A bird for $10--or $7500
Adoption fees are another way for rescuers to raise money, but few agree on how high they should be. If you do not charge enough, say some, it attracts people who want to adopt for all the wrong reasons. Charge too much, say others, and it smacks of profit.

Many organizations, such as the Parrot Education & Adoption Center in San Diego, prefer to charge nominal fees. PEAC asks for $10 for small parrots and $150 for macaws.

Bonnie Kenk of Parrot Education & Adoption Center in San Diego: She doesn't believe applicants who "jump through hoops" to adopt a bird should have to pay a large adoption fee.

"We make people jump through hoops to get a bird from us," explains PEAC coordinator Bonnie Kenk, "so we feel the least we can do is to make it affordable. That way, they'll have more money to spend on a large cage, toys, excellent vet care, and food."

At the other extreme, those who adopt a parrot from The Gabriel Foundation can expect to pay anywhere from $50 for a small bird such as a cockatiel to as much as $7500 for a rare hyacinth macaw.

Murad says the high fees go to pay the salaries of the Foundation's seven employees and to keep its 200 residents healthy and adequately housed.

The average Gabriel Foundation bird stays for 2 1/2 years, enjoying outdoor aviaries and an 8500-square-foot building equipped with five separate bird species rooms and play areas. In addition, Gabriel staffers lead public tours four days a week and run an on-site lab.

Parrot paradises
When not scrambling to meet the basic requirements of food and medical care, most parrot rehabilitators entertain fond dreams of expansion.

Usually, the dream includes multiple, sumptuously landscaped free-flight aviaries, a large staff, on-site veterinarians, and an attached psittacine education center for teaching school children and hosting conventions. The fantasy compounds are always located on big pieces of donated land somewhere in the country, far from disapproving neighbors.

One rescuer who has made the dream come true is Tonnie van Meegen of the Netherlands. A breeder who quit after many of the birds he sold met sad fates at the hands of their new owners, van Meegen started the Foundation Dutch Parrot Refuge 14 years ago with 20 birds in his attic.

Tonnie van Meegen feeds a few of the 2,200 residents of his parrot sanctuary in the Netherlands.

In 1990, the refuge moved to a 20-acre wooded campsite. There van Meegen enlarged and refined his sanctuary, attracting media attention and national support for his efforts along the way.

Today, the refuge accommodates 2,200 parrots representing over 170 species in some 250 cages and aviaries, including one that measures more than 9,000 square feet.

The refuge's 20 buildings include an animal hospital, an education center, and 10 quarantines. Signs in five languages identify the parrots and describe their natural habitat. Other orphaned animals, including kangaroos, ducks, emus and a pot-bellied pig, roam the zoolike setting of winding paths.

The Foundation owes its success to 40 volunteers and the generosity of the Dutch people, who each year donate the equivalent of $375,000 in cash and building supplies. Entrance fees to the park generate another $132,000 from an estimated 60,000 visitors, many of them tourists, and another $4500 trickles in from an onsite gift shop.

Although he hopes it will not be necessary, "We can expand to a maximum of 5,000 parrots," says van Meegen. "Everything will be financed by our donors and sponsors."

Next page | Ending the need for rescue | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Sidebar | Headed for a new home: Tips for adoption and surrender
Sidebar | Lend a hand to a rescue group
Sidebar | Mistreated animals: How you can help