# Elwen - progress report



## NatalieZ (Jul 4, 2014)

Dear all

With sincere apologies for not having posted for months (life has been hectic), I now attach some pictures of Elwen taken this morning. Not the best but she is not good at sitting still!

She is doing really well. She is very friendly and confident (excessively so) and her vocabulary has expanded a lot. As well as 'buttercup' and 'budgie' she now says 'lemon chops', 'how are you doing?' and 'big beak' as well as a lot of incoherent babble!!

Thanks for reading. I do have one more question - how come here cere has never gone brown or changed texture? I understood that this is what happens with females? She has been with us for a year and a half now.

Natalie
x


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## FaeryBee (May 9, 2011)

*I'm so glad to hear Elwen is doing well. 
She looks beautiful in her pictures!*


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## NatalieZ (Jul 4, 2014)

Thank you. She is beautiful and she knows it!

Out of interest, do you know why her cere never goes brown or changes in texture?


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## FaeryBee (May 9, 2011)

*Some females ceres don't change color or texture - especially if you are doing a great job in preventing any mating/breeding type activity.

My Seffra's cere doesn't change in color or texture. *


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## NatalieZ (Jul 4, 2014)

Phew. Glad to hear we are not doing anything wrong. She really is a happy, contented and attentive little pest!

We were recently on holiday in Jamaica. In one of the hotels there were two budgies, both female, in two separate cages hanging outside the hotel and exposed to all the elements. The cages were small, dirty and had no toys. One, a lovely blue budgie, was so stressed she had pulled almost all of her breast feather out. The other, pastel yellow like Elwen, was in a cage so rusty that the tips of her tail/wing feathers and her head were rusty red (where she had been rubbing against the cage). She was very skittish also.

I had a word with the owner, showed him pictures and videos of Elwen and pointed out, as politely as possible, that budgies are not just ornaments. He promised to improve their surroundings and get new cages. Meanwhile, my husband and I went into the town, found a bird shop and got them some toys which we hung in the cages.

It really makes me so sad that people have such little regard for budgies. The owner was not a nasty person, he just didn't think and the staff hadn't even noticed the feather pulling. We had to leave that day but I hope that the toys at least made a bit of a difference. Elwen does not know that she is born!!


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