New video of the Babies

I am not sure how to embed these nice YouTube videos. So instead I will paste in the link and hope that it will take you there! Notice baby #3, who is the youngest, but who is so precocious! It never ceases to amaze me how these babies change from one day to the next, or even from the start of the day to the end of the day. It is such a miracle to see them developing. In so many ways their development parallels a human infant! Not surprising because they have the same Creator!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-KNYnV-TUc

I am really excited about all the color this baby is showing already. I have never had a baby who showed so much red at this stage! He is definitely going to be colorful! Java has a lot of red on his wings but it does not show all the time. I hope I can get a good picture of Java.

Hard to believe the difference a week makes

Baby Bird update

Lot's more color today

Today saw new changes! All of the birds are showing more color, but #2 showed the beginning of some very bright red and yellow on the front of his wings. I don't think I've ever seen so much red on a baby this age! #1 has a lot more green showing on his pin feathers today and notice the beginnings of some tail feathers!! The green tips coming out of his pin feathers look like little paint brushes dipped in emerald green!

I loved the picture of all three babies looking at the Marguerittaville sign. They definitely are alert and love bright colors! One can kind of imagine they are planning where they will go when they are ready to fly! I do believe that early stimulation of their minds helps them to develop more intelligence. I never would have thought that I would apply my background in early child development and speech therapy to the upbringing of baby parrots, but it really has helped!

Brotherly love and affection

The first picture gives a really good comparison of their sizes and development.

In the second picture, you can see where the coloring on baby #3's forehead is beginning to show. It looks like he will have more color on his head than the other two!

Here is a picture of #2 giving his older sibling an affection grooming on the face. Their awareness of one another is very clear! Baby amazons are very expressive of their emotions even from a really young age. These babies are only 3 weeks old and yet they are already beginning to use their beaks to touch, taste and feel things! The oldest one has started caressing my fingers with his beak and giving me tender little kisses.

The fourth picture is of baby #2 and #3 cuddled together. They defnitely like the closeness, which I am sure preserves their body temperatures. I am very cautious of keeping them an appropriate temperature at this stage, because they do not yet have downy covering. The room in which I care for them is in the upper 80's and they are not left out of the incubator for long at a time. But the temperature in the room is not very different from their incubator temperatures at this point. When they are fully feathered they will be able to tolerate room temperatures much better.

Aren't they just sweet?

This baby seems to be saying, "I am the oldest! Why does she insist on treating me like an infant!" Just look at my big feet! They were made for walking! Well, at least for now! But this baby is eager to get on with the business of life and if only those feathers would grow faster, he would be all for taking off for the skies!! That is not all there is to his personality though, he loves neck rubs and just melts when I offer a good beak rub and neck scratch! The beak is also changing daily, and taking on more and more of the shape of an adult Amazon beak! The lower beak is becoming more narrow and less of a "shovel!" Now why can't they just get in their feathers all nice and evenly? Those bald patches are a little embarassing! But it won't be long!

Or is it only a face that a mother could love? Again true to personality at this stage, #1 is off exploring and #2, and #3 are behaving nicely for the camera! Notice the appearance of distinct pins on #3! He will soon be hard to tell apart from the other two! The age difference on the babies is pretty easy to tell at this point because #1 is clearly showing the other two the way! They do seem to watch one another quite a bit and tend to copy cats. This has caused some problems for #3 who can't do everything his older siblings are able to do!

Family Portraits

You know how there is always one kid who won't hold still for a family portrait? Well, this is the one! #1 is already showing that incredible Amazon determination to do what he gets in his head to do! I kept repositioning the babies and #2, #3 stayed put really nice for me, but #1 continued to move himself over where he wanted to play with the shiny satiny material of the comforter. I thought he was just slipping at first but when he got there it was clear that he knew what he was doing all along!