Aussie Finch Forum

I have just been thinking about all the fun...good &great adventures I have had with bird people........
A few years ago I was living & working in London & I was lucky enough that my time in London coincided with the World Parrot Convention in Tenerife (Canary Islands)
It also was my first experience with "Bird People"...
I have to say that, of all the people I have met in my forty one years, the most generous and fun people are people who love birds.
There's something about people, who are from all walks of life, getting together, and discussing their passion....(I know that true of most about most passions) BUT people who either own birds (or hope to again) & breed them....we are a different breed.
Has anyone out there, got any good & safe stories to tell?

Cheers,
Ripley (Christopher)

Yes Ripley ( believe it or not ) I do have stories HOWEVER people might think I'm a bit DIFFERENT if I tell them .

Best kept in the vault me thinks . Looking forward to other peoples yarns though.

Jusdeb,
I agree, somethings definately should be kept in the vault....I'm lucky enough to know that most of the incrimiating things that I have been up to, was recorded on VHS & now we have Blu-Ray or DVD....so I am hoping they will never see the light of day!

Cheers,
Ripley

Yes Ripley ( believe it or not ) @ Deb

A short story to prove a point.
A couple of years ago I was collecting, using a garden rake, grass for my birds in the middle of a empty lake. It was 7.30 am on a sunday morning which coincided about the same time of day when dozens of local people walked or rode bikes around the lake foreshore for exercise. The weird looks, finger pointing and hand gestures that I seen was amazing. On occasions people would leave the walking track and travel out across the muddy ground to see and ask what I am doing. I normally answered: the grass is for my birds, for staving cattle, rabbits, environmental studies, what ever crossed my mind. I was so self absorbed in bagging grass that the fly's, bugs, brown snakes and rapidly increasing temperature did not stop me. Then a elderly man walking past, yelled out "swamp grass for your finches" and gave a thumbs up. He then yelled out at the top of his lungs "what types of finches do you have". We answered each other questions a couple of times, then he kept walking around the lake.
In typical fincho tradition, I thought to myself latter on, a total stranger now knows my name, roughly where I live, what type of birds I own, what birds I have for sale, and if he had a pen probably my phone number. If it was not for the common link of owning finches/birds I would never supply or would not want to know information about some weirdo(it takes one to know one) raking grass in the middle of the lake. Would you?

You are right wagga, I would never in a million years just start chatting to a bloke I saw in KMart or Woolies, but after walking out from the local bird place behind someone who had just bought some birds we spent a good 45 mins chatting in the street.

I talk to total stranges everywhere. Both professionally and privately. But that's me.
LML

I have on occasion been admiring birds at the local pet shop and notice a like minded person standing beside me doing the same .

Awkward moments where your not sure if its going to be a race to see who puts dibs on the birds first or that other moment where someone says " nice birds "
followed by "yes indeed " another moment or two and we know each others names and phone numbers and that we both breed that same type of bird .

This is usually followed up with visits to each others aviaries and birds bought /sold or swapped ...Bloody true has happened 3 times and Im sure will happen again .

Oh sorry Ian ( pet shop owner and a world of knowledge on all things birdy ) .

Oh more birdy attracting birdy ...My other has a list of peoples names and numbers just from talking to them at work .

Needless to say pert near all my birds are sold by word of mouth ...

Nice stories you guys! I once spoke to two nice old men the other weekend about the finches I keep, and we were all having a loverly conversations about zebra finches. I found out they did not know a lot about them, and they had asked if I knew the difference between male and female. So for 5 minutes, we were all crowded around the cages spotting all the males and females.

Also, I went walking around the block with my dog, a bucket in one hand, and was stopping every few feet to collect the milk thistle and dandelions. Coco, being the good girl that she is, was walking around off leash, and I just had to say 'Stop, sit, stay' when I noticed a nice healthy clumo of milk thistle. Anyway, I found a lot of people were very confused in what I was doing! The stares I got!

Next weekend, and this week, I am sticking up a few finch forum flyers I just printed out around Werribee and Bayswater, so if anyone chances to see a brown haired girl sticking up 'Aussie Finch Forum' flyers, please say hello! Hopefully I might meet some people too!

[quote="jusdeb"]I have on occasion been admiring birds at the local pet shop and notice a like minded person standing beside me doing the same .

Awkward moments where your not sure if its going to be a race to see who puts dibs on the birds first [quote]

I get that feeling. I feel like shouting 'MINE!" all of a sudden