Free flight with my conures, my story …
New article and a new story. This time around I would like to share with you the story of Molly Nae, an avid glider who practices free flight.
Recently while browsing Facebook, I came across one of these posts that caught my attention. I felt an urge to want to say more … So I did not hesitate to ask her to give her the floor on “Bird and You”. You will understand by reading his story below.
This is my story, My encounter with free flight
As a reminder, this article has no educational purpose and was not written with the aim of encouraging or not the practice of free flight.
I currently have 4 pairs of Molina conures living in an outdoor aviary. 1 couple eam and 3 couples epp. I have been doing free flights with my eam and an app for a year now.
I had absolutely no knowledge of this practice until I stumbled upon a few pictures by chance, and I found it fantastic, and magical. Being able to make our captive parrots fly freely was a dream to me.
I took here and there some testimonials, and advice with the aim of being able to do the same with mine.
At the time, I was not on social media and I must admit that I was totally unaware that the practice of free flight required training, conducted by professionals.
Home Socialization and education Free flight with my conures, my story …
Free flight with my conures, my story …
Younès March 1, 2020Socialization and education
New article and a new story. This time around I would like to share with you the story of Molly Nae, an avid glider who practices free flight.
Recently while browsing Facebook, I came across one of these posts that caught my attention.
I felt an urge to want to say more … So I did not hesitate to ask her to give her the floor on “Bird and You”. You will understand by reading his story below.
This is my story, My encounter with free flight
As a reminder, this article has no educational purpose and was not written with the aim of encouraging or not the practice of free flight.
I currently have 4 pairs of Molina conures living in an outdoor aviary. 1 couple eam and 3 couples epp. I have been doing free flight with my eam and an epp for a year now. I had absolutely no knowledge of this practice until I stumbled upon a few pictures by chance, and I found it fantastic, and magical. Being able to make our captive parrots fly freely was a dream to me.
Conure flying
I took here and there some testimonials, and advice with the aim of being able to do the same with mine.
At the time, I was not on social media and I must admit that I was totally unaware that the practice of free flight required training, conducted by professionals.
Free flight with my conures
I, therefore, embarked on this adventure on my own and I strongly advise all those attracted by this practice to train with a competent person.
I, therefore, give you my approach and my feelings, which are only binding on me, and am in no way the spokesperson for this practice.
As written above, I do a free flight with my pyrrhura conures. Small parrots around 80g. Beautiful small prey, in the Somme …
I live in a mountainous region, at the top of a hill, in a very open area. A few trees and a border 100m away.
At first, I thought the spot was ideal, but I quickly changed my mind. It actually offers a real playground for our raptors.
On outings, conures spend more time in trees chewing and clowning than flying. A wooded area would be more suitable, although this will not stop a hawk.
My conures, living outdoors, are desensitized to as many things as possible. They know the sky and the biggest birds that fly above them.
They know the sounds of construction sites, the excavators, and the helicopters that graze our house.
All this does not scare them away. In addition, being extremely territorial, they are very attached to their place of life as well as to their social group, so they have no interest in leaving.
How to free flight train a bird
Risk 0 does not exist!
However, this practice absolutely requires and requires training. Our small parrots are very complex, there are a lot of things to understand correctly before getting started.
You should know that 99% of the time, the outings go very well. The risk lies in the remaining 1% which most of the time does not forgive. The free flight should not be a necessity but a “plus”.
By this, I mean that your birds should live in a spacious aviary, which should meet all needs if it is set up correctly and their food is adequate.
When the outing is over, after 15 min as after 2 hours, I call them and they come immediately, I take them to the aviary door which I open a few inches and they sneak in.
It wasn’t easy to teach them how to fit into such a tight space, let alone my epp, but they quickly learned. The weather changes very quickly.
This requires being able to shorten the exit and return them in a few seconds. A gust of wind and your conure can be blown very high, so high that it can get lost and never come back.
My conure victim of a predator
Free flight conure pyrrhura
One of my conures got caught by a hawk. This same hawk tried to take two other conures from me. They fled and remained hidden a few hours before returning, luck!
The hawk is a formidable predator that appears out of nowhere that humans do not frighten and which can lift a bird over 500g.
When I am with my birds outside, our relationship is multiplied, they are linked to me and me to them.
They work in groups but also in a very close connection with me. And that feeling, that adrenaline, becomes an easy drug to get addicted to.
I wonder about the practice of free flight !!!
I question myself, constantly. Who am I doing it for? For them? Or for me? Are the risks I put at risk worth it? Is it selfish of me?…
To conclude, given my journey, my flight location, and the loss of one of my beloved conures, and free flight leaves me with a bitter aftertaste and I am not today ‘hui not sure to want to continue …
Free flight bird training
SOURCE: Margaux Deman