Lost Bird Reunited With Owner After It Joined A Backyard Easter Party And Started Talking

When Brent Chadwell got a call from his girlfriend saying that his five-year-old pet parrot Tiki had gotten out of their house in Cape Coral, Florida, earlier this month, he assumed the worst. 

“I thought, ‘There’s a 50% chance that something eats him,’” Chadwell told McClatchy News of his immediate reaction to losing his “super friendly” Solomon Island eclectus parrot. 

“He would just walk right up to an alligator and get eaten,” he added. “He has no concept of, ‘Oh this thing might try to eat me so I have to get away from it.’ He’s only been cuddled or loved.”

Despite his fears, Chadwell immediately got to work on finding Tiki. He spent hours searching, told neighbors to keep a lookout for the little bird, and posted pictures of him on local Facebook groups for lost pets.

On Easter Sunday, three days after Tiki went missing, Chadwell received a Facebook message from someone saying that his beloved parrot had been found.

“I just immediately started crying because I was so happy,” he told McClatchy.

It turns out that Tiki was not far from home, and was found in the backyard of a family having an Easter party. Reed Schweizer told ​​WBBH-TV that he started hearing “peekaboo” over and over again, and when he turned around, there was Tiki.

“That’s how he greets people,” Chadwell explained to the local news station. “That’s definitely Tiki’s way of telling them, ‘Hey. I need help.'”

As luck would have it, the man’s sister, who happens to be a vet tech, was visiting from Housotn. She was able to get Tiki to step on her hand and bring him inside for some food and water. A quick Facebook search connected the family to an elated Chadwell.

“He was so happy, he yelled, ‘Peekaboo,’ he pressed his beak into my face,” Chadwell told the news outlet. “I just told him how happy I was to find him.”

Chadwell told Southern Living that Tiki is back home and doing “great” after his three-day adventure, though the accidental outing left him a little ruffled.

“The first couple days he was a little bitey and squawked a lot,” Chadwell said. “Now he's back to talking and being his normal gentle self.”

Glad to have you home safe and sound, Tiki!