Thrifty Foods, Broadmead, who provide double cookies for a reduced price, and have done so for the past year! A heartfelt thank you goes out to the caring people at Thrifty Foods, Broadmead!

We owe a big thank you to Dori Tomra of Prince George, who recently undertook a unique collection drive on our behalf. If you have ever shopped at Canadian Tire you will know that you receive Canadian Tire “money” towards future purchases. Many people don’t bother to use this “money”, so Dori collected $26.15 of it amongst her friends. This donation will help us to buy four new brooms, a mop, and some scrubbers. These are some of the essential cleaning supplies we go through each month at the Refuge, to keep the parrots’ residences clean and healthy.

Perhaps others will be inspired by Dori’s efforts to take up similar collections — to have fun while helping our special birds at the same time. Many thanks to Dori for sparking a creative fundraising effort for the Refuge!

What an eventful and wonderful week it has been! We have many thanks to give to some wonderful people who are helping to make a real difference by providing a home for life for our psittacine friends.

The very generous benefactors who donated the money for the new Macaw House visited us again and made another incredible donation! These dedicated bird lovers, who wish to remain anonymous, have changed the lives of so many birds. We are so grateful and indebted to them for their kindness.

Al and Ria – two of our special volunteers who come in five nights a week from 5.30 pm to 9 pm to hand feed more than 100 incoming and special needs birds, and then take those who cannot fly out for a walk in the evening sunshine – made another huge commitment. They donated $2000 to pay for Chi Chi Macaw’s surgery. They are now her virtual adoption sponsors. Thank you so much, Al and Ria.

We also received a further $584 from the great people at Postal Depot 4, Langford, and Postal Depot 1, Victoria. These funds are the proceeds from the goodie stores that these special folk operate on behalf of Ben, Maggie, and Andy Macaw. Well done and thank you, everyone!

The owners of the Century 21 Real Estate office in Slave Lake, Alberta, came to visit the four birds that they have rescued over the years and brought to the sanctuary to live in a flock lifestyle. They were thrilled to see how well the birds are doing. They also donated $500 for each bird for their annual virtual adoption support. Thank you – you are fantastic!

In more wonderful news, Teko, the Citron Crested cockatoo, has a new virtual family. Heather Clarkson – the full virtual adoptive mom of Moses the Greater Sulfur Crested cockatoo – is now paying a further $20 a month towards Teko’s support, and supplying all the peas he can eat! Huge hugs and thanks to Heather.

Christa Kangas has taken on the incredible responsibility of assisting with the cost of supporting Joey, the Congo African Grey. Thank you, Christa! You’ll be thrilled to know that he has beautiful red tail feathers now. We’ll post a new picture soon. Joey is so happy about it that he wants to show them off to you all!

Jane and Carmen, our volunteer webmasters, are now full virtual adoption sponsors who are helping to support our huge flight of beautiful lovebirds, including the fourteen new lovebird arrivals. This monthly pledge goes a long way towards all the food and cleaning care they need.

The staff, volunteers, and the parrots of the World Parrot Refuge send a huge thank you to everyone, and hope to see you at the Refuge soon!