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Living In Bird Land

CANDACE C. MUNDY/TAMPA TRIBUNE PHOTO

Rose Bock, of Tampa Bay Avian Center, spends some personal time with "Casper", a Triton cockatoo.

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By STEPHEN HAMMILL, The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 24, 2007

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KEYSTONE - Rose Bock had no experience with birds when she met her husband, Scott, 15 years ago.

She was a trained paralegal. He had just moved from Indiana, where he was breeding exotic birds in the snow.

'When we met I fell in love with him and the birds, and I hated my job,' she said, 'so I started tending to them.'

Now she runs the Tampa Bay Avian Center, on 5 acres off North Mobley Road, where she cares for 80 pairs of breeding birds.

'Basically, I breed macaws, cockatoos; I breed African greys, Amazons and their subspecies,' she said.

The birds, mostly colorful, many large, some rare, share a common trait: They make noise.

C.B., also known as 'Crooked Beak,' a blue and gold macaw, likes to chatter.

'I'd be in the office doing paperwork,' Bock said, 'and I'd go, 'La la la la!' and he'd answer, 'La la la la!''

When rubbed on the neck, C.B. responds, 'Mmm, good.'

Others greet Bock as she walks past the cages, vying for a little attention. 'They'll say 'good morning' when you get up,' Bock said.

They learn to speak from listening to people. It is mostly mimicry, but some owners are certain their birds understand them.

This time of year Bock is moving birds and refitting nest boxes in preparation for the mating season. The cooler weather is welcomed by all.

'They roost in the mountains, which are very cold,' she said. 'They actually hate the heat.'

In the wild, the birds raise their own, but here Bock pulls the eggs and brings them indoors to her nursery. This tends to encourage more egg production. It also causes hard feelings.

'Some of them hate me because I steal their eggs,' Bock said.

Not all do. Casper, a Triton cockatoo, got into trouble when her mate, MacGyver, started plucking out her feathers. Casper started doing it to herself, too.

'It's a behavioral thing,' Bock said. 'Sometimes they just fight each other and we have to separate them.'

The solution: Bock cut a hole in a plastic bowl and placed it around Casper's neck to keep her from plucking more feathers.

'She was so gentle; she just let us do it without a peep,' Bock said.

Casper is so in love with the attention, Bock said, she's trying to be a pet. Bock's husband is considering the idea.

'All of these birds here, and I don't have a pet,' he said.

The couple also raise German shepherds and chickens. A Florida-based distributor buys 85 percent of the aviary's newborn stock. Bock also sells exclusively to three pet stores in New York, Virginia and Michigan.

She tries to keep the individual sales to a minimum. Parents often will buy their child an exotic bird without realizing the investment that goes into it.

'I don't do much retail because I have trouble with that,' Bock said. 'They'll call back three weeks later, and I'll end up having to take them back.'

For a pet, she recommends the hawk-headed parrots.

'They look like a hawk and have an Indian headdress,' she said. 'They're very sweet. They like to clown around, lie on their backs and let you pet them.'

The breeding birds' wings are not clipped. If the cages are left open they fly off, which happens from time to time. Most return, however, to be with their mates. The couplings can last years, even decades.

Mr. and Mrs. Blue, 15-year-old Hyacinth macaws, started mating for Bock three years ago. Native to the forests of central South America, the Hyacinth macaw is the largest flying parrot species in the world. A classified endangered species, they can live to be 100. They're the smartest birds in the aviary and the most aggressive.

'There are about 2,000 of these left in the world,' Bock said.

Mr. and Mrs. Blue's babies are valued at $9,000 to $12,000. Bock keeps her address out of advertisements to avoid bird theft. Most of her breeding birds were caught in the Australian wild, before that country adopted stricter exportation laws.

Scott Bock has been working with exotic birds for 25 years, getting his start at a 65-year-old aviary in Indiana. He relocated to Florida in 1989 and a year later began building Tampa Bay Aviary from the ground up.

He later started a landscape company, and after marrying in 1992, left the day-to-day care of the birds to his wife.

'People told me, 'Don't get into that; you're going to hate it; it's a 24-7 job,' but I love it,' she said. 'Plus, we have a handicapped son now grown, and it allowed me the chance to spend time at home with him.'

Bock is up in the middle of the night for feedings. She turns the eggs in the nursery every day. She mixes her own feed to save money - about 400 pounds' worth costs her $225 a month.

'You couldn't do this if you didn't love it,' she said. 'It's a lot of work.'

Walking past the Blue-front Amazons, Bock exchanges laughter with them.

'Hello!' they say, then, watching her go, 'Bye-bye!'

For information, call the Tampa Bay Avian Center at (813) 920-9334.

Reporter Stephen Hammill can be reached at (813) 865-1523 or at shammill@tampatrib.com.

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