Since Zazu grew his flights in and began flying a couple of years ago, he's always been eager to fly to me, not always at convenient times... if i'm studying or doing an art project everything goes fluttering to the ground in the sweep of B&G wings - he's always been a bit of a velcro bird.

Zazu has always enjoyed retrieving, and picked up flighted retrieve pretty quickly once he learned to hang on to his retrieve object (he kept dropping it enroute). So i thought the next logical step might be "get it" (fly to perch where object is waiting) and then "bring it" (fly back to me with the object). Today he did this chain three times in a row just for fun before demanding a walnut. Pretty fun. Lately i've been having him retrieve pieces of paper. i can retire and he can support me as a winged panhandler...

One of these days i'm going to have to set up a web cam. Zazu has invented a new pastime: he takes the sleeve of an old sweatshirt of mine tied to his playgym, works it through his beak to the cuff, then flies across to another perch still holding the end of the sleeve in his beak.

Twice now in as many weeks Zazu has startled and flown off into neighborhood trees. Yesterday he took off over my back fence, always my worst fear as i lose sight of him quickly, but turned to circle back and wound up in a tree a few houses up the street.

Zazu seems to be hitting puberty, or something. One day he's ridiculously clingly, flying across he room to snatch my car keys from my hand in an effort to prevent my leaving... the next he's opening Mouse's cage for a game of chase while i'm at work.

Since Zazu's adventure in the neighbor's tree i admit that i've been nervous about taking him outside, and anyway the weather wasn't really cooperating... i realized i wasn't comfortable anymore just strolling out with him as i have done... have to mentally prepare myself, load pockets with graded treats and car keys (urban reality bites: my neighbor probably wouldn't mind my fence climbing antics, but who knows about the complete strangers not much further along, as the macaw flies)... i was actually wondering about the wisdom of letting him grow his flights in and encouraging him to use his wings, all the while knowing that it's too late to turn back - i can't very well go clipping him now, it would break his heart.

Zazu's latest favorite fun thing to do is to fly to my shoulder, deftly (and gently) remove an earring, and fly off with it to a perch where he blackmails me for it's return. He's become very quick and sneaky at this. He's an ace retriever and i taught him to "trade" objects for nuts when he was snatching my glasses off and destroying them. But flightedness adds a whole new level to the game.

We had a sunny break in the rain today and i played hookey with Zazu. We were practicing recalls in the back yard when he suddenly turned in flight and went sailing over my back fence, landing in a neighbor's tree.

...are really, really short distances. i had him outside for the first time in a couple of weeks this afternoon since we are having a brief break in the rain. He was excited to be out but pretty nervous too; it took some patient coaxing to get that first short hop. On his second recall he overshot and went sailing on past me, but as he wasn't in a panic but had merely miscalculated he made no attempt to gain altitude and glided for several yards, ending with a nice low and much more graceful landing than i would have thought possible. Outside we are starting at roughly 1/4 his comfortable indoor distance.

Some of you with more experienced fliers are probably going to laugh at this, but... Zaz is giving me grey hair! It feels like he went from perch potato to junior space cadet overnight, so unlike Mouse, who seemed to take the whole flight thing in stride, with day-by-day skill-building.