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Why Get Involved?

© Mary Wilson

At our last bird club meeting, the question of getting new members involved arose once again. Several of the older members of our club are retiring, or scaling back their duties, leaving room for us younger members to step up to contribute our fair share. The number of bird organizations undoubtedly grows everyday, as does our need for humane programs, such as Finches With Wishes http://www.finches.org/ and the Humane Society.

As a young bird owner, or perhaps someone with a pet bird or two, you may be asking yourself what you might have to offer to a national or local bird organization. I can think of several things and will share them with you here, hoping that you might help out an organization or two.

The foremost thing that any bird owner brings to a group is the love of birds. Whether it's just a single parakeet or an entire house full of birds, each person can bring his or her own love of birds into the environment, and use that love to assist avian groups. Just one more person that cares for our feathered friends, is one more in a time of need.

In this age of "awareness," there are many animal rights groups that would seek to ban, or make bird ownership so unbelievably expensive that they might as well ban, bird ownership. Recently, bird owners were encouraged to drop by the USDA's website and write letters opposing a measure that would classify birds with laboratory animals, requiring stainless steel cages, separate food preparation areas, and other measures that would make bird ownership unfeasible for many of us. If every bird owner stood up for the love and joy our feathered children provide, we would have an army of caring so big, that we could stop these ridiculous groups for good.

Every bird owner brings experience to the bird club. Even a small child caring for a parakeet or cockatiel has experience with birds. I'm not talking about the "I've raised a hundred different mutations" type of experience, but the simple knowledge of proper care of birds. Granted, some bird owners have more experience than other, but that's another reason to get involved. Bird owners learn from each other. No one person knows everything about birds.

I've only listed a couple of reasons, but if you sat down and thought about it, there would be a lot that each of us could bring to an organization.

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