When any animal shows fear, whether it be a dog, cat, bird, whatever, it takes a lot of patience to turn that fear around. We have two fearful animals in our house, our Golden Retriever, Honey, and our Cockatiel, Milly. We have learned to cautiously approach them, not to startle them, and provide them the calmest best environment that we can. I don't think Milly or Honey will ever be truly comfortable, but we love them to pieces and accept their personalities the way they are.

Milly hisses on occasion. But I have learned her moods and I have learned to live with her quirks. What I don't do is try to force her into any situation that makes her uncomfortable. She doesn't like us to get her out of her cage, so we let her climb out on her own. She adores our other bird, Roger, and only wants to be near him. They have separate cages, but spend most of their time out of their cages, eating and preening each other, as well as singing to each other. She has learned to "step up" onto my finger and now she is even learning to fly over to my shoulder. We NEVER expose her or Roger to any of our other animals (cats and dogs). We have been working with Milly for almost a year now, but her background is unknown, except that she was basically ignored for a long, long time.

Milly and Roger love leafy green lettuce. They love pasta too, and their newest thing to love is Total Cereal and Cheerios (thank you PCB).

The point of this epistle is that I think you need to settle down, and understand that this bird may not be exactly what you want him to be, but he can be happy and satisfied, and you CAN befriend him, but just maybe not in the way you want to. I would definitely keep his wings clipped so that he can't fly and injure himself. That will cause him to be even more frightened. Play soft music during the day in the room where he is. And KEEP him isolated from the dogs and other animals. Spend time with him, even if you're just in the room talking with him and doing something else.

I hope that you will learn to love him, regardless of his personality, and do your best to make him feel safe.

We all can't have the wonderful, personable birds that Popcornbird has, but we can enjoy the ones we do have and provide them love, warmth, good things to eat and toys to play with. Remember, Popcorn and Muffin are Popcornbird's only pets and she spends a tremendous amount of time with them. They didn't get to be the way they are overnight.

Logan