A Revelation - Fluff's Identity

On one of the beautiful days of Autumn back in 1996, our family welcomed a new member to our home, a lovely yellow-orange colorful hand-fed Cockatiel. it was a gift given by my sister and James cousin. The Cockatiel was boarded on an airplane with my parents flying over 3,000 miles across the US continent in a cardboard box. We in Walnut, California were excited but weren't prepared of what to do.

At the time of his arrival, Fluff was only four months old. We adored him very much but weren't sure how to handle him, and he was visibly nervous and agitated being in an unfamiliar environment. As time went on, we adapted to each other. He loves eating from our palms, hanging out on our shoulders, snuggling and rubbing his head against our hair. He is especially fond of us giving him message on his yellow head and orange cheeks.

Every weekend like clockwork, he will be whistling out loud early in the morning and make sure we take him out of his cage. Time passes and in a blink of an eye, Fluff is now twelve years old. He is always in good health and we make sure he has a lot of exercise by having him flying around the house several rounds a day. Occasionally, James will take him out of the cage and do a wrestling match. We ( James and I) always enjoy several rounds of frivolous provoking of Fluff, the idea is to stimulate his senses lest it should become senile since he is fast approaching the advancing age. On average, the Cockatiel's lifespan is about fifteen years.

Two weeks ago, he started a very strange behavior. He chewed up all the newspaper covering the bottom of the cage and curl up itself in a protective posture. Every time we tried to get him out of the cage, he attacked us vehemently. We thought Fluff was crazy and we joked that Fluff might be depressed since he now entered into the midlife crisis. We simply brushed off his odd behavior offhandedly.

Last Sunday night, while James and I were again curiously observing his behavior, suddenly when he was ready to attack, James looked, Lo and Behold, there were two eggs in the cage. We were both shocked and incredulous of what's happening. Fluff, a "He" that we were so sure of for the last twelve years, laid two eggs. I told James, this is serious. How could a single male Cockatiel lay eggs? We immediately searched the Internet for answer, and it turns out that "he", is definitely a "she", and it was not uncommon for single female to lay eggs at all. The fact that Fluff has very bright, unfading orange cheeks and yellow feather for all these years fooled us all.