Hot food

Last week, Max tried to help herself to some of our dinner (this recipe if anyone else has a butternut squash around that needs to be eaten -- it was delicious!)  It's hard to see in this picture, but the steam was preventing her from trying it (she ultimately did get some squash.)

This reminded us of a story from her chick-hood, almost 10 years ago.  We were very new to parrots and had only had her a couple of weeks.  We had made spaghetti noodles, so we gave her one.  But we weren't careful enough with the temperature to make sure it was cool enough first.

She gulped down the noodle without chewing; belatedly, she realized it was too hot, so she grabbed the end of the noodle with her foot and pulled the entire noodle out of her body.  It was so strange to see, and gave us a important lesson (that you think we would have known based on common sense) about making sure food is cool enough for them.

Now, every time she investigates food that's too hot, we ask her if she remembers the noodle incident from when she was a little chick.  I don't know if she does, but she is very careful to wait to eat something until it won't burn her.