A wee budgie in a cage, a constant companion of a crofter.

No 213.

There was in my youth neither croft nor cottage that did not have a cage with a budgie or a canary. Some had more than one. Some had fancier birds, tropical ones taken home by some sea-farer on a wind-jammer from far away places. A visitor would be greeted with a song or two, magical music indeed. Sometimes the wee bird would just have a ball all on its own for no reason at all, just feeling good. It was a constant companion for many an old buddie sitting beside the peat fire, no longer fit enough to go far out the door but still in many cases as mentally bright as ever, still good for an after-day-set. A wee dram or a drop of homebrew on a visit was very much accepted too, or just a cup of hot sweet tea if you liked that better!!.

The cage would be religiously tended, water renewed daily in a small drinker, fresh bird seed in a tray, the cage cleaned out as need be. Small carran or runch seeds from under the theshing mill did just as well for feeding, and cost nothing.
I remember a few specials. Head of the list was “Cheep Cheep”,. an unfledged sparrow chick that fell out of a nest on the farm with my sister Anne in Aka Aka in New Zealand. We were introduced to it on our first visit there in 1978. Anne’s son Stuart took it under his care, housed it at first in a box lined with cotton wool to keep it warm, fed it with small bits of bread soaked in milk whenever the wee thing cheeped. Which was often!! Hence the name.
Stuart brought it up to become a handsome fully fledged flyer, even if it was a humble sparrow.
A cage was there for it but it was often allowed full range in the room, settling on ones head sometimes with rather spectacular results!!! Beat Brylcream hands down!!! Cheep Cheep lived for ten years, a ripe old age for a sparrow.

It was followed after its decade by a budgie which we saw on our next visit to New Zealand in 1993. The budgie was taught by my brother-in-law Sandy Muir to deliver a very good wolf whistle. Once when Sandy had badly damaged his leg and the District Nurse was there to dress the wound, she, a mid aged and buxum lady I believe, was bending down to her task over Sandy in a shortish skirt. Budgie let out an his outrageous wolf whistle, particularly well timed, I believe. A never to be forgotten moment of high merriement. The nurse, a single lady, once she had recovered her composure, said she had never been so well whistled in all her life, and had indeed been rather giving up hope!!!

In Australia in January 2006 with brother David in Pemberton in the South West corner of Western Australia we were visiting for dinner a nearby friend of his. He had a splendid parrot. At dinner I thought someone was mocking something I had just said. Indeed it was so, sounded like a tape recording it was so exact. It was the parrot, capable of the most extreme mimicry, both words and accent. And the bird kept on mocking or repeating someone every now and then throughout dinnrer. I never heard the like.

In Stronsay there were many wee cage birds of one kind or another. We were however never allowed one for ourselves. There was always some little birdling that fell out of a nest, most were seen to by the farm cats, some we took indoors in an attempt to raise it to aduothood, we never quite managed !!
What we did have was small wild ducks, usually mallard, captured at St Peter’s Loch next the old Cemetary down by the beach. I know, we should not have taken them, but we were boys. Sometiimes a mallard (stock duck) nested and hatched up in a stack in the cornyard, the wee hatchlings falling to ground. This they survived, light enough to survive the fall, but if left there on the ground the farm cats would take care of them.
So we had small hutches of chicken wire usually used or rearing chickens, but pressed into service for our orphaned ducklings. Our success rate was mixed, but the main enemy was rats who burrowed under the cage and destroyed our little friends all too often.

Breeding cage birds was a pasion with many people, as still it is. Bird shows, classes for caged birds at the local Island Show in all their many different breeds, fierce competition for the top prize, Caithness Shows too.
Criticism of the judge of course who was always totally blind to the wonderful attributes of a particular bird of some competitor. Or else was over friendly with the eventual winner’s wife!!!
The range of birds to be seen was spectacular, and still is today.
But, in spite of all the spectacular plumage of the exotics. the wee canary in the crofter’s kitchen is still my favourite