SASKATOONEXPRESS - April 9-15, 2018 - Page 1
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Saskatoonʼs REAL Community Newspaper
Volume 17, Issue 14, Week of April 9, 2018
Finding forever homes for feathered friends
Cam Hutchinson Saskatoon Express anet Gibson and Tara Nordmarken laughed at times and were sombre at others while sharing bird stories. They talked about a parrot named Eeyore. One day, while in Nordmarken’s care, Eeyore was overly aggressive when taking a nut from her fingers. Nordmarken wasn’t happy and grabbed the nut right out of Eeyore’s strong beak. She said, in no uncertain terms, that bad behaviour would not be tolerated and rewarded. “WOW,” Eeyore yelled. “WOW.” Then there is Ernie, a 40-year-old parrot who must have been a construction worker in another life. Whenever a woman walks past Nordmarken’s home or she has him out at a show, he does a wolf whistle. Try explaining to a woman that the whistler is a bird. “Yeah, right.” Nordmarken and Gibson are at the helm of Saskatoon Parrot Rescue. They are busy women. In the first six weeks of this year, they had 41 birds surrendered to them. Many of these are big birds like parrots and cockatiels. The two have been on the frontline since last July when the person previously running the organization moved to Toronto. The two were board members and decided the rescue program was much too important to let go. Birds are given up for a number of reasons, they said. A lack of education is a big one. People purchase birds because they are pretty, they talk and they’re on YouTube. There have Aaron been times when NordAS040909
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Tara Nordmarken, holding a parrot named Ernie, and Janet Gibson run Saskatoon Parrot Rescue. (Photo by Cam Hutchinson.) marken, who lives in Rosthern, has gone into pet stores to give employees a lesson about housing birds and has been told to leave. “It ticks me off. It makes me angry,” she said. “I would go there and see there were rodents beside birds beside rabbits. That can’t happen. When somebody touches the cockatiel and then touches a rabbit and comes back and touches a bird, it’s all cross-contamination.” She said selling a bird and handing the
buyer a pamphlet doesn’t cut it. “It’s here’s my money, here’s your animal, goodbye.” People have no idea that some of these birds will live to be 80 years old, she added. “It’s a lifelong commitment. It’s like having a child. You will end up passing away before the bird does.” Ernie came into Nordmarken’s care when his owner died.
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“You get this bird living forever and the kids don’t want it, what do you do with it?” Gibson asked. Nordmarken estimated that about 80 per cent of surrendered birds came from good homes. Death, divorces and changes in life are among the reasons for giving up a bird. “How do you say no? It’s not the animal’s fault. We have to advocate for the animal; we’re their voice,” she said. (Continued on page 4)
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