Sooty - Red Tailed Black Cockatoo
Those who know me well know I've always dreamt of having a black Palm Cockatoo. Sadly they are very rare to find in rescue and exceptionally expensive to buy. Imagine my excitement when I had the opportunity to buy a Red Tailed Black Cockatoo hand reared baby. The only problem was he was in Norfolk. But, undeterred, Stacey and I visited Norfolk one week-end and saw, and fell in love with the bird we later called Sooty. Sooty was hatched on 30 November 2017. Sooty was not fully weaned so we left him where he was to be fully weaned. Sooty's breeder usually bred aviary birds but on this occasion his pair layed a second egg and he knew the parents would only rear one, so he took the second bird and hand reared it. After a couple of weeks the breeder was due to go on holiday and leave Sooty with a
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friend. To avoid the stress of getting to know his friend and then getting to know us we decided it would be better for Sooty to come to us and for us to continue hand rearing him. This went much better than expected and he soon was fully weaned onto a pellet diet. He tries all varieties of fruit and veg - some he eats; some he plays with; and some he throws out but we are persistent! We harness trained Sooty while still a baby (the best and easiest way) and he soon got used to coming out with us. He has attended several shows and is always very popular being so unusual! When he is about 4 years old he will lose his white flecks and his colourful tail will become black with a plain red bar across it.