Aviary Adventure

Here are some phone photos (not the greatest - but we had to record this fun!!) of a cool adventure from last week. Each week we are looking for a local fun adventure to do together. Last week I took the 4 boys to the Aviary in Liberty Park. It had been a couple years since our last visit.
First we toured the park looking at the different birds. The boys copied the bobbing head of a silver tailed pheasant, and admired a pair of swan parents. The dad was purposefully pulling small branches of leaves off a low tree and making a pile - presumably to cover the 3 large eggs in the nest. Mama swan carefully tended to her eggs, never taking her attention from them. Colin was mesmerized by these large beautiful birds.
Next we went to a bird show. Large birds of prey flew over our heads demonstrating all different sorts of behavior. We learned that falcons fly 200 miles per hour in a dive, and punch other birds out of the air. A large running emu made us all laugh. Scotty thought the owl looked mad.

Lastly we went to the Amazon Adventure (this is what the photos are from). For a small extra fee, we were able to feed these beautiful amazon birds. About 30 red, yellow and green birds perched on branches above us. The boys held pieces of apples in their hands, and the birds landed on their arms to gently eat the apples bite by bite. Once Jacob had four birds on his arm! Scotty was excited to have 2. Michael had a bird that wanted to climb his shirt, using his beak to hold on. Colin again was mesmerized by these beautiful flying birds! Fun family day!!